<p>WCASParent–Yes I understand your list perfectly. Location, size, competitive culture, etc. These were what I and family felt what makes my s attracted to NU more, besides his firends going to Michigan and Chicago. </p>
<p>gad-- I know what you mean about the name sakes. AT the grad level, there are many Korean alumni from NU active in various academics and research institutions. It may be a different situation at undergrad level though.</p>
<p>
Being South Korean myself, i definitely understand what youre saying. My mother and many of her friends had never even heard of NU before I told her about it.</p>
<p>My thought process ultimately went that although i was born in korea, I would be working and living the rest of my life in America where NU has great name recognition and prestige, not to mention NU felt like a much better fit for me than any ivy out there.</p>
<p>For what its worth, among the english speaking korean adults i know, almost every one knew about Northwestern and its reputation.</p>
<p>Thanks people : )
I think I will decide after the campus visits.
Both schools are such great institutions… had no idea I could find myself in such a dilemma:)</p>
<p>^ Just say you go to the “Kellogg University.”</p>
<p>^and tell them you shall sell cereal for a living.</p>
<p>gad–Let me to tell you… NU is well-known in Korea. In Kangnam (the Beverly Hills of Korea), the parents and students know its prestige. My cousin and aunt, who are from that area, told me many outstanding kids from Korea (mainly Kangnam, of course) applied to NU this year. =] So, don’t let the fact that some people in Korea haven’t heard of NU sway your deciding.</p>
<p>Btw… what’s that thing above my post???</p>
<p>I guess they are referring to Kellogg School of Management lol</p>
<p>Hi WCASParent,</p>
<p>Would you by any chance commenting which one of these schools (Cornell-HE, Berkeley-CNR, NU-WCAS) will be better in Pre-Med/Pre Health areas as I know I will pursue graduate studies in medicine and health policy management after undergraduate? I will visiting all
the three schools in the next 10 days. I definitely will consider double major or Major/Minor in my college. </p>
<p>Thanks,</p>
<p>sjac</p>
<p>Cornell’s College of Human Ecology is actually very well regarded - it’s among the best in the world in the programs it offers. And as a student in HumEc, you will be a Cornell student - you graduate with the same degree as everyone else. </p>
<p>I had to choose between Cornell and Northwestern last year. I chose Cornell and don’t regret it for a second. The people aren’t weird, as someone has said on this board. Far from it, in fact. I was surprised (and happy) to see how down to earth and normal everyone was when I got to campus in August. And someone else said that, as Cornellians, we live in a constant state of comparison to other schools in the Ivy League. Not true, at all. No one here cares about Ivy League status - it’s just a name, after all. And no employer will distinguish between a degree from Cornell or Brown or Dartmouth (or Northwestern, for that matter). One more thing: Cornell is not that intense (certainly no more so than Northwestern would be). WCASParent - how does Cornell seem overly intense to you? Did you study here? Unless you have gone to both NU and CU, there’s no way to quantify academic intensity (in relative terms). </p>
<p>So to the OP, my advice would be to not buy into the misinformation that’s so rampant on CC. For schools as similar as Cornell and Northwestern, choose based on fit. Good luck</p>
<p>"Unless you have gone to both NU and CU, there’s no way to quantify academic intensity (in relative terms). "</p>
<p>Moreover, you’d have to have gone to both recently, and studied the same things.
I graduated from Cornell, and had my butt kicked there, pretty much, in the sciences.
My D2 is there now, studying social sciences and the arts, and is having a fine time.
Meanwhile D1s friends who graduated from Northwestern found it to be very intense.
