<p>Yeah, agreed. I'm all for countering lies, especially when they're repeated, but I think this is pretty well settled/refuted and there's no need to rub it in.</p>
<p>Ben--thanks for talking to him. I never would have asked, but I do appreciate it.</p>
<p>
[quote]
In essence, Mudd has other advantages over USC and UCLA that might be making up for the negation of a graduate program: smaller classes, a more rigorous curriculum, stronger student body, etc.. Caltech and Mudd are much more similar and so comparing these PhD students would provide a better measure of the effect of a graduate school on undergrad education.
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</p>
<p>Look, like I said, I suspect that Caltech is probably a better undergrad program than Mudd, mostly because Caltech seems to be more selective than Mudd. Given the choice between Caltech and Mudd, I would probably choose Caltech. </p>
<p>But my point is that having large research departments can't be that big of an advantage for undergrads, otherwise the LAC's would have great trouble in placing any of their students into the top PhD programs, which is evidently not the case. Like I said, Mudd seems to be far more successful than USC or UCLA are, especially on a per-capita basis, and I would suspect that Mudd would even give a research powerhouse like Berkeley a strong run for its money, again, on an undergrad per-capita basis.</p>
<p>sakky, this is well-refuted in post #64. Let it go.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Next, the number of matriculants from Harvey Mudd to Caltech graduate programs vs. MIT or any other school is also a deeply flawed method of analysis. First of all, consider that a significant fraction of the Harvey Mudd student body would have gone to Caltech had they been admitted. (Statistics about common applicants and admits bear this out--Ben Golub will back this up, I'm sure.) Note that I didn't say that every Harvey Mudd student would have, or that your friend Bob from down the hall would've, or anything like that--it's simply a true statement about "a significant fraction" of the student body as a whole. Given this, is it really so surprising that Harvey Mudd students who have done well at HMC might want to go to Caltech for grad school, given the opportunity? Furthermore, Caltech is a lot closer to HMC geographically than it is to MIT. If you want to stay on the east coast Caltech is obviously not for you. This criterion would filter out at least some MIT students and probably zero HMC students. (For similar reasons, a sizeable fraction of each Caltech graduating class goes to Stanford for grad school.)
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</p>
<p>I believe I addressed this point. Like I said, I agreed that HMC has a geographic bias for Caltech. However, like I said, MIT is a far larger school (quadruple the population) than HMC is. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I think the idea that the number of Harvey Mudd students who get Caltech PhDs somehow establishes any sort of parity with Caltech and/or MIT is pretty thoroughly refuted by these numbers.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>First off, I never said there was "parity". My simple point is that HMC is not that bad, and certainly that the HMC experience, despite not having graduate departments, still clearly gets a strong number of its graduates into the top PhD programs anyway, and certainly more so than large local research universities than UCLA or USC. Hence, that shows that the mere presence of large research departments is, by itself, not that big of an advantage. UCLA has large research departments. But that doesn't seem to help its undergrads that much, at least as far as getting its grads into Caltech for graduate school.</p>
<p>Besides, your previous analysis bears mention here. You said, in effect, that Caltech wins the cross-admit battle with HMC (which I think is probably true), and that HMC grads then probably want to go to graduate school at Caltech. Well, I think the same analysis could be said for other local schools such as UCLA or USC. After all, I think a lot of UCLA or USC grads, especially in the technical majors, would rather be going to Caltech, but didn't get in, and so they would also be expected to want to go to Caltech for graduate school. Yet apparently few do. </p>
<p>That's all I'm saying. I don't want to get into the discussion of whether HMC has parity with Caltech or MIT, but I think we can at least all agree that HMC seems to do better than UCLA or USC. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Finally, let's take a look at the claims about this vast number of Mudd students going on to Caltech for grad school and supposedly proving the worth and/or equality of HMC. I called up the latest Caltech Commencement program on <a href="http://pr.caltech.edu/commencement%5B/url%5D">http://pr.caltech.edu/commencement</a> and compiled some statistics on the PhD grads. The number of Caltech PhDs given to undergraduate alumni of each college were: </p>
<p>Caltech: 7
MIT: 3
Harvey Mudd: 1</p>
