Dartmouth vs. Cornell

<p>I was seriously wondering the same thing...he should be in here telling us how stupid anyone would be to EVER turn down their local community college for Cornell.</p>

<p>What if I transfer from either Howard/UConn/ UPitt?</p>

<p>I changed my mind about community college did I make a right choice?</p>

<p>What if I get a gpa of 3.2-3.5 is it good enough, after 2 years?</p>

<p>bumpbumpbump</p>

<p>Did anyone here take this major? How difficult is it to reach an A?
Is it very demanding?</p>

<p>Is anyone hear?</p>

<p>I've always seen Dartmouth>Cornell, I think that this is partly because of all my research on ib which constantly shows Dartmouth as a better school than Cornell and smarter people at my school going to Dartmouth instead of Cornell. But again, this is just me so don't take it as the end all be all. Philosophy shouldn't be too hard, I'd assume it be not the most intellectually chalengnig major out there.</p>

<p>What is the most popular cell phones here?
Example: High school students (sidekicks)
I would think smart phones like Blackberry, Palm Centro and Treo 800, for schedules right?</p>

<p>Outside of some undergrad programs Cornell is the better school and has a much better reputation overall, regardless of how many of your smart classmates chose Dartmouth over it.</p>

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Outside of some undergrad programs Cornell is the better school and has a much better reputation overall, regardless of how many of your smart classmates chose Dartmouth over it.

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<p>Well, I wouldn't be so bold as to say it has a 'much better' reputation. The two are about on par for general undergraduate education and experience. (Although I am certain some Dartmouth loyal would beg to differ). </p>

<p>Perhaps Cornell is much better when it comes to research prowess, but for the undergraduate experience it's like comparing two very delicious fruits. Except one is an apple and the other is a pear.</p>

<p>Or a green apple. Hmm...</p>

<p>^lol</p>

<p>I guess that what Dartmouth vs. Cornell boils down to ... do you prefer red apples or green apples?</p>

<p>Cornell is a different animal than Dartmouth. Cornell's competency is its research focus, its more like the Cal Berkeley of the Ivies whereas Dartmouth is the Amherst or Princeton. Cornell can't be beat at the disciplines where specific discipline excellence matters; things like architecture and computer science. Because of its graduate schools its international reputation (like a Cal) is very high. </p>

<p>As an undergrad school for someone going to grad school, professional school, or getting an elite job in the US Dartmouth is one of the best few in the country. Its grad placement is highest after HYP among the Ivies according to most surveys (never seen one counter-example), its almost three times as rich per student as any non-HYP Ivy, and it does incredibly well with elite recruiting into banking and consulting. Its highly selective and has a very strong alumni following/ network. Its the LAC of the Ivies.</p>

<p>...Isn't Princeton the Princeton of the Ivies?</p>

<p>^XD That didn't make since to me either...</p>

<p>Nah... Cornell is the red apple and Dartmouth is the green pear. Thanks to the Ag School Cornell has the lock down on most of the apples -- be they red, yellow, green, or purple.</p>

<p>Again, I do like Dartmouth, and I think the allegiance that Dartmouth cultivates among its alumni is something to be desired. And I don't disagree that Cornell is the 'Berkeley of the Ivies' in that it is the largest and has the greatest diversity of students, interests, and academics. But at the same time, the Cornell experience offers a lot more resources and individual attention than the Berkeley experience. Unlike at Berkeley, no Cornell student will ever be restricted from a major simply on account of the fact that "there are no more spots left" as is woe to happen at Berkeley. Don't forget, at Cornell the liberal arts college features 4,000 undergraduates and 1,500 graduate students. At Dartmouth the liberal arts college features 4,000 undergraduates and 500 or so graduate students.</p>

<p>Also, the resources per student that Slipper alludes to at Dartmouth may be a bit of an exaggeration. In 2006-2007, Dartmouth had around $660k per student, whereas Cornell, Brown, Columbia, and Penn all had around $300k per student. So a little bit more than twice the endowment. But, if you count the support that Cornell gets from NYS, it brings Cornell up to around $450k per student, which narrows the gap significantly.</p>

<p>Check out page 70 of the following document:</p>

<p><a href="http://dpb.cornell.edu/documents/1000405.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://dpb.cornell.edu/documents/1000405.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Additionally, per capita figures may exaggerate the resource differences at a school and fail to account for the economies of scale that may be enjoyed among a lot of different amenities. For instance, Cornell or Columbia's research libraries would trump Dartmouth's any day of the week in absolute terms, and that is what matters for the end-user. For my senior thesis, I used a bunch of data and old volumes that I know would never be found among Dartmouth's libraries simply because Dartmouth isn't a federal repository. </p>

<p>But yeah, Dartmouth is the Amherst of the Ivies. But I think most would claim that Amherst aspires to be Dartmouth, and not vice versa.</p>

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Because of its graduate schools its international reputation (like a Cal) is very high.

