<p>My interest is in biology/pre-med but I also want to have a good all-around education, just in case I may change my mind about this being doctor thing later on. About the cost, WUSL offers me about 2K scholarship each year and D nothing.</p>
<p>I have been on this site for a while and have really been impressed by a lot of good and thoughtful comments and suggestions. So, guys, any words of advice about my current quandary?</p>
<p>I would do dartmouth</p>
<p>yeah if it were me i'd pick dartmouth...from what ive heard its the best overall college experience....especially if youre interested in clubs and stuff like that. also i think dartmouth was rated #1 for happiest students?</p>
<p>wustl is good for pre-med...its real only strength, making it kinda specialized...dartmouth has the better all-around education</p>
<p>I'd go with dartmouth as well - while WUStL is a good school, it seems to have really grown in recognition beyond a 300-mile radius from St. Louis over the last few years based pretty much on the strength of its massive, way-too-many-trees-cut-down marketing campaign. Speaking only from our own 2 kids on college trails over the past 3 years, we've had a small forest of WUStL paper propaganda stuffed in our mailbox.</p>
<p>Dartmouth, on the other hand, has had a very good rep for a long time - without blowing its own horn.</p>
<p>I don't think the 2K scholarship makes up for the academic difference at all. Dartmouth all the way.</p>
<p>" also i think dartmouth was rated #1 for happiest students?"</p>
<p>i thought UVA was rated #1 for freshman, sophomore and junior years, and yale for senior year</p>
<p>Wash U has a very well-funded and respected medical school (#3 this year in the U.S. News rankings.) Think about whether you want to go to medical school. If you are serious about it, going to Wash U for college might be the better route; you'll have an excellent med school a stone's throw away (you might decide to take classes there,) you'll have more opportunities to do independant research in the medical field, and you'll have a leg up in the admission process to Wash U's med school. Don't trust Dartmouth's walking billboard, i.e., slipper1234, too much.</p>
<p>Call me a Dartmouth billboard, but I wouldnt choose WUSTL over Brown, Duke, Penn, Columbia, Northwestern, etc either. Its a school on the move, no doubt, but its still a level below all of these. That said, it is still a great school with great access to Wash U's med school. But don't overplay that connection. Its not going to be anymore helpful at the undergrad level than the hospitals of any of those other schools. Dartmouth (like Brown, Duke, etc) has a much better placement rate into top grad schools.</p>
<p>Go to Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Higher placement rates?! Show me some evidence.</p>
<p>Anyone have the WSJ top feeder link? People fault it all the time, but with 15 of the top schools its not THAT off the mark, and WUSTL is wayyyy behind. In USNEWS peer assessment (which is a research oriented stat) its a 4.1, below all of those others. In fact, WUSTL has never been ranked ahead of Dartmouth in any reputable ranking system ever.</p>
<p>Dartmouth is more undergraduate focused, has an amazing quality of life, and arguably better academically. WUSTL is coming onto the national scene, but it still isnt the same level yet.</p>
<p>the WSJ top grad school feeder link as requested:</p>
<p>Don't you guys thing if they added some more schools to that list (grad schools being used), it would change. For example, the fact that U of Chicago is used for business/law, it definetely will give an edge to U of Chicago in those rankings b/c more U of Chicago undergrad students are likely to end up in that region for grad school.</p>
<p>dartmouth has a unique college experience along with very happy residents. students are very happy and really want to be there. alumni connections are very strong so im sure finding undergrad internships/research won't be hard to find.</p>
<p>I want to clear up this matter right now.</p>
<p>That list is neither an accurate nor a fair indicator of what it alleges to guage, the percentage of graduates who go on to elite med, business, and law schools. First of all, the authors only tallied the students who went to certain grad schools (for the names of the 15, check the link.) Of these, Dartmouth's (quite excellent) Tuck School of business was included, Washington University's (very excellent) Medical School was not. As you can see, this lead to a very skewed list. I couldn't understand why Wash U's med school was overlooked (again, it was rated #3 in the 2006 U.S. Report rankings) while Yale's was given entry (#11 on the same list) until I glanced at the date the list was published. </p>
<p>My friends, that list was published in 2003. </p>
<p>The moral, Kazoo1?</p>
<p>Always confirm statistics spewed before you. To make a decision, consider the distance between your home and both colleges, think about whether you'd prefer a Midwestern or a New England environment, and check to see what majors are popular at both colleges. Really, you have a delicious decision to make. Dartmouth and Wash U are both great.</p>
<p>P.S. Slipperling1234, really, please do get some new data. I wouldn't want to see you 50 years down the road, still clinging to your precious 2003 Wall Street Journal Feeder List.</p>
<p>I absolutely agree with you college1988, that is why its only half accurate, there are probably another 15 schools that should have been included. But HUGE differences like between Washington and the Ivies I think are still relevant since the margin of error is not close to that big.</p>
<p>you are absolutely correct, it is apparent that Wash U still does not get the same respect as does it peers.</p>
<p>I've never been to Dartmouth college before, but I have seen Wash U's campus. I had to ask for instructions a few times, and I have to say, all of the students I met were really cheerful and friendly, kind of in that laid-back Midwestern sorta way. I sat in on an Intro to Biology class, and the professor who taught it, gruff-faced gentleman, kept the entire class, all 200 of them, entranced with his energy. He ran circuits around the auditorium, pulled students out of their seats, and cracked one-liners that could stand up with Jay Leno's best.</p>
<p>lol wow, that professor must have been sweet...</p>
<p>go to dartmouth.</p>