Columbia University vs. UPENN vs. JHU

College Search & Selection
1

<p>So I'm trying to make a college decsion and it has come down to these three schools.
I am going into Biology ( not necessarily pre-med but I am open to it) My real goal is to become a research scientist.
However, I also love Humanities and want to be able to double major in a humanities field with Biology.
I want a friendly student body, good research oppurtunities, ( not too cliquey- dislike cliques), no grade deflation, and a nice city.</p>

<p>My fears:
Columbia
1. People complain about it's lack of campus/ student body. I want to live in a place where I can easily get friends together to go out and chill. I don't want my friends all spread out over NYC, and me in my dorm alone.
2. Postings on CC about Columbia have generally been negative. From outside I have heard everything from lack of a student body to unsafe campus.
3. The fact that Columbia ( I've heard) is dominated by grad/ Barnard students. I want to be close knit friends with those from my university.
4. alumni giving rate is low. Does this mean anything?
5. Columbia has nothing to offer but the city.
My Loves:
Columbia
1. The Core
2. NYC
3. Most diverse ivy
4. Also Columbia made me a John Jay scholar
5. long, intellectual conversations?</p>

<p>UPENN:
Fear:
1. That Upenn is too cliquey.
2. I heard the students get drunk/party a lot. Drinking/Partying is not my scene.</p>

<p>Likes:
1. campus atmosphere
2. upenn students seem happy /love their school
3. speech and debate team is awesome</p>

<p>JHU
Fear:
1. Baltimore is unsafe
2. students at JHU are generally unhappy/competitive/stressed in Bio. major</p>

<p>loves
1. JHU= Bio mecca of the world.
2. Baltimore is far away and a new city to me/ a new adventure
3. NIH is right in Baltimore and they are conducting studies on AIDS</p>

<p>Can anyone help me?</p>

<p>Thank you so much.</p>

2

<p>Will you get a chance to go to accepted students weekends? Might be the best way to get your own sense of the schools. It sounds like you could be happy at any one of them.</p>

3

<p>^I agree. Spend some time at all three. You can get a great education at any of them but the atmospheres/ cultures are decidedly different. Not necessarily better or worse, just different. Only you can determine which of the three would be a better fit. My criteria (or anyone elses’) doesn’t really matter.</p>

<p>I chose Hopkins over Penn and Brown and have never regreted it (I didn’t apply to any NYC school; NYC is just not my thing). The area around Hopkins’ Homewood campus is not unsafe; it is arguably safer than Penn’s neighborhood. When you get to know the neighborhoods around Homewood, you’ll find a lot to like. It’s true that Baltimore (and Philadelphia and New York) have a lot of drug-related crime but, in each case, it is largely contained to well-known bad neighborhoods which you will have no need to and no business in visiting. All three schools are urban schools and you will need to develop some urban smarts at any of them. But if you don’t do stupid things (like walking around alone off campus at 3 a.m.) you will be fine. Most Hopkins students end up liking if not loving Baltimore.</p>

<p>It is a myth that Bio students at Hopkins are generally unhappy. The converse is true. Yes, you will find unhappy premeds there and at every other top university. The fact is that premed course are designed to be difficult and stressful because they are preparing you for a difficult and stressful profession. If you can’t handle the stress/difficulty of organic chemistry–you probably are not the type of person who should be a physician. There is a reason why these courses are thought of as “weeding out” courses. There is nothing unique about Hopkins in this regard–Hopkins simply has a larger percentage of premeds than other places.</p>

4

<p>Regarding your Penn fears, keep in mind that there are 10,000 undergrads at Penn, comprising an extremely diverse student body in which everyone seems to have no problem finding his or her social scene.</p>

<p>Also, in terms of research, remember that Penn is the only one of the three schools that has its medical school and research complex–not to mention highly ranked veterinary, dental, and nursing schools conducting extensive medical and related research–on the same compact campus as all of its other schools. Plus, the world-renowned Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, with its extraordinary research complex, is also right there. Your Biology–and other–classes would literally be next-door to and surrounded by this amazing array of medical research facilities. And this presents numerous biomedical research opportunities for undergrads, just a few steps away.</p>

<p>Bottom line, though, is that all 3 of these are fantastic schools, and you can’t go wrong at any of them. As others have opined, it’s really a matter of personal choice and fit.</p>

5

<p>

I know, I don’t want to reject any of them. Is there anyone who can talk about Columbia?</p>

