College Comparison XVII: Geographic Diversity

College Search & Selection
21

<p>Hawkette, I see it differently, and as a person who has lived 11 (2 in the Northeast, 2 in the mid Atlantic and 7 in the Midwest) of his 18 adult years in the US, I am qualified to pass judgement on this matter. Yes, there are differences between New Yorkers and Georgians, just as there are differences between residents of Southeastern Michigan and Southwestern Michigan. Southeastern Michigan has a large Middle Eastern, African American and liberal population whereas Southwestern Michigan has a predominently white (primarily of Dutch origin) and conservative population. Minneapolis is very different from any city in Ohio. And if you think residents of Chicago bear any resemblance to residents of Iowa or Indiana, you seriously misunderstand the Midwest. </p>

<p>However, regardless of cultural differences, those are all part of the same geographic area and the title of this thread is “Geographic diversity”.</p>

<p>Here’s how I see it:</p>

<p>DUKE:
67% East Coast
13% West Coast
10% Midwest
4% international
(6% is missing, and I assume those from from the South and Southwest)</p>

<p>GEORGETOWN (truly very diverse)
56% East Coast
11% Midwest
5% Southwest
15% West
13% Non-US</p>

<p>MICHIGAN (There is something fishy about your percentages as 5% of Michigan undergrads are international and your percentages add up to 101% without accounting for that 5%!). A more accurate breakdown in my opinion:</p>

<p>75% Midwest (includes 66% from MI)
10% Northeast
5% Mid-Atlantic
3% South
3% West
5% international</p>

<p>I definitely agree that Georgetown is more geographically diverse than the majority of universities, but most universities are like Duke and Michigan.</p>

22

<p>“^ I, personally, consider percentages a better measure of diversity than absolute numbers.” </p>

<p>Keilexandra, I think both absolute and relative numbers are important. Yes, 5% is less than 10%. For example, 5% of Michigan undergrads are international students vs 10% at Grinnell. Clearly, 10% sounds like more than 5%. However, at Grinnell, that 10% represents 150 students from 50 or so countries. At Michigan, the 5% represents 1,400 students from 100 or so countries. If you leave out students from the 5 or so most highly represented countries (South and East Asia), I doubt that you have more than 50 international students at Grinnell compared to 500 at Michigan. So, which school has more international diversity? Is it so clear cut? I would say that both the relative and the absolute numbers should be given their due.</p>

23

<p>Hawkette has a major vendetta against Michigan. She is willing to fabricate numbers and data to support her biased, anti-Michigan claims. She will give other flagship public universities their dues except Michigan! New members, take note!</p>

24

<p>^^^Thanks for the comments tenisghs. Newcomers to CC need to be constantly reminded of this.</p>

25

<p>Alexandre - Sure, in absolute numbers larger schools have more international diversity. But where are you more likely to encounter that diversity? Percentage is a better measure of a given student’s chance of meeting someone from a “different” region.</p>

26

<p>Keilexandra, we each have our own view on this subject I suppose. I personally never expected anything to be handed to be on a platter. I prefer to get things on my own, but I want everything to be availlable to me when I put my mind to it. That is why a larger school with greater absolute numbers fits me better. </p>

<p>That being said, it is not hard to find diversity when you have 8,000 undergraduate students that qualify as geographically diverse, even on a campus with 26,000 undergrads. </p>

<p>And in some programs at Michigan, such as the CoE, Ross, Economics, Math and the core sciences, OOS students and international students typically make up a larger portion of the student population. For example, at Ross and the CoE, in-state students are usually slightly less than 50% of the undergraduate student population and international students typically make up 10% of the undergraduate student population.</p>

27

<p>Oh alex, I always LOL at the lengths to which you will go to portray your alma mater in a more flattering light. </p>

<p>OK, interpret it your way if you like if it lets you keep up your delusions, but you’re probably the only person on the planet who classifies student geographic data as East Coast, Midwest, West Coast, Non-US. </p>

<p>Congratulations on living 11 of your 36 years in the USA. I guess that makes you an expert after all on regional differences. :rolleyes:</p>

<p>Tenis,
I see U Michigan as among the top echelon of public universities in America and have posted as much many, many times. Your libelous charge of “fabrication” is false and not appreciated. </p>

<p>Re your school, I present plenty of information to support my position. IMO and based on the data that I constantly review and compare for UNDERGRADUATE students, my conclusion is that U Michigan is among the top six of public universities in the USA and among the Top 35 of all colleges. While that may not be enough for you and other U Michigan partisans, I consider that high praise.</p>

