Hi everyone! I’m having trouble deciding between Dartmouth, Berkeley, and Barnard College of Columbia University for political science/public policy. Please help!
The thing is I love Barnard the most out of the 3 but I’m not really sure about the prestige
Unless money is a factor, I would choose between Barnard and Dartmouth. Fit is more important than prestige, so Barnard over Dartmouth would be an understandable choice. Plus Barnard is plenty prestigious. Definitely different vibes. Not sure if the COVID-19 situation in NY would impact your decision (we do not know what it will be come August), but that could be one reason to look at Dartmouth.
OP wrote: “I love Barnard the most out of the 3 [options].”
Strong arguments can be made for all 3 schools, but, without more specific input from you, the only argument that matters is yours.
P.S. Prestige is really a non-factor as all of your alternatives are strong in that respect.
If you associate prestige with student profile, the most notable aspect of these schools is their tendency to overlap. For example, the 75th percentile ACT score at Barnard lands two points higher than the 25th percentile score at Dartmouth:
ACT Middle Ranges (class of 2023)
Dartmouth: 32–35
UCB: 30–35
Barnard: 30–34
Does cost and debt differ and matter for you?
Nope! Money is not a factor in my decision 
Barnard College graduates receive their degrees from Columbia. That should provide plenty of prestige.
Barnard College students can cross register for courses at any of the other colleges at Columbia. So, opportunities to learn from Columbia faculty and to develop mentoring relationship(s) with them are readily available as is interaction with the rest of Columbia undergraduate smarties.
For anyone who prefers a women’s college, this really is a unique opportunity probably matched only by Scripps College of the Claremont consortium
If you “love Barnard the most” and money is not a factor then it seems to me you have your answer.
Congrats on your wonderful acceptances.
if you choose berkeley you will be competing against A LOT of other people for internships, without the attention of professors or advisors. If I were you I’d choose between Dartmouth and Barnard. If you are concerned about prestige I would choose Dartmouth, but if you really want to have more academic and professional opportunities, Barnard seems like the best bet
Dartmouth is definitely the top for prestige, but that is the worst reason to pick a school, especially since all of your choices are very prestigious. I would take out Berkeley because of the massive size and lack of overall undergrad focus.
At Dartmouth and Barnard, you’ll have small class sizes and close access to professors, which imo make going to an expensive college worth it.
Without more info about why Barnard is your favorite, I will just elaborate on the differences between Barnard and Dartmouth (where I attend).
I think the big differences are that one is rural and one is urban, and that one is co-ed and the other is all girls. Those are the only things you should be thinking about. If one makes you happier and you think you’ll flourish more there, then a small difference in prestige won’t make a difference.
Dartmouth is within arm’s reach of a city (Boston) with coaches running every day, but life here is very much the classic college campus experience. That brings with it a close community and fun college traditions. There’s a large variety of things going on always, so you won’t be stifled, but if you’re the kind of person who really needs to be in the city, then that’s not what we have here.
Barnard of course is directly in NYC. I’m a guy, so I never considered it, but I got a good look while I was walking through Columbia. I assume you’ve visited?
The really big thing is that your social life, from what I understand, is primarily out in the city rather than on campus. That is the major difference. I know this seems intuitive, and you probably already know, but really think about it. NYC definitely has a lot to offer, but on the flipside, there are very few social spaces that are the college’s own. You may like that you’re always mixed in with a different crowd of random people, or you may not. I preferred what Dartmouth had to offer.
The coed vs all girls difference is also significant. If you choose Barnard, you will have many classes at Columbia, so seeing the other gender won’t be a prob, but the big difference is that you are living with all girls. This does affect your social life, since while you will be taking classes and going to student societies at Columbia, Columbia college and Barnard are not the same. You will be coming home to a specific environment. It’s not necessarily good or bad, but something to think about.
Hope this helped.
Barnard is extraordinarily prestigious. Please.
Besides you would be part of the Seven Sisters – an extended network of women who attended women’s colleges. This is a deep and strong network.