So I think there are too many variables at play to draw accurate conclusions on this point.</p>
<p>They are both great schools, and I wouldn’t expect either to be a cakewalk.</p>
<p>I don’t regard this program is a “weak link” there at all, if anything it seems to have gotten stronger over the years.The recent Hum Ec kids I know of are super, IIRC stats are fully comparable to the other contract colleges. Like with all of them, the key is the degree of match between their curriculum and your interests.</p>
<p>sjac- I don’t know anything about Berkeley - CNR. As between the others, there is a big difference between pre-med programs and pre-health (called “Global Health” or “Community Health” at certain schools); different curriculum and different levels of competition, both at the undergrad level and in applying to grad school. I can tell you that NU’s pre-med curriculum is rigorous, as would be expected. I would imagine that if you are doing pre-med work at Cornell, you would be taking more of the required courses with A&S and Ag students than with Human Ec students. You can be sure that the pre-med curriculum at Cornell is just as rigorous. It’s a grind either way. So think about which school’s atmosphere you prefer. For me, as I said above, I think that NU’s location just outside of Chicago and the atmosphere of the campus and immediate environs is far more appealing than Cornell’s.<br>
As for the basis of my comparison, it’s based on two things: relatives at each school and my understanding as to the impression the schools’ names make on resumes when we are hiring at my firm. As I said above, both NU and Cornell are great schools, but when people see Human Ec, there tends to be a raising of eyebrows (including by Cornell alums). Yes, its reputation has improved over the years, but that’s because 30 years ago it was not highly regarded at all. Now it is a fine school, but as I said, in my experience I have not seen it esteemed equally to the other Cornell schools.</p>
<p>I KNOW. I AM IN EXACTLY IN THE SAME BOAT AS YOU.</p>
<p>for me its:</p>
<p>NU - WCAS (biological sciences)
Cornell - HE (human biology, health and society/biology and society)</p>
<p>potential careers: related med, global health</p>
<p>I love both schools so much (based on research) that i feel so torn having the need to choose one. I’ve spent hours perusing over student reviews and forums, talked to ppl abt it, thought and prayed abt it for days and nights, and even made a table that consists of 4 pages weighing the pros and cons, and yet i’m still wavering between the two, sometimes even sick of thinking about picking one.</p>
<p>Well at least you get to visit the two schools.
please post here what you think of the environment, people, etc, for both collges and ur final decision! It’ll help ambivalent ppl like me who live abroad (hong kong) and are unable to visit the campuses!</p>
<p>THANK YOU.</p>
<p>"…my understanding as to the impression the schools’ names make on resumes when we are hiring at my firm. As I said above, both NU and Cornell are great schools, but when people see Human Ec, there tends to be a raising of eyebrows (including by Cornell alums). Yes, its reputation has improved over the years, but that’s because 30 years ago it was not highly regarded at all. Now it is a fine school, but as I said, in my experience I have not seen it esteemed equally to the other Cornell schools. "</p>
<p>Well I went there, 30+ years ago, have a kid there now, neither of us in Hum Ec, and I don’t feel the same way at all as these “cornell alums” of yours. Back in the day I saw nothing to distinguish Hum Ec school majors, as a group, from students at the other contract colleges there. If anything, these students are slightly relatively better now, and they have certain specialty majors, relating to pre-med (Human Bio, or whatever), that seem more prominent now than when I attended. And successful, BTW, from what I can tell. But back then, the students were essentially indistinguishable to me.</p>
<p>And I’m suprised you’ve seen many of them in the workplace to be evaluating them, it is a small school with various specialized majors that tend not to be applying for the vast spectrum of jobs in general. Not too many situations where a major in nutrition, human biology or fashion design is competing with an english lit major for the same job. But if you are making certain assumptions based solely on school you are potentially making a mistake, because some of the brightest students at Cornell attended the contract colleges there.</p>
<p>Each of these colleges is a leader in their respective areas of study; a student with interest in the specific fields they focus on does not have many “better” places to go to pursue these particular areas. In the same sense that Northwestern’s College of Communications undoubtedly has outstanding programs in its field and has many outstanding graduates.</p>
<p>Besides which, I imagine a good chunk of grads of both schools go on to graduate and professional schools and will eventually be evaluated for employment primarily on their terminal degree. For example, kid of guy I know is graduating from Hum Ec with 2+ med school admissions in hand, I imagine the MD will be more relevant for subsequent employment than the BS from Hum Ec.</p>
<p>Regarding NW, suggest check to see to what extent proximity to chicago erodes the nature of campus life there. My D2 saw some urban and suburban campuses where campus life turned essentially non-existent on weekends, becoming virtually ghost towns. Cornell life is centered in and around campus, where you will be in the company of the college community, in a college town.</p>
<p>At NW a far higher proprtion of your fellow students will be from the midwest, and at Cornell a far higher proportion will be from the Northeast. This might possibly have some ramifications for more probable subsequent geographic bias, proximity of college friends , alumni base, grad programs, etc.</p>
<p>I decided to attend Cornell :)</p>
<p>Thanks for the feedback!</p>
<p>Congratulations on your choice!</p>
<p>GAD - curious as to how you made your decision? Did you visit other websites to help with the process. I have been to both and they seemed to have a very different vibe, different type of locale, etc. Academics great at both. Both very well regarded. did you prefer the Cornell type college town 'bubble" over being near a big city? was it the specific coursework?</p>
<p>Away from academics, the ‘mantra’ about Chicago/Evanston ‘connection’ of Northwestrern is becoming somewhat stale. Everytime the NU positives are mentioned, this Chicago is mentioned as the first or second item. Honestly, you are not going to the college for the big city. You are going for the education and college/campus experience first. IF this Chicago connection is SO PROMINENT in NU’s strength, then you need to rethink whether NU is really that good. Again, no one is going to Columbia for NYC, Harvard for Boston, UPenn for Philly, or Caltech for Los Angeles. Although you can take advantage of the cities from time to time, that’s just 1-2% of your college life.</p>
<p>SOmeone also mentioned that NU’s campus is a ghost town on weekends because all kids go to the city, where as Cornell has a lively campus life, even on weekends? 4 years is short and you can live on campus and not feel that sick.</p>
<p>toughyear-
So what did your s decide?