<p>That's right. One lonley guy. And that Caltech "7" figure is despite the fact that Caltech in virtually all cases actively encourages their alumni to go elsewhere for grad school to get more breadth--particularly because they've often already done graduate-level research by the time they've graduated.</p>
<p>(Lest you think these numbers are some sort of fluke, the relevant numbers for last year were 7, 4, and 2; the year before that 8, 3, and 1; before that 7, 2, and 0.)</p>
<p>So over four years:</p>
<p>Caltech: 29
MIT: 12
Harvery Mudd: 4
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</p>
<p>The numbers for Caltech to Caltech are not meaningful to me, because of the strong homefield advantage. After all, the same holds true at MIT. The most popular graduate school for MIT undergrads is MIT itself, by a factor of almost 8:1, as in almost 8 times the number of MIT undergrads chose MIT for graduate school as chose the next most popular graduate school (Harvard). In fact, it is a fairly common saying within MIT that the easiest way to go to MIT for graduate school is to just go there for undergrad and just stay there. I am quite certain that the same is true at Caltech. Yes, there are some departments at Caltech, such as geophysics, who would prefer their undergrads to go elsewhere, and the same is true at MIT, but by and large, both schools have a strong preference for their own undergrads, and their own undergrads strongly prefer them. </p>
<p>Besides, look at it this way. I would say that, within MIT's graduate programs, there has to be at least 10 former MIT undergrads for every former Caltech undergrad. That doesn't mean that Caltech is 'inferior' to MIT, it's just a simple reflection of geographic biases, population sizes (MIT undergrad is 4 times the size of Caltech undergrad), and possible home-field admissions advantages (i.e. I suspect that if an equally qualified MIT and Caltech student were to both apply to MIT for grad school, the MIT guy would have the edge, and vice versa would be true for Caltech). </p>
<p>The point is, it's quite clear to me that Caltech would send the most undergrads to its own grad program, just like MIT sends the most undergrads to its own grad programs. It's far more fair to compare third parties. I.e. HMC vs. UCLA/USC to Caltech, or HMC vs. MIT to Caltech, keeping in mind the various biases involved. HMC has a geographic bias to Caltech, but MIT has many more students. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I think the idea that the number of Harvey Mudd students who get Caltech PhDs somehow establishes any sort of parity with Caltech and/or MIT is pretty thoroughly refuted by these numbers. Even if such a fact <em>could</em> establish equality, we see that the numbers aren't even close, and that the claims made above by the Harvey Mudd trolls--"more Caltech grad students are from Harvey Mudd than MIT," and so on--once again aren't even true in the first place.
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</p>
<p>Are you referring to me as a "troll"? What's up with that? I think I even said myself that I would give Caltech the edge over HMC. </p>
<p>My simple point is that HMC is not that bad, and in particular, clearly seems to be beating other local large research universities such as UCLA and USC on a per-capita basis.</p>
<p>
[quote]
sakky, this is well-refuted in post #64. Let it go.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>How is it refuted? I don't see UCLA or USC grads dominating HMC on a per-capita basis, despite the fact that they have large research departments. Hence, having large research departments, by itself, can't be THAT strong of a boon.</p>
<p>I think it's actually a combination of factors at play. It's not just having large research projects/departments. It's the combination of that PLUS having a highly selective undergrad population PLUS having a culture that encourages those undergrads to explore research that really count. If all you have are large research departments, that doens't count for that much. I would point to Berkeley - verifiably brilliant research departments, but also having lots of undergrads who, honestly, aren't that good, and also having a culture that is rather hostile to its undergrads. </p>
<p>Look, I am not saying that there is "parity" between HMC and Caltech. Again, I have always said that I would give the edge to Caltech. But my point is, HMC (and the LAC's in general) are pretty good, despite not having research departments.</p>
<p>Finally, don't tell me to 'let it go'. I have freedom of speech. If I want to keep posting about something, I have the right to do that. If you don't like my posts, fair enough, then don't read it. But let the people who want to read them be allowed to read them. I think it is improper for anybody to tell anybody else to stop posting, as that's tantamount to censorship.</p>
<p>
[quote]
This argument is entirely illegitimate, and here's why.</p>
<p>Yesterday, I founded the Yevrah Dumm Institute of Technology. Yevrah Dumm has only one department -- geobiology -- and offers studies only leading only the Master of Science degree. Yevrah Dumm has only one faculty member (I won't say who, he made me promise), and one student (guess who!).</p>