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<p>I wouldn't go so far as to say Cornell's reputation/international reputation hinges only on the rep of its grad schools. Cornell does have 3 number one undergraduate colleges in the nation(Hotel, Architecture, Agriculture), arguably all number one in the world, and one undisputed number one undergraduate college in the Ivy League(engineering). Its liberal arts school is on par with pretty much any non-HYP Ivy. It is able to produce all this fantastic research and maintain incredible programs because its (absolute) endowment is large. Endowment per student does not matter much(see below). </p>

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hereas Dartmouth is the Amherst or Princeton.

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<p>Not really... Princeton's already in the Ivy League and it produces incredible research whereas Dartmouth produces next to zilch in terms of research. Plus Princeton is a science/engineering powerhouse, Dartmouth is not. D is more the Amherst/Williams of the Ivies- other than size, it doesn't share too many similarities with Princeton. </p>

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its almost three times as rich per student as any non-HYP Ivy,

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<p>This really doesn't matter... It's total endowment that matters most because most schools have a fixed cost regardless of how many students they admit. This fixed cost is by far greater than the marginal cost of admitting another student. Absolutely speaking, Cornell's endowment is far greater than Darmouth's(5.4 billion versus 3.6 billion). That's why how Cornell is able to build incredible facilities such as its nanotechnology labs, particle accelerator and able to have incredibly well funded programs such as engineering and architecture and build an international reputation while expanding to other countries, whereas Dartmouth is not. As an undergrad, I've been able to use a state-of-the art nanotechnology lab in my introduction to nanotechnology course. I definitely would not be able to do something like that at Dartmouth. And I definitely would not have been able to study a real form of engineering at Dartmouth (engineering science does not count).</p>

<p>The value of a high per-student endowment is the yearly budget to support per-student spending on advising/ grants/ research/ etc. Dartmouth spends more on its students than any other Ivy (COHE 2008), followed by Yale and Princeton. This means more grants for thesis research, more undergrad advising, and better career counseling. All benefits of an undergrad focused school and part of the reason Dartmouth does so well with grad placement and recruiting (I also think the ridiculous level of alumni loyalty helps D with recruiting as well). Dartmouth UNDERGRAD is overwhelmingly richer per student.</p>

<p>Cornell Internation rep IS because of its grad schools. Hotel and Architecture are very esoteric schools, they aren't the reason people in Beijing know about Cornell. Similarly although Cornell undergrad engineering is highly ranked among the Ivies, overall its behind places like Georgia Tech and Michigan. So this IMO isn't the reason for its prestige internationally. Its the grad schools.</p>

<p>Slipper, I would have to disagree with you on your assertions about Cornell's prestige. At the point that many many international students are coming to Cornell's school of Hotel Administration, I don't think its too esoteric of a program to garner the prestige that it apparently enjoys internationally. Additionally, Cornell Engineering is sort of unique in that it offers a great Engineering School with some of the best programs in the world, while still maintaining its Ivy League status - which historically has been more about the liberal arts than professional majors. Cornell itself is a great university which produces a lot of research, as it spends close to 300million dollars a year on said research. This naturally garners interntional attention and is in no way tied to Cornell's grad schools. </p>

<p>And Cornell's facilities are amazing and aren't accurately represented by the per-student endowment.</p>

<p>Just my thoughts</p>

<p>
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The value of a high per-student endowment is the yearly budget to support per-student spending on advising/ grants/ research/ etc. Dartmouth spends more on its students than any other Ivy (COHE 2008), followed by Yale and Princeton. This means more grants for thesis research, more undergrad advising, and better career counseling.

