Hi, so I’m currently a junior in high school and I plan on ED’ing to either Cornell Dyson or Dartmouth. I’m very confident in my academics but I’m not sure if my extracurricular activities (almost all business related, including national awards) will give me a better shot at Cornell since it’s a business school as opposed to Dartmouth where I would be studying Economics. I really like the atmosphere of both schools, so it really is a matter of which school I would have a better chance of getting into.
GPA (school doesn’t do unweighted): 96 without freshmen year: 100
Class Rank: School does not do ranking
SAT: 1600 (redesigned SAT)
SAT 2: Math 2: 800 Chem: 750 World History 790
Extracurriculars/Honors
DECA (leadership role)
Model UN (leadership role)
Business Honors Society (leadership role)
5th place at DECA states top 10 at internationals
Spent 2 years interning at a marketing firm over the summer
I think you’ll be competitive at both Cornell and Dartmouth for ED. Given your stats, why not give Wharton ED a try? It’s obviously going to be a bit tougher, but overall Wharton is such an outstanding program. If I were you, I’d stick with Cornell or Dartmouth (vs. Penn CAS) if you like the atmosphere at those two better.
If you are going into your junior year now you have plenty of time to decide.
Have you done basic research such as read up on the schools in some guide books (ex. Fiske, Princeton Review), visit if possible, etc.? If you have not, then start with that. If you have, do you have a preference?
Do you want to be in a b-school at Wharton or Dyson or study economics or something else at Dartmouth? There is a big difference in the curriculum if you go in as a business major or a liberal arts major. I suggest you spend time looking over the coursework you would take in the different programs to see if you have a preference.
In general I only recommend applying ED if you prefer one school above all others and there is no need to compare financial offers. If you are not in that position, reconsider applying anywhere ED.
These schools are reaches for everyone so be sure to come up with a list of reach, match and safety schools that you can afford and would be happy to attend.
First off thanks for all the feedback. @Boothie007 the reason why I am not considering Wharton ED is that it is very unlikely that I will get in, and I don’t think my GPA is high enough to get into Dyson or Dartmouth RD. I really don’t want to lose the leverage I get from applying ED.
These schools have acceptance rates between 7% and 14%. They cannot accept close to all of the well qualified candidates. Your academics are certainly competitive but all of these schools should be considered reaches. You have mentioned urban and rural schools…b-schools and schools where you will be a liberal arts major. The major commonality is that tbey are Ivy League. I would think about what college experience you want. Put some applications in to Ivy school you like but expand your horizons.
Columbia admits a lower percentage than either Cornell or Dartmouth overall, so I imagine their ED round is also slightly more selective – but you can confirm that by looking at the schools’ common data sets.
Anyway, if you are just now going into your junior year, you have plenty of time to continue reading and asking questions about these schools. If it’s not too much trouble, you could visit them, though many people wait for acceptances to come in before visiting.
Regarding ED, don’t do it unless you are completely sold on a school. So if that is going to be Cornell or Dartmouth, just make sure before you make that decision.
And be sure to apply to some matches and at least one safety. For all apps, make sure you like the schools and can afford them without taking on too much debt.
What state do you live in and what is your financial situation ?
I ask state, since in NYS you would get about a $15k/year discount for Cornell AEM, from any other state
you pay same as at any private school.
These schools are all very different from one another, visit and decide which is for you.
If you really want marketing, a liberal arts school like Dartmouth makes less sense but would be fine
to ultimately get into a good MBA program.
Also note, my S thought he would study econ, and decided to switch majors.
I am glad he is at a large school where they have lots of other options.
Cornell, Penn and Columbia are all better in that respect, vs a liberal arts college like Dartmouth.
I know it’s called Darmouth College, not Dartmouth University, and it’s undergrad focused, but Dartmouth has a med school, an excellent MBA program, and an engineering school. It’s a research university. And Columbua has no undergrad B-school, so I fail to see how it would be a better option.
@blevine Dartmouth is a university and has a wide array of majors. In addition my D did go to a small LAC and when she decided to change majors, she had a huge choice of options at her school as well. I’m glad a large school worked out for your S, but I’m not sure that the potential of changing majors makes a large school a necessity (or even preferable). Each person needs to see out an environment (in an affordable school) where he/she can best succeed.
@usualhopeful Engineering at Dartmouth…not really. They do have a major like a few other liberal arts schools,
but those schools typically have few upper level courses, not the same experience as a true engineering school,
and more oriented towards getting you into grad school for ENG, not directly into the workforce, as compared to Columbia, Cornell and Penn. Yes you can go to grad school from any eng program if you do well, but seems like the
only real goal at LAC that have an ENG major (vs separate college of eng).
Also note I assumed we were talking undergraduate school, so a med school and MBA is totally irrelevant to this thread. I was talking undergraduate colleges with substantial undergraduate specialties, such as ENG, ARCH, BUS, COMM, THEATER/FINE ARTS, NURSING, EDUCATION, ETC. The larger schools have the same liberal arts offerings as Dartmouth, Brown, Harvard, Swarthmore, etc, plus much more more substantive options. Since most kids don’t truly know what they want, not bad to have all those options. That said, I am sure many many people would be happier at a small college and do very well that way. Just saying it is a major difference, but of course not right for everyone. People can get lost at very large universities. But I think the larger private undergrad schools are just the right size. Big enough to offer what a school 2-3x their size can offer, not so big as to truly get lost in the crowd.
We seriously considered smaller colleges for both kids and felt the curriculum was just too much of a compromise,
even though the atmosphere was certainly nice.
I think the conversation has strayed way off of the OP’s question…Bottom line IMO is that the OP needs to figure out what he/she wants in a college and not just focus on schools because they are in the Ivy League.
Yes, Dartmouth is a university… but among universities, it is among the most undergrad-centered.
It will fall short of being as undergrad-focused as a LAC, but not by a wide margin… and you also get the usual relative advantages of a university: more major and class options, greater name recognition, and more real research opportunities.
So much feedback… I’ll try to address as much as I can.
I am from New York
I’m interested in a career in finance, particularly I want to work on Wall Street. Now I know career interests change, but a career change will most likely not be supported by my family (tough love) so I’m basically going to assume that I will follow through with finance.
The reason why Dartmouth is so high on my list is because it is extremely undergrad focused, great recruiting, and the students seems genuinely happy to be there. Not to mention I like the idea of a close-knit college community If i were to pick a 1st choice it would be Dartmouth.
On the other hand, Cornell is like that pesky 2nd place. Students at Cornell also seem to love their school and the recruiting from what I heard is also really good. I can also see myself being very happy here. So since I’m happy with both schools, I was just wondering:
Since all of my EC’s are business-related, would it make more sense to put my ED on a business school (Cornell) than a liberl arts type school? However, if you guys don’t think my business dominated EC"s are an issue for Dartmouth Economics, and I would have a just as high (or low) chance of getting in there, I would ED to Dartmouth