28

<p>Taking Michigan out of the discussion, I don’t find Duke that geographically diverse. It is an east coast school…even if that east coast extends north and south. And where I live, Duke doesn’t get many applications. </p>

<p>Is there a lot of diversity of thought and culture at Duke?</p>

<p>The school is a rich person’s school, no? Well, maybe not for the basketball players. :)</p>

<p>Actually, even some of the basketball players come from well to do families. :)</p>

<p>What is the percentage of students that are full payers at Duke? Since we love percentages. :)</p>

29

<p>OK…I looked up the full payer question.</p>

<p>[Duke</a> University Information, Introduction, Academics, Admissions, Financial Aid, Students, Athletics, Alumni, Faculty, Alumni, History, Campus, Students, Faculty, Address, and Tuition](<a href=“USA University College Directory - U.S. University Directory - State Universities and College Rankings”>Duke University (DU) Introduction and Academics - Durham, NC)</p>

<p>There might be more up to date numbers, but this is what I have.</p>

<p>“More than forty-two percent of Duke undergrads receive financial aid of some sort. Aid usually consists of a package combining:”</p>

<p>58% of the student body is not on a scholarship. That is pretty amazing. Can you really have diversity of thought with those numbers? I don’t think so. Different cultures…I guess as long as they are upper and upper middle class cultures.</p>

<p>I really don’t care about the different cultures of the mid-atlantic states compared to the northeast and the south. </p>

<p>There are different cultures 10 miles in every direction from where I live. And we are talking the same geographic area. </p>

<p>But 58% full payers…</p>

<p>Nope. Don’t see diversity where it counts. Social classes.</p>

<p>It’s always about social class…</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.pbs.org/peoplelikeus/[/url]”>http://www.pbs.org/peoplelikeus/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

30

<p>

</p>

<p>hawkette, your words may seem positive here, but your CC history proves otherwise. In most of your colleges and universities reports and other various threads on this forum, you either misrepresent or underrank the University of Michigan. You call posters, who continuously call out and correct your “statistics”, Michigan “partisans” or the “mafia.” Sometimes, your data is so flawed that these posters (it’s not only Alexandre) have to repair the damage so that prospective applicants don’t leave this site thinking Michigan is an inferior school. I may not post often, but I DO browse your threads, hawkette. If you really think I’m bluffing, new members can always type “hawkette michigan” in the search engine and pull up your post history.</p>

31

<p>“OK, interpret it your way if you like if it lets you keep up your delusions, but you’re probably the only person on the planet who classifies student geographic data as East Coast, Midwest, West Coast, Non-US.”</p>

<p>Delusional huh? That may well be. But for accuracy’s sake, I actually break the US down into four major geographic quandrants: East Coast, West Coast (includes Southwest), South and Midwest (includes great plains). Some states cross quadrants. For example, Texas has some parts that fall in the Southern quadrant and some parts that fall in the Western (albeit southwestern) quadrant. Penn has some parts that fall in the East Coast Quadrant and some parts that fall in Midwestern quadrant. Of course, Alaska and Hawaii are their own region and do not fit in that quadrant. </p>

<p>“Congratulations on living 11 of your 36 years in the USA. I guess that makes you an expert after all on regional differences.”</p>

<p>I never claimed to be an expert on regional differences. I am, however, knoweldgeable enough to make an observation on this subject. </p>

<p>Finally, although Tenisghs is currently a graduate student at Michigan, she is first and foremost a proud Northwestern alum and does not qualify as a “Michigan partisan”.</p>

32

<p>FWIW, I’ve kept up with hawkette’s threads/posts for a while now and I don’t see what the big deal is. So she likes some measures that put Michigan in a poorer light than the measures that you like; and so? I, at least, don’t come away from her posts or threads with any special perspective on Michigan, save for the constant bickering.</p>

<p>I have no partisanship wrt Michigan whatsoever; I regard it as an excellent public university, but I’m utterly uninterested in large public universities.</p>

33

<p>Keilexandra, Hawkette measures institutional quality through statistics. Even if excellence in those cases could be captured statistically, the lack of accurate data on universities makes it impossible to accurately and faily rate universities. </p>

