<p>Could you tell me why you decided to go to Harvard and not to any other college? I know this question has been asked hundreds of times before, but I really need to know this now. (I was accepted and am still trying to make my decision).</p>
<p>its harvard. i know lotsa kids who didnt think they were gonna go/didnt think they were gonna get in but got in and their parents kinda pushed/influenced them to go. its hard to turn down harvard. harvard is harvard. no other school has the same name-popping ability</p>
<p>that's one reason, i guess. i'll go through the reasons i love harvard: 1. fantastic location - it is only a few minutes from downtown boston (almost as close as columbia is to downtown manhattan-most people don't realize this), but it has a very expansive, quiet campus, unlike columbia. being near boston gives you boston's cultural, arts, restaurant, club, etc scene - many harvard organizations actually rent out clubs in boston for events that are solely for harvard students. in addition to the city itself, there are 60 colleges within half an hour or something crazy like that, and bc, bu, and tufts are right in your backyard, so you can party there or meet new people or get together with friends...you get the idea. 2. it is my opinion that the people at harvard are the most unique and diverse group out of any university in the world. since harvard wins nearly all cross-admits with other institutions and everyone the world over knows harvard, it can basically have almost anyone. most likely, never again in your life will you be in a place that has assembled people of the talents, genius, and who have the unique experiences/backgrounds that you will get at harvard. for goodness' sake, the admitted class of 2009 represents 80 countries; princeton's, for example, represents 40-something. 3. harvard's endowment is nuts. this is good for several reasons: awesome finaid, funding for study abroad or research without hassle, campus events, etc. heck, they paid for me to fly from nyc to boston - $600, when i could have taken a bus for $30! 4. shrek's reason gives rise to other ancillary benefits such as attracting not only the brightest minds in the world for lectures or discussions, but also every artist/comedian/movie star alive today - everybody wants to perform/talk about their latest research at harvard. 5. the facilities and faculty are unmatched. period. how many nobel prize winners? close to 40, i think? and contrary to what misinformed individuals will claim, there is no lack of undergrad focus...if you have read hanna's posts, you'll know that only the grad school of arts and sciences even shares faculty with the college and then, the college always wins in funding/opportunities (she attended both the college and the law school, so she has an excellent basis for comparison). i really don't know of any large research university where you will have close interaction with your professors if you don't use their office hours or contact them. i think if this were the case, they would end up being like the gestapo - faculty calling you at all hours when you don't need help or anything. personally, i know that if i want to talk to a professor i'll just shoot him/her an email or freaking go to his/her office during office hours. it's really not that tough. 6. finally, there is just that allure that only harvard has. everyone from your grandmother to a 4-year-old in south korea has heard of harvard, and they will all be proud/amazed that you go/went there. this reason alone is not enough to choose harvard (many people do for only this reason, and these are the people you see writing books after they refuse to transfer and suffer through four years of hating their life), but i think there are a bunch of other damn good ones why you should. i'm sure i forgot something, but that's basically the nuts and bolts of why harvard university is the greatest institution in the history of mankind :)</p>
<p><em>claps</em> good post unctuous!</p>
<p>Just for the record, since you use Columbia as comparison, they have had 72 Nobel laureates.</p>
<p>i'm talking about the present, not in sum over their history.</p>
<p>I'm not sure how many laureates Harvard has currently. Columbia has 7, I believe. <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/cu/pr/special/nowin.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.columbia.edu/cu/pr/special/nowin.html</a></p>
<p>Not that it makes a whole lot of difference. Just wanted to point it out ;)</p>
<p>I basically had to choose between Harvard, Yale and Princeton.</p>
<p>I chose Harvard because it was the only place that felt like "home." It was the only one of the three that made me feel extremely comfortable, Princeton being my second choice.</p>
<p>Complaints about social life, etc. are really meaningless to me, as the social life at ANY school is what you make of it. I was extremely impressed by the cultural/minority groups at Harvard. No, correction: extra-curriculars at Harvard, in general, felt more vibrant to me than they did at the other schools. I don't think I encountered more than 2-3 people who weren't heavily involved in something non-academic; I didn't get this impression from the other two schools.</p>
<p>Name-dropping and the name in general don't matter that much to me; since I think I may want to go into journalism (keyword: think), I would've chosen Columbia if the "name" were really an issue. And, let's face it: Harvard's is a very heavy name that lends itself well to being dropped.</p>
<p>But, probably most importantly, I love Harvard because of the student body. I find it almost impossible to classify students there, box them into groups. I couldn't find "The Typical Harvard Student." And yet, despite this difficulty categorizing people, I found a niche almost instantly. At Yale and Princeton, I spent much of my visit trying to find a group of people I could relate to. I eventually found one at Princeton; I never did at Yale. Harvard students take risks that I don't see students at many other schools doing. Example: Does Princeton have an equivalent to H-Bomb (which is very well-done, btw)? Does Yale? </p>
<p>These are just things that I considered when deciding. My advice is to go to pre-frosh weekends; they were, for me at least, extremely instrumental in informing my decision.</p>
<p>Best of luck to applicants for the class of 2010!</p>
<p>CONGRATULATIONS TO THE HARVARD CLASS OF 2009! See you next fall.</p>
<p>abcd, i really have no idea even what i was referring to with that statistic lol. i just remember reading that number somewhere, along with an explanation of how harvard has the most. i could be completely wrong.</p>