<p>I think I missed something in the conversation, but as someone who lives near the Claremont Colleges/is familiar with them/knows people there, I would say that MIT is more than "just a notch better" than Mudd.</p>
<p>@CheersFan:</p>
<p>"So I guess in your view no prospie can form an educated opinion based on campus visits, classes attended, inquiries about general reputation to people in the field and examination of course descriptions and faculty bios"</p>
<p>Campus Visits: How thoroughly did you visit the campus's? How many nights did you stay? What part of term did you stay?</p>
<p>Examination of Course Descriptions: Here I completely agree with AtomicFusion, in general people who are a few years away from taking a course really don't have any basis to judge a course's difficulty and style. Also students and alumni often give exaggerated views of the difficulty or ease of particular courses that they suffered through.</p>
<p>General Reputation of People in the Field: This is generally a bad idea. Often the biggest of the big shots will not be spending much time with you. And often times in many fields some of the most famous people are not well known outside of that field (having done extremely obscure work back in the day). </p>
<p>Faculty Bios: Please, most of these are written in a half-joking manner. I honestly hope you did more research on particular faculty members than just going to their home page and reading their canned statements.</p>
<p>Harvey Mudd is an excellent school. But I think you have to be very careful when using the word "comparable" as it's a really loaded word. They are probably comparable in certain specific aspects. But on the whole they are not comparable. Harvey Mudd is an undergraduate institution if I'm not mistaken, and MIT is a research university. The missions and aims of these universities are different, and that difference trickles down to every aspect of these universities.</p>
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AtomicFusion: So I guess in your view no prospie can form an educated opinion based on campus visits, classes attended, inquiries about general reputation to people in the field and examination of course descriptions and faculty bios (I did all of this with respect to MIT and Mudd). If that's your view, why are you on CC then? Sorry if I offended you, but in my opinion, which is apparently shared by at least several other cross admits, MIT is just a notch better than Mudd. I also acknowledged that Mudders would likely disagree with me on this and they are entitled to their opinion. I liked Mudd alot, gave it very serious consideration and was recommending it here as an alternative to MIT. I dont see any of this as controversial. I also dont see how you have added anything to the discussion.
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<p>I never said Mudd was on the same level as MIT; I only said it was comparable. If I meant Mudd was on the same level, then why would I have also included schools like Purdue and Case in my list? Mudd is just very comparable in the types of students it attracts and the scholastic atmosphere. MIT and Mudd are not comparable in general purpose: Mudd is a small LAC and MIT is a research university.</p>