<p>Furthermore, it is possible for a university to be excellent, without attaching a major segragating descriptor such as “public” to it. If you attach the word “public” to “excellent”, the insinuation is that it is excellent, but only when compared to public universities and not in an absolute sense. In Hawkette’s case, the distinction is deliberate. She genuinely believes that even the best public universities are not excellent in an absolute sense. If she were to provide us with a list of the nation’s top 20 universities, not a single public university will make that venerable list. Only 2 or 3 public would rank in the top 30 and only 5 or so would make the top 50. If you share her opinion, then attaching the word “public” to excellent when describing schools such as Cal, Michigan and UVa would get the desired effect. On the other hand, if you respect those universities as truly excellent but merely not “for you”, then I suggest you refer to them as excellent universities and drop the word “public” altogether.</p>

34

<p>Not sure how this thread turned into a discussion of financial demographics, but let me at least provide the data that puts some comments into perspective.</p>

<p>The claim has been made that Duke is not economically diverse due to only 42% of its students receiving financial aid. Maybe, but I guess that depends on what threshold you want to use in making that claim. See below and judge for yourself what level you’d like to use. </p>

<p>FYI-for U Michigan’s OOS student population (you know, the population that supposedly gives U Michigan so much diversity), the % receiving aid is only 35%. Furthermore, while Duke will meet 100% of demonstrated financial need for all students, U Michigan meets the full need for its OOS students about 62% of the time. For the record, U Michigan meets 100% of the need for its IS students and 51% of them receive aid. </p>

<p>Here is the full list of the percentage of students on each campus receiving financial aid. </p>

<p>% of students receiving financial aid , % of need met , Private National University</p>

<p>72% , 66% , Worcester
71% , 87% , Case Western
69% , 100% , MIT
66% , 82% , Rensselaer
61% , 77% , Fordham
60% , 100% , Harvard
59% , 86% , Syracuse
58% , 100% , Yale
57% , 100% , Princeton
56% , 100% , U Rochester
55% , 73% , Yeshiva
54% , 89% , Pepperdine
54% , 86% , Brandeis
53% , 72% , NYU
52% , 84% , Carnegie Mellon
50% , 100% , Stanford
49% , 100% , Caltech
49% , 100% , U Chicago
49% , 100% , Dartmouth
48% , 100% , Columbia
48% , 98% , Johns Hopkins
47% , 100% , Notre Dame
47% , 90% , Boston University
46% , 88% , U Miami
44% , 100% , Brown
43% , 100% , U Penn
43% , 100% , USC
43% , 96% , Lehigh
42% , 100% , Duke
42% , 100% , Vanderbilt
42% , 94% , George Washington
41% , 100% , Emory
40% , 100% , Northwestern
40% , 100% , Georgetown
40% , 100% , Tufts
39% , 100% , Cornell
39% , 100% , Boston College
38% , 100% , Wash U
35% , 100% , Rice
32% , 88% , SMU
29% , 100% , Wake Forest
21% , 24% , BYU</p>

<p>na , 96% , Tulane</p>

<p>% of students receiving financial aid , % of need met , State University</p>

<p>60% , 82% , U TEXAS
58% , 85% , UC SAN DIEGO
57% , 81% , UC DAVIS
55% , 52% , U IOWA
54% , 82% , UC S BARBARA
53% , 82% , U PITTSBURGH
52% , 84% , UC IRVINE
52% , 84% , UC S CRUZ
51% , 86% , U MINNESOTA
51% , 69% , OHIO STATE
50% , 90% , U MICHIGAN
50% , 72% , U CONNECTICUT
50% , 67% , U ILLINOIS
49% , 83% , UCLA
48% , 95% , PURDUE
48% , 62% , RUTGERS
48% , 61% , U MARYLAND
47% , 56% , PENN STATE
46% , 88% , UC BERKELEY
46% , 87% , U FLORIDA
45% , 74% , MICHIGAN ST
43% , 72% , INDIANA U
43% , 70% , CLEMSON
43% , 64% , VIRGINIA TECH
40% , 91% , TEXAS A&M
40% , 80% , U WASHINGTON
39% , 73% , U DELAWARE
32% , 100% , U N CAROLINA
32% , 77% , U WISCONSIN
31% , 87% , GEORGIA TECH
30% , 81% , U GEORGIA
28% , 81% , WILLIAM & MARY
27% , 100% , U VIRGINIA</p>

