I am currently figuring out where to visit for spring break college trips, and since I live in Oregon, Cornell would be difficult to visit! With that being said, Cornell is one of my very top choices. Here are my questions (specific to Human Ecology):
-As a prospective pre-med, what has your personal experience at CHE been like? Or Cornell in general?
-While it has been discussed before, I cant seem to get a concrete answer on if it’s as cutthroat and competitive as people say?
-This one seems to be 50/50, have you found Ithaca to be a pro or con?
-Can you have a good social life without being in a fraternity?
-My other “top” choices (other reaches) are Brown, Penn, and Northwestern. Why would you say Cornell is better than these institutions?
I really appreciate any and all responses! Thank you guys
I am not pre-med myself, but I am in Human Ecology (PAM). That being said, I do know many pre-med students, and I think I can help you out some. I wouldn’t describe HumEc pre-med as being competitive per se (or at least, my pre med friends haven’t said anything of the sort), but it is definitely a lot of work, way more than I had as a freshman in PAM. My personal experience at Cornell has been great so far, it sounds cliched but you just need to find your niche. I have, and I’m very happy. Ithaca is a great city, aside from the cold there is a lot to do in the city itself. Outside of Ithaca you won’t find much, but there’s enough in Ithaca that you won’t really need to venture out of the city (aside from going home, of course). You can definitely have a good social life without being in a fraternity. That being said, if you like going to parties often, frats are definitely the way to go. Unfortunately, I did not apply to any of the other schools you’ve mentioned in this post and I therefore cannot help you there, considering I know nothing about what it’s like at any of these places. I hope I have been informative enough for you.
I’m not premed so I won’t talk about that, but overall I have found Cornell to be very collaborative. I’ve never been in a cutthroat situation. You might get internally competitive either with yourself or subconsciously with those around you, but I’ve never seen someone outwardly act on that sense of competition, if that makes sense. Basically, I always want to get good grades, and if a class is curved, I want to do better than the other students on exams. But I’m never going to sabotage anyone or anything like that. I study with friends, including ones in the same class as me whom I’m theoretically “competing” against.
I love Ithaca more than anywhere in the world. I’m super biased – I’ve lived here my whole life – but there’s just nowhere else like it. It has its own character and the people here are amazing and we have festivals and celebrations all the time of love, art, and music. I’m sure it’s not for everyone, and I’m sure it’s a shock for people coming from a big city, but if you come in with an open mind, you’ll love it. You said you’re from Oregon; I’ve heard people say Ithaca is similar to Portland, at least in the general vibe, but I’ve never been to Portland so I can’t confirm. I could write a whole novel about Ithaca, so I’ll end my Ithaca rant here, but if you have any specific questions about it I would be more than willing to answer them.
Yes you can have a good social life without being in a fraternity; there are plenty of other organizations on campus you can join, including clubs for basically any interest and professional fraternities (different from social ones). In my experience, it takes some time to learn how to balance your academic and social life properly, but there are lots of different paths you can take to have a great social life.
@Ranza123@LViaLViaquez thank you both for such detailed responses! It’s truly great hearing such positive things from people who go to Cornell, instead of rumors and myths.
Both of my daughters attended Cornell. They did well at Cornell, but I don’t remember them talking about being competitive with other students. They had many friends outside of their own major/school, so when they socialized with friends they didn’t necessary talk about school work often. Both of them joined a sorority, at the same time they also had friends from their own ECs.
I think students at Cornell work hard and they also play (party) hard. My kids always had more parties/events to attend on weekends than they had time for. I have heard them cry on the phone due to amount of work they had.
I like Ithaca. It is not too big and it has a lot of culture/dining/entertainment. It is a perfect college town. If you like outdoor activities, you would love Ithaca. My older daughter wasn’t an outdoor kind of person, but she still found plenty to do.
There are webcams at Cornell. You can get on to get live view of the school.
@oldfort – I hadn’t thought about it in a while and agree that it makes me smile. Interesting to see that the university seems to have adopted it as a PR piece.
I’m not a Cornell premed either, but as a BME there, I took some of the courses you would take as a premed. I’ll describe them a bit.
I took Bio 1440, which is intro physiology. It wasn’t particularly killer - you just had to keep up with lecture well. Get comfortable with office hours, because some topics (like kidney function, ahem, ahem) are going to be a bit harder to walk through the biological processes mentally than others. If you get Ronald Booker and Cole Gilbert, who I had, expect the exams to require some short answer explanation. And the multiple choice to be a bit tricky at times. Fortunately, the curve is not going to make it nearly impossible to get an A - you only have to be a standard deviation above the mean to secure it, and that deviation can be two multiple choice questions and partial credit on a short answer. You should love it as a premed - you’ll learn a lot of stuff that really is relevant, and it’s rather interesting.
I also took Bio 1500, which is a bio lab course you have to take because intro bio (Bio 1440 and 1350 (cell biology, another class you have to take)) doesn’t have a true lab portion. It actually is more like training you to be a scientist than just doing little experiments designed for you like high school biology labs. First, you’re told about the scientific method and aspects of real scientific papers(as well as taught how to find, read, and cite them), and trained a little in using statistical software to draw conclusions from data. Then you design one experiment on antibiotic resistance, analyze the data, and then write your own scientific paper on your findings. You also design a limiting nutrients experiment, analyze the data, then make and present a scientific poster on your findings. You also have two lab practicals to test whether you’re getting some of the skills in data analysis, drawing conclusions, and actual equipment usage. This is a course many get easily annoyed at, but it actually does a lot for you to go through all that. It’s not too bad so long as you don’t procrastinate the paper or poster - the actual biology is fairly simple. Follow the rubric for the paper/poster and pay attention during lecture/lab, and you’ll be fine. There is no curve, and the grading rubric is generous, so you shouldn’t fear a curve or difficulty destroying the chance to get an A. Indeed, my semester, the median grade was an A-.
I didn’t take the general chemistry you would, but that’s the only course I’ll truly warn you to watch out for. Well, mostly if you get Wolczanski -