As for your comment above, I believe that the location of a school - like its size and other factors - DO make a difference, so I don’t think that the fact that NU is in a great suburb right outside of Chicago can be “stale,” because it remains true for each and every student who is weighing different factors that may be more or less appealing about different schools. Also, there is not a doubt in my mind that some students DO pick Columbia for NYC when they are comparing it to, say, Duke, and that others pick Dartmouth over Harvard (and vice versa) because they prefer (or dislike) the more remote location and the difference in size.
Finally, it is definitely not my understanding that the NU campus is a “ghost town” on weekends. There’s always a lot going on.</p>
<p>WCASParent – well, he is still up in the air and is being increasingly pressured to make a decision. We visited cornell last week and he first turned more positive, then more negative. He was first turned positive after doing some investigation on CC, attending presentations there and talking with his friends who made recent visits. Then he turned a bit more negative after attending an informal BBQ party at one seneior UG(premed) student’s apartment where a number of senior/junior students and faculty attended where he spoke with some students who were apparently stressed out in their studies. My s will be visiting the wild cats day for 26-28th of April. I keep reminding him that he will have to send in the decision cards the day after he returns, and thus do some more serious research and thinking before going there so that he can observe/study the ‘right’ questions on the campus and with the existing students. Being premed, we came to the conclusion that the rigor of courseworks should be less of a factor because he has to work as hard no matter where he may end up; also for the same matter, the college life and social life may matter less due to the focus he has to maintain for the four years. So this sort of neutralized the disadvantage Cornell had with respect to NU. We’ve been talking about the importance of academic options, such as selection of courses and majors as well as the ease or difficulty of maintaing a good grade, which is not possible to answer before actually attending to the school for a while. He also has the research scholar position at cornell which will nicely give him the necessary ‘research’ item in his med school application. One thing we are unable to judge is what kind of research and clinical experience and how easily, NU may be able to provide during the first three years of study there.</p>
<p>I threw the above post to provoke some responses about NU from the existing students. I noted that this CC NU board is very quiet and far fewer existing students seem to ‘sell’ their school as compared with cornell and other schools. Only alumnus (Sam Lee) or parents (like yourself) seem to respond and provide feedbacks. I thought this may indicate that the students are less excited or enthusiastic about their school once having matriculated. There are quite a few cornell students pitching for their school and I liked their enthusiasm.</p>
<p>My d had 2 friends who were both stressed out in their studies at Northwestern.</p>
<p>IMO, if someone is going to go premed at either of these schools, taking the full, “typical” pre med path regarding coursework, they should plan on being somewhat stressed out, at either school. Any differential in degree of stressed out would have too many variables to distinguish.</p>
<p>There is a regular poster to the cornell board, now in med school, who seems to insist that it’s no big deal there. I don’t believe him, as far as the routine experience goes, I just think he’s a genius. That’s the prolem with talking to particuar people, they are not you. But as a macro matter, I’ve never heard anyone suggesting Northwestern is any mellow school, in fact my Ds friends said the reverse is true. Hence I personally doubt there is any real difference in this regard that can be relaibly and validly discerned.</p>
<p>YMMV.</p>
<p>You can look at average grades, though, if these are available. I think on the Cornell board I’ve seen reference to that. But you can bet people work for those grades. At both of these schools, I imagine.</p>