<p>% of students receiving financial aid , % of need met , LAC</p>

<p>69% , 100% , Grinnell
64% , 100% , Macalester
61% , 100% , Mt. Holyoke
58% , 100% , Wellesley
58% , 100% , Smith
58% , 89% , Bard
56% , 100% , Vassar
56% , 100% , Harvey Mudd
55% , 100% , Lafayette
54% , 100% , Carleton
54% , 100% , Holy Cross
53% , 100% , Oberlin
52% , 100% , Haverford
52% , 100% , Occidental
51% , 100% , Amherst
51% , 100% , Pomona
50% , 100% , Williams
50% , 100% , Wesleyan
49% , 100% , Swarthmore
48% , 100% , Middlebury
48% , 100% , Bryn Mawr
48% , 96% , Whitman
46% , 100% , Bates
45% , 100% , Claremont McK
44% , 100% , Scripps
44% , 100% , Barnard
43% , 100% , Trinity
43% , 95% , Colorado College
42% , 100% , U Richmond
42% , 98% , Kenyon
42% , 95% , Bucknell
42% , 85% , Furman
41% , 100% , Bowdoin
41% , 100% , Hamilton
40% , 100% , Colby
39% , 100% , W&L
39% , 98% , Sewanee
34% , 100% , Davidson
32% , 100% , Colgate</p>

<p>na , na , US Military Acad
na , na , US Naval Acad</p>

<p>tenis,
I’m not misrepresenting or underranking U Michigan. I’m presenting data, comparing with other colleges and drawing conclusions. I think you and others in the U Michigan choir just don’t like my conclusions which IMO award U Michigan a pretty high position among American colleges. As noted earlier, for undergraduate students, I see U Michigan as a Top 6 public university and among the Top 35 national universities. </p>

<p>I don’t remember ever posting that U Michigan’s an “inferior school”; please post the offending comment…if you can. But I certainly remember being repeatedly attacked for daring to express the opinion that there are many other colleges that are better places for undergraduate students. </p>

<p>If you want me to change my opinion, I suggest you make supported arguments that actually take the competition into consideration. What seems to be missing from your view and which I repeatedly try to communicate here is the reality that there are a lot of very fine undergraduate destinations all across the USA, many of which IMO are better choices than U Michigan.</p>

35

<p>Alexandre. It is understandable why certain posters have difficulty addressing top publics scools in the same light as top privates ones. These posters are typically from states that have weak public university systems or who have attended public universities in those same systems.</p>

36

<p>Hawkette,
I believe this is the offending comment:
“I see U Michigan as a Top 6 public university and among the Top 35 national universities”. </p>

<p>They would say the numbers in that statement are lower. ;)</p>

37

<p>“The claim has been made that Duke is not economically diverse due to only 42% of its students receiving financial aid. Maybe, but I guess that depends on what threshold you want to use in making that claim. See below and judge for yourself what level you’d like to use.”</p>

<p>Well… those numbers are from Duke. ;)</p>

<p>Since the school costs $50,000 a year… a person needs a family income of what …$200,000 + probably more…or a wealth of over $1 million … or some combination…</p>

<p>That would put the family wealth or income in the top 5% of the population. And I am being very conservative. So conservatively, 58% of Duke’s student body comes from families in the top 5% of income or wealth in the US. It’s probably more because some financial aid goes to athletes.</p>

<p>That is not diverse.</p>

<p>Low economic diversity schools lead to schools with low diversity in thinking because social class is one of the biggest determinants in how people think…which is why I supplied the the link about Social class in America.</p>

<p>The financial aid numbers from post #34 don’t change anything. Duke’s economic demographics exist after the financial aid from the school…which according to Hawkette’s numbers are the same as mine.</p>

<p>58% of Duke’s students’ come from the top 5% of the population in income or wealth.</p>

<p>It’s probably a lot higher but I don’t have the time to go into it.</p>

38

<p>And the reason I am talking about financial diversity is no matter what the geographic diversity is, if a school’s student body isn’t financially diverse, the school isn’t diverse in thought.</p>

<p>And Duke isn’t geographically diverse.</p>

39

<p>

</p>

<p>I don’t know that I’ve ever seen you outright slam Michigan in that way. However, I see a lot of “damning with faint praise” and so forth. There is a subtlety to the way you slight U-M, and I think that’s probably what riles up the people who think so highly of the school–it’s harder to counter insinuations than outright statements. </p>

<p>I might compare it to a different topic on this board, one on which we are on the same side. I think we agree in our sentiment that there are some schools (especially some in the south) which aren’t as highly regarded as they should be. It’s not comments like “RICE SUCKS!” or “Vandy is an inferior school” that are so galling–because those are easy enough to argue against (or dismiss). Rather, it’s the more subtle ways that these schools are put down (or don’t get their due) that sticks in my craw and feels difficult to overcome.</p>

40

<p>Vandy is not economically diverse. The same with Rice.</p>

<p>I’m just using Hawkette’s numbers.</p>