I’m just wondering what you guys think is a better school for studying math as an undergrad, Dartmouth or Penn (not sure if I want to do pure or applied yet). Please consider rigor, professors, research opportunities, grad school placement, job placement, and your overall opinion of the program/school. Thanks.
I am no expert, but if I were in your position, I would be inclined to choose Penn.
Not so sure to be honest, but I can say that Penn doesn’t have an applied math major for undergrads, so if you think you may want to study that, then go for Dartmouth if they have a strong Applied Math program. That said, I know some math majors who like to complement those courses with Stat classes in Wharton and then end up getting a Stat Minor in addition to their Math Major.
@anonymouswalrus
Penn is ranked #17 and Dartmouth #52 on UsNews. Overall Penn is a much stronger research institution so I would definitely say that research opportunities are better at Penn. Also math is a very widely applicable field and Penn has stronger departments and stronger research across the board. Also Penn really encourages its undergrads to do research and offers many opportunities. In terms of job placement, Penn is known for its pre-professionalism and it has the strongest employment statistics, highest salaries after Harvard. Obviously I am biased, but I think Penn is an overall stronger choice than dartmouth based on rankings (i.e prestige) , research output and opportunities, employment statistics and also in getting a more diverse and vibrant college experience. It is very important to note that the environment at Penn and Dartmouth are really different and you will have a completely different college experience in one vs the other.
just for you reference, here is some insight into what many student facing this dilemma choose.
http://www.parchment.com/c/college/tools/college-cross-admit-comparison.php?compare=University+of+Pennsylvania&with=dartmouth
Also consider the difference in setting. Do you prefer the city, or a rural location?
For all the issues you’ve outlined, and as the previous posters have stated, the choice is Penn.
I feel like I’m a better fit for Dartmouth as a school, but it is clear that Penn is better for math and I don’t want to miss out if I get into both. Another issue is I applied to M&T at Penn which requires my fallback to be Engineering or Wharton (I chose engineering) but I really want to just study math in the College. Penn requires me to be in the School of Engineering for at least 1 year before I can transfer to the College and transfer is not guaranteed. Penn’s pre-professionalism is not really my style to be honest and that is my major concern. Otherwise, both schools seem great and I don’t really have an urban vs. rural preference/
You can take basically the same schedule from Engineering that you would in The College. It should not be difficult to transfer from SEAS to The College as long as you are in good standing. My D is in SEAS and has already completed a Math minor in The College.
Both schools will provide you with a great education in math. It’s true that a lot more research is being done at Penn and if research is a primary interest of yours, then I would not second guess the choice to attend Penn.
With regard to Penn’s pre-professional atmosphere, I will say that it was a major concern of mine before I matriculated. Penn’s College of Arts and Sciences, however, provides the most outstanding interdisciplinary liberal arts education available. You will have access to all of the intellectual vitality and rigor of a traditional liberal arts college with the support of one of the world’s leading research universities. If you don’t want the pre-professional aspects of Penn to play a major role in your experience there, then they don’t have to! All of the Ivies are pretty pre-professional. For example, all 4 of Dartmouth’s valedictorians back in 2012 ended up in the same exact field: Business (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/blog/the_best_and_the_brightest.php). The irony of the Ivy league is that students have access to the absolute best liberal arts curriculums, professors and resources in the world and yet huge swaths of them still end up pursuing a very narrow set of careers. Penn’s pre-professionalism is definitely obvious; it’s an attribute that the school wears on its sleeve. But it does not have to define your experience in the College if you don’t want it to. And yet you can rest assured knowing that you have access to all of the best recruiters and career services professionals (which Penn shares across all 4 schools).
If you have any specific fears with regard to the pre-professional atmosphere or Penn student life in general, feel free to identify them either here or in a private message and I (and many others here) would be happy to discuss them in a way that might shed some light on how warranted those fears might be. But in general, my time at Penn was not defined by pre-professionalism so much as it was defined by a LOT of reading for my English, History, Poli Sci, Romance Languages, Art History, Philosophy, and other humanities/social sciences courses.