6

<p>

</p>

<ol>
<li>No school is perfect for everyone. All undergrads live on campus, so you will not have to worry about schlepping your way to your classmates apartment on the upper east side…</li>
<li>Columbia’s campus is among the safest in the ivy league. Countless research has been done on this and you can find it everywhere. CC is not a good venue to gauge the experience of MOST students…remember, you can’t always believe what you read on the internet…</li>
<li>Columbia is not dominated by grads/Barnard students. Yes, there are many grad students on campus, but this allows you to meet and network with all types of people. I tend to look at it as a benefit.</li>
<li>The alumni giving rate is certainly not at the top, but compared to the other schools you are considering, it is probably about the same as Penn and more than JHU.<br></li>
<li>As for Columbia offering nothing but the city? You can’t be serious, right!? It happens to be the preeminent university in the greatest city on the planet, with a world renowned faculty and roster of alumni…</li>
</ol>

<p>All in all, you need to visit each school to make an informed decision. </p>

<p>Congrats and good luck with your decision!</p>

7

<p>All great schools. I don’t think you can go wrong with any of them. Baltimore is not any more dangerous than the other two schools, Columbia is not less friendly, and Penn is no worse in the areas of cliques or parties than JHU or Columbia. You can pick blindly and do just as well at any of the three. Congratulations for having such wonderful choices in a rough admissions year.</p>

8

<p>I have a friend who is a freshman at Columbia. He hates it. He said that NYC becomes to distracting. He can’t study. Also, he claims all the classes are too hard. And he despises the Core because the idea that everyone should read the same books seems limiting to him. The funny thing about his story is that he was deferred Ed to columbia, then waitlisted, then accepted. He was rejected at every over ivy</p>

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<p>Oh no!
(I’m worried)</p>

<p>But I do like the Core, so maybe I’ll like it at Columbia. Ugh. I really need to visit.</p>

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<p>I assume jengajenga will be going to Penn…so take this with a grain of salt. lol</p>

<p>In fact, I know of two people who transferred from Penn to COLUMBIA, and they transferred for a variety of reasons. You will not find everyone happy at any college…</p>

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<p>Count me in as another vote for “you have to go to admitted student weekends”</p>

<p>But I’d narrow it down to Penn and Columbia, personally.</p>

12

<p>Columbia seems clearly the best choice. It has amazing biology and humanities, intellectual atmospher and by far the best city. And as John Jay scholar you will have access to special opportunities.</p>

13

<p>Penn is generally more social, while Columbia is more city oriented, and although you will find unhappy students at any school including Penn and JHU, you will find numerous more students at Columbia complaining about the same negatives you’ve listed. And Penn students generally love their school more then Columbia’s and JHU’s do. JHU doesn’t have many strong departments as strong as Penn or Columbia’s nor is the city as amazing as Philly or New York. I generally feel that Penn ha a little of everything: social scene, urban, big city, frat scene, large undergrad population, smart kids, huge research opportunities Number 1 college for internships and generally happy students, while Columbia (lack of on campus social scene, you’ll see most post for Columbia would be to make friends in dorms, since you won’t be seeing our classmates on campus (they will be to busy in New York), these dorms are probably high rises, which if you ever go on Penn’s housing threads you’ll see comments on how the structure of high rises creates an anti-social environment, while at Columbia there be your only opportunity to foster campus unity). While JHU may not have every student holding a knife to someone’s neck there will be a strong cut throat scene fostered by the large amount of premed students, even for top 20 school’s standards, and the fact many attend JHU just to attend its medical school.</p>

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<p>If I were you, I think I’d narrow it down to Penn and Johns Hopkins. </p>

<p>Those I know at Columbia (one junior boy, one sophomore girl) definitely complain about the things you’ve listed as fears. Neither has found as solid a group of friends as those I know at other schools and both say that most students leave campus to socialize and on weekends. I also know a Barnard freshman, though, who has loved her experience so far. The experiences of the Columbians I know could, of course, be unrepresentative of the experiences of the rest of the student body.</p>

<p>Johns Hopkins and Penn, on the other hand, do seem to be more community-oriented. If their biology departments are all fairly equal in strength, I think one of these two schools might offer you a better college experience. I may be biased toward Penn, but I would still choose Johns Hopkins over Columbia if I were in your shoes.</p>

<p>Congratulations on your acceptances and best of luck deciding! I hope you decide to join us in Philly next year :)</p>

15

<p>I would go to Penn if I were you. But I agree with the others who say that you should go to the admitted students events.</p>

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<p>i am really astonished by the cc posts about columbia! I think less ppl from columbia actually go on CC.
Anyways, I was accepted to penn, columbia, and some other ivies. And I ultimately chose columbia.
As a sophomore, I will tell you that columbia is a great school.
You will make a ton of friends on campus…
Columbia has a ton of things to offer…
Columbia WILL challenge you. But that is what makes columbia such a great school.
I also preferred nyc over philly. Nothing compares to nyc. But that’s just me. You should check out both places and visit all of these schools.</p>

