<p>I agree they may not be proportional 1:1, but they are correlated to some degree. Let’s face it: many large flagship public universities draw popularity simply from their sheer size and resulting ‘default’ status for the students of that state. I suspect that may explain the anomalous ‘Alabama’ entry above.</p>
<p>Size does not matter, if Caltech were the most sought-after crown jewel. Nicholas Mycroft Christensen of Alabama chose Alabama and MIT. One of the last year’s ten winners, Gabriela Farfan of Stanford and a Wisconsin native, named Wisconsin and Stanford.</p>
<p>From the Intel Talent Search website…</p>
<p>Goals:
“Recognizing excellence in science research”
“Improving math and science education”</p>
<p>Because it is all about math and science…you would expect MIT and CIT to be a the top…</p>
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<p>Uh, actually, size does matter and your examples actually serve to prove the point. The Universities of Alabama and Wisconsin happen to be the largest flagship public universities in their respective states and are therefore going to draw interested students simply for that reason alone. If Nicholas Mycroft Christensen and Gabriela Farfan had come from Alaska, they would have probably said the University of Alaska.</p>
<p>yes, guys…size DOES matter. ;)</p>
<p>When you reach the pinnacle point in science, well, at high school level, you should know the difference between University of Alaska and Caltech.</p>
<p>I used to trade commodity futures. Many times for my untrained eyes, I could not tell the difference from their appearances between copper and gold. Gold was $500/oz while copper was $1.5/lb.</p>
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<p>Similarly, you would think that one would know the difference between Caltech and the University of Alabama.</p>
<p>The point is, the Intel STS is open only to Americans, and every single American is going to be partial to the large public universities of whatever state they happen to live in.</p>
<p>Well, I know three of the finalists from the last three years. Personally I don’t think that they are as dumb as unable of telling the difference between Caltech and the University of Alabama. All three were coached by their parents or professors at universities. I had a long conversation with one of them not long ago. What I understand is that about 20 of last year’s finalists are at Harvard and 10 at MIT. </p>
<p>All three of of them are at Harvard right now. Only one of them I think is really good, in any sense.</p>
<p>This year, MIT is really looking good to get more, so does Stanford.</p>