Columbia College vs. School of General Studies

Colleges and Universities A-Z Columbia School of General Studies
841

<p>AdmissionsGeek,</p>

<p>Thanks for your input. There certainly is no model GS student. Some people are there purely to learn in a rigorous setting, perhaps after (or in the middle of) a successful career, after being widowed and divorced. They might not have or need another field like law.</p>

<p>It seemed to me 1 in 4 people at GS were pre-law (poli sci, econ), 1 in 4 pre-biz, 1 in 4 or 5 were writing and a good dose of poli sci (but not pre-law). Some had a year or two out of school, some had decades. Itā€™s only natural that there was a huge span of goals ā€“ from the perhaps more expected ambitious Ivy variety, to the personal and altruistic.</p>

842

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<p>more than heart-warming, this is actually an important point to make. Columbia is doing a service by taking in non-traditional students and especially students who have served their country and then offering them an ivy-league caliber education. Whatever your complaints about GS, you cannot take away their impact on social mobility (even if financial aid is pathetic). Many GS students take on huge amounts of debt, graduate a year early to minimize debt and get jobs at law firms and on wall street to pay off debt. They then go on to earn higher salaries than they otherwise would have been able to without the college degree + columbia brand name. This makes GS a better school than we are giving it credit for.</p>

843

<p>Amen.
10char</p>

844

<p>GS is of course a good school. However, why do GS student claim that GS is same as CC ?</p>

<p>The course requirements, educational resources and experiences are different.
CC awards AB (Latin) and GS awards BA(English). </p>

<p>You are welcome to say that GS is an excellent school. However, it is wrong to say that GS is same as CC.</p>

845

<p>collegeboy, wrong again, your latin diploma reads Baccalaurei in Artibus (BA) and not Artium Baccalaureus (AB). columbia no longer formally calls its bachelorā€™s degree an AB, though some older alumni do use it. in fact wiki cu shows a 1935 degree that also says Baccalaurei in Artibus</p>

<p>ssol uses the english Bachelor of Arts, and your transcript reads Bachelor of Arts. yes cc degrees are in latin, but in the end both degrees are signed by PrezBo and come from the Trustees of Columbia University as a Bachelor of Arts. </p>

<p>you know again, if you want to say they are different do it, but it is your desire to throw in the last punch that makes this debate well silly, and you sillier.</p>

846

<p>So CC receives Baccalaurei in Artibus Latin degree
and GS Bachelor of Arts. English degree</p>

<p>Clearly they are different </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>You missed one important signature.
CC diploma (in Latin) is signed by CC dean and GS degree (in English) is signed by GS dean. </p>

<p>Both CC and GS are Columbia degree but they are ā€˜differentā€™ Columbia degrees. If GS is same as CC , then why the diplomas are signed by two ā€˜differentā€™ dean ?</p>

<p>Columbia awards three undergraduate degrees : AB BA BS (this web site is wrong ?)
<a href=ā€œColumbia OPIRā€>Columbia OPIR;

847

<p>so by your logic, my degree would be different than someone whose degree is signed by the new dean, or than someone whose degree was signed by George Rupp. or different than anyone before 2005 because they had a different diploma design.</p>

<p>the substance of the degree differs because of the language or the dean written, somehow it is no longer conferred by the President and Trustees of the same university.</p>

<p>an aggie at cornell is no less of a cornellian than an arts and science student, but iā€™m sure youā€™d parse those differences out too. most universities that have multiple undergraduate schools somehow come across as less divisive. the ultimate question, why does this matter to you? there are folks that want to raise the esteem of the gs degree because it is worth more than it is given. and to change terms, i will argue that the gs degree is similar to the cc degree. in case you wish to continue to parse language.</p>

848

<p>

You know that that is not what I meant. ā€˜two different deanā€™ means CC dean vs. GS dean. </p>

<p>

the substance of the GS degree differs becaseu GS degree requirement is different from CCā€™s. Both GS and CC degrees are Columbia degree but not the same Columbia degree.</p>

<p>Iā€™ve never said that GS degree is worth less than CC degree. What I want to say is that
GS degree is different from CC degree.</p>

849

<p>okay if you never said that the GS degree is worth less</p>

<p>whatā€™s with the argument about more top law firms. how are they relevant to the argument the degrees are different?</p>

<p>once again there are a plethora of factors beyond the degree that could account for it.</p>

850

<p>You claimed that CC & GS share same resources such as job recruiting, pre-law, pre-med etc. that is not true. </p>

<p>For example, since very few GS grads want to work at top law firms (according to your previous post #835), GS pre-law office focuses on law schools that are not well represented at the top law firms. etc. ā€¦ CC pre-law office focuses on law schools that are well represeted at top law firms because many CC grads want to work there. </p>

<p>Of course this does not mean that CC pre-law is better than GS pre-law, but they are different.</p>

851

<p>i never said they shared pre-law and pre-med. ever. i have commented that med-school placement at gs is actually very strong. and there is one job recruitment service that serves all of columbiaā€™s ugrad schools and many grad schools.</p>

<p>cc pre-law is not responsible for placement. as great as the staff members are, they donā€™t place you at all, and they would say that as much. i think you are confusing correlation with causation. students are admitted to schools. so you could say that columbia college students are more what top schools look for, that could be true. but then you have to deal with the fact that cc graduates 5x as many students than gs. it renders comparison about outcomes ill-conceived.</p>

<p>and especially in law school admissions that is sooo hands-off by comparison to med-school apps, you once again cannot make this conjecture.</p>

852

<p>How do law schools differentiate between what college you went to? Doesnā€™t oneā€™s transcript simply read Columbia University?</p>

