<p>I applied to the University of Chicago (among others) EA, and I was fortunate enough to get admitted. Even better, the expected family contribution is well within the range that my family can pay. Out of the other colleges that I am applying to, my writing supplements for the following colleges are not yet complete:
- Carnegie Mellon
- Cornell
- Harvard
- Northwestern
- Princeton
- University of Pennsylvania
- University of Rochester
- Williams</p>
<p>My high school required me to pay the application fees before I received any EA decisions, so all 8 have already been paid for. Therefore, the only thing I risk by applying is my time (and my ego when the rejection letters roll in). For this same reason, I cannot add any additional colleges to the list.</p>
<p>Which of these do you think I should invest time applying to? I plan to major in mathematics, with possible minors in economics or computer science. I don't have any strong preferences for region or size, but my main issue with UChicago is its rigorous Core - I'd much rather spend my time in my major than elsewhere. </p>
<p>First, Congrats! Second, apply to all the colleges that are better than UChicago in math then you plan on (I think everything other than URochester, UPenn, and Williams). Don’t lose an opportunity to go to an amazing college just because you didn’t want to do the app.</p>
<p>@PuffDaddy Out of curiosity, which ranking system are you using? I usually only see Harvard and Princeton above Chicago out of the ones listed for math.</p>
<p>@happy1, @ucbalumnus That’s my plan, but I’m not having such an easy time figuring out which schools those are or how I would go about determining them. Do you see any clear stand-outs in either direction?</p>
<p>@sesquipedalian4 Congratulations. I agree with happy1 and ucbalumnus that you should concentrate on schools that you would prefer to the University of Chicago. You may want to go on each school’s website, specifically their course catalogs, and see what each offers as far as mathematics, economics, and computer science courses.</p>
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<p>@PuffDaddy University of Chicago is renown for its mathematics department. But I am curious as to how you decided that these are the only 3 colleges on Ops list that would not rival Chicago’s mathematics department.</p>
<p>@Sesquipedalian4 oh the dreaded rankings. Here we go again…
Have you visited any of the schools? Can you do so before any of their deadlines (aka do you live close enough to any)? Have you looked on any of their websites or gotten any mail that makes you really want to go to one of them? How about visiting studentreviews and looking at what students have to say (note that only the really glad ones or the really disgruntled ones will be posting there, and more of the latter)
You should try to investigate and find out which one you really want to go to.</p>
<p>For grad school math, on your list, Chicago, Princeton and Harvard are the very tops. Cornell, Northwestern and Penn are very strong but not as strong as the first three. CMU is strong in financial math. As an undergraduate, however, any of those schools would give you a solid math education.</p>
<p>Congratulations to your acceptance to UChicago EA! I agree that Chicago, Princeton and Harvard are tippy top on their math programs on your list while Williams, NU, CMU, Cornell and Penn are very strong in their respective math department.</p>
<p>b@r!um (I hope I got that right!) who often posts in the International Students forum is familiar with most Math programs. Send her a PM, and ask her advice about which would could be better options for you than U of Chicago.</p>
<p>Congrats!!! I also got into UChicago, but my problem with it is money…
Anyway, since it seems like you don’t like a core curriculum, I would apply to the schools that don’t have a core curriculum. This way you have more diverse choices…</p>