<p>I'm a current senior, and am wondering what is the best specific program out of these schools, all other things being equal, for a person looking to;</p>
<ul>
<li>Prepare for/go to Law School.</li>
<li>Double major in or get a solid education in the fields of Economics/International Relations</li>
<li>Have an active campus, community and city to be involved in.</li>
</ul>
<p>Schools:</p>
<p>Cornell University - School of Industrial and Labor Relations
NYU Stern - Business and Political Economy Program [BPE]
Duke University - CAS
Johns Hopkins University - CAS
George Washington University - Honors College, Elliot School of International Affairs</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>Duke and Hopkins stand out. Duke is probable a little stronger in economics, and Hopkins is clearly stronger in international studies. Both do very well in law school placement.</p>
<p>Cornell’s arts and sciences school (privately endowed) would be comparable to those two, but not the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. Although it is considered one of the best of its kind–people know that its a state school and it doesn’t carry the same panache. [when on the Cornell campus, it’s remarkably easy to pick out the privately endowed schools (beautiful) from the state supported ones (not beautiful).</p>
<p>Stern obviously is a business school–not a liberal arts school–so the approach and education will be quite different. the Elliot School is good, but not in the same league as the others in my opinion.</p>
<p>As far as “Prepare for/go to Law School” ILR does have some significant cred; about 30% of its class actually goes to law school each year. ILR people seem to view it as sort of a social sciences boutique. It does have the state affiliation, nevertheless I personally know several partners of large Wall Street law firms who were ILR grads; it does not suffer much at all on the particular score of training future lawyers; quite the contrary it would seem.</p>
<p>You should pay some attention to the actual curriculum at each college. What you are actually going to study- non-major requirements, number and availability of electives outside the college- will be different within your choices, Some will have specific required courses, you should want that curriculum, and to take those courses, if you’re going to go there. Some will not have the typical distribution requirements (sciences, language, etc) that an arts & sciences college typically has. Others will. So do you want to take science and language courses, instead of other things you could be studying, or do you not want to take these courses? And the same with the requirements at the other colleges. For example ILR has some required courses.</p>
<p>The nature of campus life and community at NYU or GWU will not remotely resemble the campus experience at cornell. Don’t know about JHU, or Duke.</p>
<p>Thank you so much for the advice so far - any others as well?</p>