As far as “coming home to a specific environment” – women who attend women’s colleges tend to do better in their careers than women who attend co-ed colleges. Barnard gives you the best of all worlds.
Also: NYC–it’s a learning environment in itself. You would get free access any time you wish to, for example, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In your art history course, for example, instead of looking at slides of works of art, you would walk across Central Park to the Met for 20 minutes and take a look–all for free. Instead of hearing about great plays or music, you would get discounted tickets through Columbia’s and Barnard’s resources, hop on the subway for less than 20 minutes and be at Lincoln Center and watch it performed live. Ditto with nearly anything else–jazz, the art scene in Queens, not just food but cuisines from around the world, languages that you might be learning you use it in NYC for practice. Instead of reading about it you would experience it.
Also job opportunities abound.
All three are some of the best but they are very different from each other. Berkeley is a huge community with sunny weather and close ties to tech world. Dartmouth is a small, secluded and cold Ivy, Barnard is small, cold, urban and single gender. As money is not a factor, go with fit and personal preference.
Barnard is part of a large campus with many activies. Plus it’s in the middle of a vast city–all of which is extremely accessible through cheap public transportation, bikes, and walking. There’s a lovely park behind it that runs along the water (Hudson River is an estuary) for miles. Barnard is both single gender and co-ed, depending on your choice of the moment. The weather in NYC is temperate because of the ocean–it’s on par with Philly in fact it’s often about 5 degrees warmer than Philadelphia area, but usually the same. Otherwise @CupCakeMuffins is correct: choose the one that you feel happiest about.
Another consideration is how far you want to be from your home in fall. It’s not an standard situation, we are facing a global crisis.
Re Barnard and partying, we visited one of my D’s HS classmates who goes there. She said that there are a ton of parties every weekend at the Columbia campus (across the street), and she loves going there and then coming home to her quieter Barnard dorm for some good sleep.
@Dustyfeathers If you were to reread my comment, you would see that I also said Barnard was very prestigious.
I also did say coming home to a specific environment was not necessarily good or bad, just something to think about.
In fact, if you look through my post, I never made the claim that anything at either school necessarily made it better than the other. I did elaborate more on Dartmouth, because that is where I attend.
As to careers, maybe that’s true on average, but I think the difference between those coming out of Dartmouth and Barnard would be negligible. Feel free to prove me wrong.
“The weather in NYC is temperate”
NYC is not temperate as compared with Berkeley, NYC’s average low is 27 and high is 84, while Berkeley is from 42 to 75. I’m now in the bay area and grew up in NJ/NY, there’s no comparison on the weather.
“Dartmouth is definitely the top for prestige”
For political science it is not, Berkeley is probably the most prestigious of the three being discussed. The faculty is top notch, only if you add Columbia to the mix can Barnard match the depth and breadth of UCB’s faculty. To me, it should be between Barnard and Berkeley, and yes if you add Columbia’s resources and you love it the most, you should go there. good luck!
I think you’ll find Dartmouth’s Government department is very prestigious. That is our equivalent of Political Science.
We’ve produced numerous congressmen and members of cabinet, as well as those in other top political positions.
Berkeley is a wonderful school, but it is huge so there is less personal involvement with faculty and small class sizes (especially in the first two years), as compared to Dartmouth and Barnard have.
Of course, there are benefits such large schools as well, but for an undergraduate degree, I would choose a smaller one (relatively). For graduate studies, Berkeley would be a no-brainer.
As to depth and breadth of faculty (and research), Dartmouth is excellent in proportion with its size, especially in our Government department, as that is one of our most popular majors.
In addition, due to our undergrad focus, all of your classes will be taught by professors (except for potentially first year calculus, in which one section is taught by a TA). I’m sure, of course, that Barnard will also have most classes taught by profs.
I do, however, echo the sentiment that you should go to the school that fits you best and you love the most.
Is cost a concern? You will need more spending money if you attend Barnard than if you attend Dartmouth, for example.
Hi! Cost is not a concern