<p>Well, to answer your first question:</p>
<p>"One of the things that's very distinctive about Hopkins is that it has unusually high-level, remarkably small departments in the humanities. We're able to do an awful lot without having a huge faculty," Ferguson says. And because all of the humanities departments are housed together, "people know about and take an interest in things happening in departments other than their own," she says. "Last week I was at three humanities lectures only one of which was sponsored by my department. I have been at other places serious universities but I don't know of any place that has as much intellectual exchange across department lines as Hopkins does."</p>
<p>Taken from [url=<a href="http://www.jhu.edu/jhumag/0206web/halls.html%5Dhere%5B/url">http://www.jhu.edu/jhumag/0206web/halls.html]here[/url</a>].</p>
<p>As for your second question, I'm not too sure. I'm assuming the sciences have many more students involved, and thus are more competitive. I'd also guess that because of the larger student/teacher ratio, the students recieve a little less attention in the sciences. </p>
<p>Laxfan or AdmissionsDaniel could probably provide more info.</p>