@shawnspencer I think Case is under ranked, not over ranked. So its BETTER than the 37th best, in my opinion for a few reasons:
Every student gets a research option, if they want it, not just the A students
Professors want to work with undergraduates, and are devoted
The location is nice college town, stuff to do, and public transportation included in the fees.
The students are serious and smart
The size is perfect, for getting to know other students and feeling like a family.
service focus for every student, in SAGES, the general education program (three writing classes required
for every major).
Humanities professors often got their PhDs at U of Chicago, truly good humanities classes !
So it has the best of a liberal arts education combined with a fantastic research education in many fields,unusual, for a US school.
Students can get the best of a liberal arts education and also get a fine research or technical education.
Co op program is fantastic for the engineers.
Well, I am a fan of Case Western! I am thinking I should draw a salary as their marketing arm by now.
We were frankly dubious about Case Western, I mean CLEVELAND right? But I was blown over at the options my son had there. He is now at Cornell and still writing one more physics paper with his Case professor. Case just rocks, for science and music, and accounting and nursing. I am sure I left off some good majors.
I am honestly glad you feel that way! Sounds like where I go to school, a medium sized college that combines the best of the liberal arts and having opportunities for doing research and the like. Good to hear that other schools also have that wonderful blend.
We live just outside of NYC, and very, very few people at our son’s school has heard of Case Western, which is a shame. I took my son there for an open house, and he loved it. We had very low expectations on our visit but were pleasantly surprised by many things - academic resources, research opportunities, University Circle (specifically, the Cleveland Orchestra and the Cleveland Museum of Art), friendliness of the students, the city of Cleveland itself, etc. The only major disappointment was the lack of school spirit…we were there during Springfest/Hudson Relays…and my son’s comment was, “So the big spring party at Case is a band playing for 30 students who dance worse than me?” And my son dances like Elaine Benes…
@Shrmpngrtz Ha, yeah, I think the sponsored parties are low key. Quite a few over age 21 students go dancing in Cleveland though. Its not just a campus, its a city with lots to do. Anything sponsored by Case is very low key and kind of geeky, but Greek life is alive and well at Case. If your son gets in, then have him go back alone and talk to students about social life.
I don’t really think my son attended a lot of those “Case sponsored parties”, but not entirely sure. Social life goes off campus, by junior year, although there is plenty of suites on campus if a students wants on campus housing and does not want to go Greek, its easy to get housing. But the on campus students go to lots of off campus parties.
Not as crazy as a big state school, but some party life. Freshman are keeping busy, and may pledge frats by second semester freshman year. There are lots of outings in freshman year to learn to use public transportation and go downtown too. Sports are a huge deal, Cavs, Indians. Most Case students get swept into becoming Cleveland fans, unless they are from Chicago of course! (or SF).
I think there is a bit of a funny culture, “CWRU Rocks my socks”, kind of thing. It is a community.
If you look at their recruiting visits map, they are mostly in their own region, with a few very large cities outside of their region. They’re not investing recruiters’ time to build a class from all 50 states.
Just because Case accepts international students does not mean it has a solid reputation internationally. A majority of Chinese have no idea of what Case is and many don’t care about it since there are so many reputable state schools in the Midwest such as Purdue, Michigan, Illinois, and Ohio State that have superior programs compared to Case. The international population at Case are not Peking, Tsinghua, or C9 caliber students. Many of them can only get into mid to lower tier Project 211 or Project 985 plan schools, which are around top 100 schools in China. These students often perform worse compared to their American peers.
The data sets that I’ve read show that Case actually has a stronger admitted class based on test scores and class ranking than most Big Ten schools like Ohio State/Purdue and is on par with Michigan. Case is a much smaller school that is recognized by professionals for specific research rather than through popular name recognition that comes from the fandom of collegiate sports and a huge alumni network. Case is the affiliated university to The Cleveland Clinic, but few people realize that hospital is ranked above Johns Hopkins. The majority of Ohioans don’t know what a treasure it is, or the number of Nobel prizes, inventions, public health innovations, etc. associated with it. Just because some people are ignorant of its value, doesn’t mean it isn’t providing a world class education.