<p>Now, I think we'll all agree that Caltech is not demonstrably better than Yevrah Dumm. Oh, sure, Caltech has 32 Nobel Prizes to its name. But that's irrelevant blither; to make the comparison fair, we should compare only the geobiology departments of the two schools. Moreover, since Yevrah Dumm was founded yesterday, we must disregard everything Caltech before 2010. And of course, we must disregard BS or PhD students of Caltech, because Yevrah Dumm doesn't offer those degrees. It wouldn't be fair to compare applies to oranges.</p>
<p>When you take away all Caltech's unfair advantages, the comparison between Caltech and Yevrah Dumm is obviously a wash.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Ben Golub, how is the argument 'entirely illegitimate'. Don't you remember our "old friend", mdx49? He was basically using the same arguments regarding Harvard vs. MIT that you are using now. Specifically, he was invoking the notion that Harvard was a better school than MIT because Harvard had won a bunch of Nobels back in the old days before MIT had yet to fully establish itself. He was attempting to count Nobel Prize winners from Harvard Medical School, conveniently ignoring the fact that MIT doesn't even have a medical school. In fact, you even told me to stop responding to mdx49, which I complied with, because we were both so frustrated with his mdx49.</p>
<p>Yet it seems to me that now you are using the same arguments with Caltech vis-a-vis HMC that mdx49 used with Harvard vis-a-vis MIT. In other words, you are now LEGITIMIZING mdx49's arguments. I think you must agree that this is a most dangerous road to go down. Now, if mdx49 comes back, and I engage him again, all he has to do is invoke your posts on this thread to say that you effectively agree with his method of analysis.</p>
<p>"In fact, it is a fairly common saying within MIT that the easiest way to go to MIT for graduate school is to just go there for undergrad and just stay there. I am quite certain that the same is true at Caltech."</p>
<p>Then you're quite certainly wrong, as you so often seem to be around these parts.</p>
<p>I doubt anyone would disagree with you that the average student at Harvey Mudd is superior to the average student at UCLA or USC. As nearly as I can tell, that's what your post boils down to.</p>
<p>You've committed a cardinal sin of science in attempting to pursue your point in this way: you've let other variables change along with the independent variable, and pretended that it doesn't make any difference. If UCLA and USC were just like Harvey Mudd except that they had graduate programs and research and Harvey Mudd didn't, you might have a point. As it is, you don't. You can't draw any conclusions about the impact of attending a research university by comparing UCLA/USC to Harvey Mudd.</p>
<p>Berkeley is a closer comparison, but even that isn't really the same, because Berkeley offers many majors in things other than science and the intake of students have lower SAT scores and GPAs than Harvey Mudd students do coming in.</p>
<p>(For what it's worth, by the way, Berkeley students earned 22 Caltech PhDs over the same period of time that Harvey Mudd students earned 4.)</p>
<p>I still can't believe you guys are basing so much of your argument on the fact that Harvey Mudd manages to place an average of 1 student in grad school at Caltech each year.</p>
<p>sakky, I can't figure out what your point exactly is. No one is arguing that you can't get a good education without a huge research program. What I would argue is that, all other things equal (see Joe's post #87), having a research program is advantageous over not having one. And as I said before, a better comparison to UCLA/USC vs. HMC would be Caltech vs. HMC. Caltech and HMC are much more academically similar. </p>
<p>Now I agree that you can't use Caltech PhD programs to judge this because there are unpredictable factors involving Caltech undergrads applying to Caltech grad programs. Like I said, try to dig up some HMC vs. Caltech data from another school's PhD program - Berkeley, Harvard, Stanford, MIT, whatever. If they're comparable, then you might have an argument of how having a large research facilities does not matter or is negligable. </p>
<p>Alternatively, you could look at things like NSF fellowships between HMC and Caltech graduates (because they're similar) as a better gauge for the importance of a graduate program for undergrad education. I've compiled some of those numbers for the past few years, and if you want to see them, I can post them for you.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Look, I am not saying that there is "parity" between HMC and Caltech. Again, I have always said that I would give the edge to Caltech. But my point is, HMC (and the LAC's in general) are pretty good, despite not having research departments.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It doesn't take a rocket scientist to predict that having research departments doesn't guarantee better undergraduate programs. It's so predictable that Harvard has more Amherst grads in its graduate programs than let's say UCLA or USC. But on the other hands, STELLAR research department will have positive effects on a college's undergraduate programs, i.e. prestige, upper echelon faculty and student. In addition, having the research accessible to undergraduate students will be a boost to the undergraduate programs. These are the things that Caltech has, but neither USC or UCLA do. And those what make Caltech undergraduate degree more promising. Now if you want to compare Caltech's undergraduate programs head to head with HMC in regard to the number of their representative in grad schools, you can actually compare the acceptance rate of Caltech and HMC graduates in other top grad schools.</p>
