I got accepted to UPenn and Cornell but I’m not sure where to go, and I’m just looking for more information to make a well informed and educated decision. I want to know more about the to know more about the teaching style of both schools, the type of assignments that they give, the atmosphere of the campus, the grading style of the professors, how accessible professors. I don’t really mind the weather or the city vs. rural. Any info will help! Also Im trying to become a biomedical engineer or something of that sort and work with stem cells and such.Also if you have any other pros and cons please let me know and why do people say that Cornell is the hardest to graduate from and do any of these schools suffer from grade inflation( it’s something people keep mentioning).
@naijamentality Both Penn and cornell have grade deflation compared to say harvard or Yale, but at Cornell it is much worse than Penn. Penn definitely has the better bioengineering department of the two. Also Penn’s medical school and hospital and the research that is being done there is world renowned and way better than Cornell’s. I don’t know about Cornell but at Penn undergraduates have very easy access to research and it is something the school really encourages undergrads to do. I have many friends early as freshman year were able tonget research positions at HUP supervised by the best of the best scientists in their fields who work at HUP. So based on your academic interests Penn is the clear choice. Apart from academics, quality of life at penn is much better than Cornell. Penn is known for its great social life, also penn has more resources per student and its smaller size means better access to professors/opportunities etc. also in terms if career prospects and employment statistics penn definitely trumps Cornell. in general it is quite uncommon to choose Cornell over penn and especially given your academic/professional interests, Penn is def the better choice.
Yes, I love Penn vibrant atmosphere. I can’t wait to visit Penn the second time in May for my daughter’s graduation.
In response to the guy just absolutely taking a shit on Cornell:
Cornell is known for having lower grades than Harvard or Yale; however, it’s different for respective colleges within Cornell. For example, though in the college of engineering the median may be a C+ or a B- overall for some classes, the median for the whole school is more like a B+ and in many classes A-. Cornell’s medical school is also world renown and I’m not sure how you can just flatout say penn’s medical school is way better. In terms of research, penn may be more immediately accessible, but Cornell is an absolute powerhouse for research in most fields often more than most of the other ivies. If you don’t really mind living in frigid temperatures or the middle of nowhere, there is something to be said about the natural beauty and charm of Cornell’s campus that you simply can’t find in an urban environment. Cornell also has an excellent social scene — it’s such a large university that you really can find any type of person or organization to hangout with. The employment and career prospects are also excellent at Cornell and you have to consider them within your interest. I know many engineers are recruited straight out of Cornell. I can’t argue with the fact that UPenn does have more money per student than Cornell, that’s just a fact.
I don’t think this is as clear cut a decision as Penn95 makes it out to be: Cornell’s college of engineering is top-tier and both universities are incredibly excellent. It’s also not all that uncommon for people to choose Cornell over Penn so don’t feel like the only person that would do that.
TLDR: Both these schools are great, with some different pros and cons, and you’ll be probably be just as successful as an engineer at either.
Both great schools so congratulations on having great choices. If possible, revisit and try to talk to kids in the major(s) you are interested in. Penn does have strong biomedical engineering. I know Cornell has very strong engineering but not sure about biomedical. Cornell is beautiful but it is really isolated. What I like about Penn is being on a campus but being in the middle of a great city. Also, being on the northeast corridor means that NYC and Washington DC are short train rides away.
I think people have covered it, but given your interest in BME and/or research science – consider Penn just because of the accessibility to a ton of research opportunities. As Penn95 mentioned, there are people who pick up research gigs starting as freshman – maybe not in the exact area that interests them right away but they start to build up experience right away, which eventually allows them to get into a research lab they want or do their own research. That’s simply because Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Presbyterian Hos. of the Univ. of Penn, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia are all right on campus and tons of departments within those 3 hire students every year for research work, so it’s not a pipedream to get in there. I know more than one person who started in such a position as a freshman and ended up finding themselves a mentor in the MD or PhD they were working for and that person ended up guiding the student’s own research for 4 yrs followed by an application to med school or a PhD program.
I’m not suggesting Cornell doesn’t have such opportunities, but it’s just about location and accessibility. While it’s pure sciences departments are up in Ithaca; its hospitals are in Manhattan – so you’d have access to them for summer internships, but not year round.
@blackfootedpig i never said cornell isnt an amazing school. everything that i stated it is just facts: yes cornell has more grade deflation than penn (and persoanlly i respect Cornell students more than say harvard students for that). yes the bioengineering/biomedical department is better at Penn (of course cornell is better in more engineering departments than Penn). and yes truth is Penn medical school and hospital are more renowned than cornell’s. that doesn’t mean cornell’s med school and hospital aren’t great. but in general Penn hospital gets more research funding, has more higher ranked residencies, its med school has always been more highly regarded/ranked.etc. also it is right on campus and the ugrads have tremedous access to the hospital. i stated that GIVEN her interest in BME, Penn is clearly the better choice.
Also it is a fact that Penn’s overall employment outcomes are better than Cornell’s (again this doesn’t mean Cornell doesn’t have amazing employment outcomes) also it is true that the vast majority of cross admits chooses Penn over Cornell. I am not talking shit about Cornell, just stating the facts. And based on objective facts about Penn’s overall undergraduate quality and resources as well as the bio engineering department and hospital quality at Penn relative to Cornell, Penn is the clear better choice for her.
Had he/she asked me Stanford, MIT vs Penn I would have said Stanford, MIT both in terms of overall ugrad and bioengineering quality. also stanford med school/hospital is at the very least as well regarded as Penn and as an MIT student you could have relatively easy access to MGH, BWH and the rest of the Partners hospitals. I am neither making Penn to be more than it is or Cornell less. Had he/she asked me about Johns Hopkins I would have said that the overall quality of the undergraduate program and the overall quality of students it enrolls might be a notch down from Penn but the bioengineering program there is the absolute best. I think I am just being objective here.