<p>If Harvard is like strong in law/med and U of Chicago is like economics etc...</p>
<p>What are the Cornell's strengths? Also its weaknesses?</p>
<p>I realize I am kind of broad on the question....
But I just wanted to know what Cornell is "specialized" at</p>
<p>I'd most characterize Cornell as a "jack of all trades" school. It's very good for many programs, but the absolute best at.. well.. not really many. I guess you could say it has the best architecture, hotel, and vet school in the country. Many other programs are also very strong- especially the sciences (chemistry, biology- almost all specializations, and physics), engineering, english, math, and philosophy. You will find courses for any subject you could imagine taking!</p>
<p>cornell is extremely strong in the biological sciences.</p>
<p>Even though it might seem like a science based school; the university excells in the liberal arts too, as the user above has posted.</p>
<p>Cornell is definitely the best Ivy engineering department.</p>
<p>dont forget ILR. Cornell is easily one of the best in the world when it comes to ILR. Cornell ILR also seems to be at the very front of the globalization issue, something which is becomming very important to American workers.</p>
<p>I think it has the highest proportion of science majors among the Ivies. It seems to be the only Ivy that consistently competes with MIT and the other technical schools for top engineering students.</p>
<p>cornell's music program isn't that big, i guess thats a weakness; I dunno too much about it.</p>
<p>Architecture, Urban Planning, The Sciences in general, Engineering, Hotel, Veterenary, ILR come to mind for me (who is not particularly educated when it comes to cornell's strong programs). Others have mentioned math and english as well.</p>
<p>One great thing about cornell is it's very very good at everything. in terms of liberal arts, or a smart kid who doesnt know exactly what he or she wants to do, cornell seems like the perfect place. 4000+ courses in a rediculously diverse range of fields mean you could come into CAS as a prospective CompSci major, decide you'd rather do mech. engineering after a semester, then feel like you can't handle the courseload and switch to hotel at the start of sophomore year. (i'm not saying hotel is easy, it was just an example) so yeah, especially for undecided students, cornell's top notch in almost every field status is gold.</p>
<p>Could someone in CAS take a course in some of the other schools? (Take and intro engineering class for a CAS physics major, etc) It seems like it would be silly not to allow some of this to happen.</p>
<p>Just for fun, could I take a course at the Hotel School? Would it get me any credit? Just wondering. (I am in CAS) Maybe I could come home and be an awesome wine taster or something.</p>
<p>You can take ANY class offered at cornell regardless of the college you are in, as long as you have met the prerequisites. in other words, jerew, yes! mad kids take the wine class @ hotel school :p</p>
<p>i'm not sure how it's done in the other schools at Cornell, but here's how it's done at ILR: There's a number of core classes every ILR student must take. After that, there's a certain number of elective courses students must take within the ILR school (it can be any class, as long as it's in ILR). After that students have a certain number of free electives they can take anywheres at Cornell.</p>
<p>And yes, you would of course get credit for taking a course outside of your college!</p>
<p>I know at least for CAS students, that you can take any class at any school as long as you're qualified. . . .</p>
<p>HOWEVER you cannot double major in a topic outside of your college.</p>
<p>as a matter of fact you're required to take a fairly liberal distribution of courses...</p>
<p>Don't forget about the very strong business program at Cornell - Applied Economics and Management (AEM) in CALS. It's one of only two accredited undergraduate business program in the Ivy League (the other is Penn-Wharton). AEM at Cornell is very selective: 2004 freshman admission was 98 people, a 19% admission rate with a 77% yield.</p>