17

<p>I completely agree with what coulombia just said…it seems that not many ppl from Columbia are actually active in CC (mayb they hv better things to do? haha)
I found out that many ppl in CC are biased against Columbia (or relying on rumors and myths to express their opinion)…well, I’m not saying that it’s a really close-knit community, but its not like ppl there stay every day in NYC (this is a mythbreaker, in case you thought that this was true…at least now u noe that this whole “oh the campus is so empty and everyones hanging out in NYC” crap is highly exaggerated)…
As for comparing it to Penn and JHU, If I were you, I’d definitely choose Columbia…c’mon, apart from HYPSM, columbia is the top choice! (though this may as well depend on personal preferences…eg some ppl may dislike living in an NYC-type urban environment and prefer Penn or JHU to Columbia)
As for making friends, this is not just a problem in Columbia (though I admit that it would be a bit harder to join fraternities and socialize with ppl) but in other colleges too…again, this depends on ur personal taste, but I highly recommend Columbia.</p>

18

<p>I visited Columbia for an official visit (athletic recruit) a couple of months ago, so I don’t know that much, but I will share what I do know.</p>

<p>The campus is pretty small (still nice), but extremely crowded/busy with people who don’t even go to Columbia. People who work in Manhattan continuously cut across the campus to use it as a short-cut to get to wherever they’re going. And there are tons of graduate students sprawling about the place.</p>

<p>Classes are HUGE! I sat in on three classes, each with around 200 students. The professor had to use a microphone, lol. I felt a real disconnection between teacher and student, but maybe I just visited the wrong classes. A lot of focus seemed to be on graduate students, but I’m sure you’ve already heard that.</p>

<p>The dorm I stayed in was pretty crappy: the bathrooms were old/dirty, the main television was broken, and they were extremely small (again, I can only talk about the dorm I visited. I don’t know about the rest).</p>

<p>The food was awful! Haha, this may sound trivial, but I thought I should point it out. For the 3 days that I was there, I lived on granola bars and fruit. Even the students told me, “Don’t judge us by our food.” </p>

<p>I didn’t get a sense of school pride. The athletic facilities are a 20/25 minute bus ride from campus, so games don’t get packed. That said, there is a nice underground facility on campus that has gyms and stuff.</p>

<p>A lot of the students do go out into the city instead of staying on campus, but I’m assuming that’s a reason why they chose Columbia. On the floor I was staying on, pretty much every person was out on Friday night at a baseball game, restaurant, clubbing, etc. My host told me that’s pretty common.</p>

<p>In the end, I chose Dartmouth over Columbia because it seemed a better fit in terms of focus on undergrads (Teachers recognized their students by name walking around campus. The 2 professors I met even stopped me on the green to tell me that I should go to Dartmouth), opportunities, love for the school, etc. Don’t get me wrong, I love Columbia! They were my top two choices, and it was an extremely difficult decision. </p>

<p>All three of your choices are fantastic, and you should choose the one that you feel the most comfortable in. I get the sense that you will be happier at JHU (or maybe Penn?), but that’s just me lol.</p>

<p>I really hope I helped, and let us know what you decide. Good luck! and Congrats!</p>

19

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<p>These would probably be people who work at Columbia since the campus is in a residential section of Manhattan, hardly midtown or downtown. No other big employers are in the area…</p>

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</p>

<p>How did you know these were grad students!? Did they wear “grad student” t-shirts or something? And if they were, so what!? Are you afraid they might eat you or something!</p>

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</p>

<p>It sounds like you are basing a conclusion on the 3 classes you went to, all of which happen to be large classes. If I go to a school and I happen to attend 3 physical ed classes, would that mean the school only offers physical ed classes? The teacher:student ratio is 6:1 and the overwhelming majority of classes are incredibly small, which facilitates discussions, especially in the core classes. I hope your reasoning skills are a little stronger in this regard…</p>

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<p>Some dorms do suck, others don’t. You have to check them out for yourself. This would be the case I suspect for most colleges…</p>

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<p>10,000 people showed up for Homecoming. How many were at Dartmouth’s? Anyway, the basketball games are held on campus.</p>

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<p>I’ve often run into professors on campus and off, and they all seem to remember me by name so I don’t see your point here. Are you suggesting that a professor at Columbia can’t recognize his/her student by name? C’mon, get serious.</p>

<p>At the end of the day, of course these are personal decisions to be made. One school will be a better fit than another. You have to visit the schools and engage the students and stop relying on the often biased and agenda-ridden comments on CC…</p>

20

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<p>Not to hijack this thread, but the National Institutes of Health is actually located in Bethesda, Maryland, about an hour and half drive southwest of Baltimore. </p>

<p>Perhaps a few institutes (like NIDA) has a building in Baltimore, but most clinical trials for AIDs are on the main NIH campus in Bethesda.</p>