853

<p>GS transcript says ā€˜School of General Studiesā€™<br>
CC transcript says ā€˜Columbia Collegeā€™</p>

<p>When applying to law schools through LSAC ( which is required ), the undergraduate college code for CC is different from GS code. They are regarded as two separate institution. </p>

<p>Columbia clearly wants to tell the world that CC degree is different from GS degree. This of course does not mean that CC is better than GS.</p>

<p>At Cornell University, all undergraduate schools use same college code and thus law schools canā€™t distinguish different Cornell undergrad schools.</p>

<p>UPenn also use same college code for all undergrad schools.</p>

854

<p>Collegeboy, </p>

<p>That was precisely what I was asking so thank you for providing that information. Where do you get all these statistics? I would love to attend Columbia and I was informed that the only difference was the language printed on the diploma but from what Iā€™ve read I am a bit more skeptical. </p>

<p>Considering I have already been accepted to UCLA, USC, and UC Berkeley, would I be better off at one of those schools or at GS if my goal is to attend an elite law school?</p>

855

<p>Dude, go to GS. My only fear was regarding Wall Street recruiting, and thatā€™s only because bankers are by and large superficial prestige-whores who might discriminate against GS. Top grad schools, however, would not do that. If your goal is law school, GS would offer you the best education of any of the schools you listed.</p>

856

<p>Iā€™m with J M. From what Iā€™ve read, from diploma nomenclature to rules of on-campus recruiting, I see only differences without distinction.</p>

857

<p>KingJames,</p>

<p>Iā€™m not sure why youā€™re asking College Boy for advice, since it seems that will only result in yet another reason GS and CC are not the same (school, quality, education, zip code, etc). If there were 2 things I learned about Columbia, the first would be that many people love to split hairs and make unfavorable comments about the different undergraduate colleges. I also saw this to some degree between Ivies. I think itā€™s just a function of the overall prestige machine ā€“ thereā€™s always something ā€œbetter.ā€ I donā€™t doubt a lot of the anti-GS sentiment is from self-hating CCers who never got over not being accepted to Harvard or Yale. Iā€™m a first generation college student from a white trash family, raised by a single mother in a redneck town and could list a dozen reasons why I should be a stripper, prostitute, teen mother or other statistic based on my family, upbringing, economic class, etc. That I went to any Ivy in any capacity is somewhat miraculous. But for some, only Harvard, Yale and maybe Princeton count. </p>

<p>Itā€™s all relative. As I believe Admissions Geek pointed out, USC, UC Berkeley and UCLA are all fine schools with good alumni networks, especially on the West Coast. If you want to work on the East Coast, those schools are certainly well known in NYC at least. But I must tell you, recruiters and potential supervisors get awfully excited about the word Columbia on my resume. Itā€™s the first thing they say on the phone or when I walk into an interview. I canā€™t compare the response to the CA schools youā€™re considering, though. Iā€™m the kind of person who is happy and gets more compliments on shoes and purses I find at Payless or thrift stores, so I donā€™t need the designer label. But your BA is forever and a designer label can only help.</p>

<p>While my answer about law school admissions was anecdotal, GS law school admissions are still impressive and Iā€™m sure comparable to students from CC (or any other college, for that matter) when GPA and LSAT are equal. Also, if you are financially needy, your GS advisor can write a letter to Princeton or other LSAT prep class providers and they will typically give a 50% discount. The class helps a lot.</p>

<p>I think you said money wasnā€™t an issue. Is that on both ends? Meaning ā€“ is financial aid/debt level not an issue and salary is also not an issue? Iā€™m bringing this up since my friends in law school are worried they wonā€™t get jobs, let alone the 6 figure jobs our friends who graduated a few years ago were able to find. Since debt is almost inevitable for law school, 2-4 more years of high levels of borrowing might be a factor.</p>

<p>Best of luck, whatever your decision.</p>

858

<p>[Columbia</a> GS vs UCLA bizecon | WallStreetOasis.com](<a href=ā€œhttp://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/columbia-gs-vs-ucla-bizecon]Columbiaā€>Columbia GS vs UCLA bizecon | Wall Street Oasis)</p>

859

<p>Hey guys,</p>

<p>I want to see how I stack up. Iā€™m currently attending Kingsborough Community College and am looking to transfer to Columbia University School of General Studies. Iā€™ve spent 1 semester at Kingsborough so far and have a 3.6 gpa. I want to be a psychology major at Columbia and currently am a Liberal Arts major at Kingsborough. By next semester I will be enrolled in a honors course and will be on the deans list, a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and a member of the National Honors Society as well as be apart of the Honors Club. My extra curricular will include working as a mentor at NY Youth at Risk Program. Iā€™m 25 and believe I definitely fit the model for a non traditional student. Iā€™ve been working in the film industry for 7 years and now am looking to change careers to psychology.</p>

<p>Does anyone think that taking courses at Columbia University School of Continuing Studies over the summer would help my chances out as well? Iā€™m also going to try to get in touch with the psychology professors at Columbia and introduce myself to them. Since I may take courses at Columbia during the summer I may not apply till spring 2011. Do you guys think its better to take the GSAE or should I just retake the SATs? Becuase Iā€™m also considering applying to Yale and Standford.</p>

<p>Any help would be greatly appreciated! Wish the best of luck to everyone applying to Columbia.</p>

860

<p>Sorry to repeat this question, but has anyone sent supplemental information for awards or charity work? There are only three spots in the online application and I was hoping to include more information. Or, should I just pick the top 3 for each category?</p>