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<p>Oh come on, you don't need to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get good advising. Every Ivy has good advising. Half of all Cornell engineers do research with a professor during their undergrad years. Who cares if Dartmouth spends more per student than any other Ivy? Where is Dartmouth's particle accelerator then? Where are its incredible nanotechnology facilities? Where are its extensive research libraries? I don't think you understand the structure of fixed costs/marginal costs. The fixed cost of all students to a university is by far greater than the marginal cost of admitting a student. Universities don't sit down one day and decide, okay, we are going to spend 200,000 per student. That's just not how it works. Instead, they decide okay, we will build a particle accelerator, create new nanotechnology labs, allocate some money towards research, etc. That's why Cornell with an endowment that's about 2 billion larger than Dartmouth's is able to have better facilities and more high-quality programs for its students than Dartmouth does. </p>

<p>
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Cornell Internation rep IS because of its grad schools. Hotel and Architecture are very esoteric schools, they aren't the reason people in Beijing know about Cornell. Similarly although Cornell undergrad engineering is highly ranked among the Ivies, overall its behind places like Georgia Tech and Michigan. So this IMO isn't the reason for its prestige internationally. Its the grad schools.

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<p>USNEWS RANKINGS UNDERGRADUATE ENGINEERING
1. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology 4.9
2. Stanford University (CA) 4.7
2. University of California–Berkeley * 4.7
4. California Institute of Technology 4.6
5. Georgia Institute of Technology * 4.5
5. U. of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign * 4.5
7. Cornell University (NY) 4.4
7. University of Michigan–Ann Arbor * 4.4
9. Carnegie Mellon University (PA) 4.2
9. Purdue Univ.–West Lafayette (IN)* 4.2
9. University of Texas–Austin * 4.2
12. Princeton University (NJ) 4.1</p>

<p>It looks like you're wrong. Cornell is tied with Michigan in engineering. It is also one spot behind Gtech in engineering. There is virtually no difference between these programs then. Cornell undergrad engineering dominates Ivy league engineering and is right behind MIT, Stanford, Berk, and Caltech in the rankings.</p>

<p>Architecture is not an esoteric field at all... Maybe hotel is esoteric but architecture or agriculture are definitely NOT esoteric. Part of the reason why Cornell is so well known in Asia is because famous Asian leaders have come to Cornell to study in the Architecture and Agricultural schools. Ratan Tata, one of the leading Indian billionaire industrialists today got his bachelor's in architecture from Cornell. The Taiwanese president completed his degree at Cornell's ag. school. These two fields are not esoteric and all and help to build Cornell's undergrad rep abroad. Plus, as I mentioned before, Cornell is an engineering powerhouse. </p>

<p>Anyway, who cares what the reason for Cornell's international prestige is? At least it has international prestige. Dartmouth is virtually unknown outside of the states. It does not matter why your school is highly regarded internationally, as long as it is highly regarded internationally. Nobody on the streets of Beijing says: "I don't think highly of Cornell because its grad schools might boost its reputation."</p>

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And Cornell's facilities are amazing and aren't accurately represented by the per-student endowment.

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<p>Exactly, schools like Dartmouth and Brown can't even afford to create facilities like those of Cornell because their endowments are small, absolutely speaking. Because their endowments are not absolutely big, they just can't afford these facilities.</p>

<p>Spending per student matters. At Cornell 5.4 Billion is spread over almost 20,000 students and faculty vs. 3.6 Billion over 5500 students at D, most of them undergrads. Dartmouth's greatest spending is on undergrads its a very real difference over most of the Ivies. For example, when applying to grad school a Dartmouth student has the advantage of countless study abroad programs led by Dartmouth profs. $10K grants for undergrad research are commonplace (I got one for my thesis research in the pacific). Presidential Scholarships for research are available to every sophomore with over a 3.3 (I did one too). Medical advising and career services are fantastic. The President of the college likely knows who you are, and if you want a meeting with him its yours. All these things matter. All these things get you into grad schools. All these things breed alumni loyalty (75-80% of the class turns up for 5th year reunions), which in turn helps with elite recruiting. </p>

<p>Access to a particle accelerator is for a particular subset of the population, and like a Cal for that set of research driven students Cornell is a better choice than most of the Ivies. For those looking to go into CS, Architecture, Hotel, and want to be engineers (as opposed to engineering majors who want to work in top business) I recommend Cornell over almost any Ivy. </p>

<p>As I mentioned Cornell and Dartmouth are very different places. I think its hard to find a better general undergraduate education than at Dartmouth. For those who are into heavy research or want to go into the workforce in a highly skilled area like architecture or Computer Science, Cornell is the choice over most of the Ivies.</p>