<p>^-- exactly right.</p>
<p>It would be interesting to look at the number of Caltech vs. HMC undergrads at Stanford, at MIT, Harvard, etc. (adjusting for size of HMC and Caltech, of course). The great thing is that Caltech and HMC are so geographically close that there is no geographical bias. Obviously, you wouldn't look at Caltech grad school because there are all sorts of bias.</p>
<p>I don't think, incidentally, that Caltech's advantage in this comparison would be overwhelming. Harvey Mudd is an excellent place. Its undergrads are great. I think you would observe Caltech > HMC > Harvard >> UCLA, Berkeley, other top publics.</p>
<p>That's something we can all be proud of.</p>
<p>Btw, to sakky's #86:</p>
<p>My post does not legitemize mdx's arguments. However, you can see that the "let's make the comparison fair" rationale can also lead to absurd results.</p>
<p>My own preference is to start with a null hypothesis that is neither overoptimistic nor insulting. If we have few data on a place (due to newness, smallness, whatever), we need not assume it sucks, but it would be too much to assume it's amazing. Until there is sufficient time so that we get out of the range of small-number statistics, we can reserve judgment. So we would reserve judgment (for the most part) on both Harvey Mudd and Yevrah Dumm, until both have had time to prove themselves in the long term.</p>
<p>(Even Caltech itself is just reaching the age where we can talk about meaningful aggregates!)</p>
<p>I don't agree with dLo..In Harvard, there is freshman calculus/analysis course called Math 55. I don't think there are any courses intenser than Math 55 of Harvard, including Caltech.
Though, overall, Caltech is probably the intensest college.</p>
<p>Well, only a tiny fraction of students at Harvard (heck, a small fraction of the MATH MAJORS at Harvard) take Math 55. Whereas at Caltech everyone (no exceptions) takes very intense proof-based math courses.</p>
<p>Yeah all this fighting should stop. Caltech is more exclusive than HMC, but neither school is really "better." They have different styles. If you're a prospective student at either of these schools, you should be happy to get into either one. If you get into both then look at the differences between the school and decide which is best for you. For example if you want to be a general engineer, you might want to go to HMC. If you want to be a biologist, you probably should go to Caltech. Then consider differences besides the majors like location (caltech is more urban), size (HMC is smaller), etc</p>
<p>Nothing is really better than anything else in an abstract sense, so threads like this make no sense if that point isn't realized.</p>
<p>"For example if you want to be a general engineer, you might want to go to HMC."</p>
<p>I don't think there's any program at all I would've gone to Harvey Mudd over Caltech for, and I'm struggling to imagine a scenario in which I would have (parent on the HMC faculty and free tuition? I dunno.) But I'm glad to see that Mudd-a-palooza is still going on over there.</p>
<p>And Caltech is "urban"? News to me! I would argue that the size is pretty much a wash, as well. The undergrad student bodies are about the same size... Caltech has grad students, but Harvey Mudd has all those other Claremont colleges right there. In any case, if you think these are the factors that people use to make their choice (for those who have a choice), I think you're kidding yourself. I'm going out on a limb to say that the five most important factors in choosing between the two schools are for the majority of applicants as follows:</p>
<p>1) Got into one but not the other
2) Never heard of one prior to junior-year college spam, so didn't apply to that one
3) Applied binding ED to one and so didn't have a true choice
4) Difference in research opportunities
5) Difference in general reputation, alumni success, etc.</p>
<p>In response to car202 (post #92), my comment was only meant to point out my personal experience. For those interested I took Math S-21b and Math S-152 at Harvard. While there, I also audited Freshman Seminar 21u.</p>
<p>I took Math 114, Math 241, Biol 101, Stat 112, and Econ 001 while at UPenn.</p>
<p>6) Ben Golub</p>
<p>lol... I might have ended up at Tech anyway (I was already planning to apply) but Ben's posts in the MIT forum lead me over to these boards where I subsequently posted. It was because of Ben that I felt it necessary to visit Caltech. It was because of Ben that I got to go to a House Dinner while at Tech. So you could say it was partly because of Ben that Caltech became my first choice. And it was because of Ben's advice (at least partly) that I got off the waitlist.</p>
<p>(Can you tell that I'm a ben fanboy?)</p>
<p>I take back my post; caltech is of course hands down the greatest institution in the world!</p>
<p>thank you! we think so too :-D</p>