Actually, according to data sets, Case is actually a much more glorified version of Ohio State and Purdue. In terms of research, Case is good, but students shouldn’t solely pick a college just because it’s “good” at research. Case is not well known elsewhere because public universities in the Midwest offer much stronger engineering programs than Case. Yes, the Cleveland Clinic is a good hospital, and most people know what it is. Case is not really a treasure, and I’m sure a majority of Ohioans know that Case isn’t anything special compared to Ohio State. In fact, Ohio State has better programs in engineering and humanities, even medicine. How is Case a treasure? What are the innovations?
Also, if Case is even living up to its research reputation, why doesn’t it provide people with opportunities associated with the research? I apologize for digressing here, but I feel that the education I’ve received here doesn’t correlate with the research. I chose Case over Purdue and Ohio State because of what I’ve heard about the research, its affiliation with the Cleveland Clinic, and the innovations made here. However, when I arrived, I realized that there is nothing special about Case and that it offers same programs everywhere else.
I know when I went to Case, you had to provide evidince/data to support your consclusions.
“In fact, Ohio State has better programs in engineering and humanities, even medicine”
Please provide detailed evidence why this is so. What programs are better? What makes them better? How do you know this?
We are not trying to dispute your feelings about Case, but you make broad statements and provide no evidence for them.
You can say that rankings don’t really matter and that they have bias. If so, why does Case post those figures on their “Facts and Figures” webpage. Like a figure for being ranked 37th overall for US News and World Report, being ranked 12th for undergraduate BME, and 32nd for WSJ ranking. It seems like to me that Case is cherry picking data to make themselves seem better. Why don’t they ever say what their rank is overall in context to US News for engineering, humanities, or business. You can say that rankings don’t tell you much, but why don’t the Ivies or Ivy equivalent schools post ranking statistics on their website? It seems like less known schools are using those rankings to convince students to apply and go there.
Also, what would be the difference of studying engineering or chemistry at Case vs. Ohio State in terms of the material? It’s pretty much the same.
I go to Case and one of my close friends is from Cleveland, so she has a lot of friends at Ohio State. When she talked to her engineering major friends at OSU about their classes, she was really surprised.
For Case, we have to either take a full semester of Matlab or Java. At OSU, they get their programming knowledge by going over multiple languages for two weeks each. So where they get a basic knowledge of many languages, we dive deep into Matlab or Java so that we can actually use them for complicated engineering calculations.
For our engineering math sequence at Case, we take Calc I, Calc II, Calc III, and then Differential Equations for one semester each. At OSU, they combine Calc III and Diff Eq into a single semester, which means they go into less depth.
Finally, this is anecdotal and might just be due to their personal experiences and choices, but from what we’ve heard, Case’s workload is WAY harder that OSU Engineering’s - my friend’s OSU engineering friends always complain about not having anything to do on Sundays whereas we at Case spend our Sundays studying and doing work.
So I guess my knowledge is anecdotal so might not be accurate overall, but from what I’ve gathered, Case goes more in depth on content and prepares its students for the real world with its high workload.
I doubt that studying engineering or chemistry is “the same” at CWRU vs. The Ohio State University, even though the content may be the same in many cases. There are probably meaningful differences in areas such as class size, access to faculty/instructors, and student/faculty ratios, among others.
Saying that the study of engineering or chemistry is “the same” at CWRU vs. The Ohio State University because they cover similar material, is like saying that driving a Jaguar vs. a dump truck is the same because both have combustion engines that move the vehicles.
@SuperAnz69 What is your major? I can tell you that if you want to get to know your professors at Case Western, you will get a much better education than Purdue or Ohio State. You will be able to work one on one with a very top professor at Case Western, try reaching out. I can help you figure out which professors to approach if you PM me.
My son was like you may be, shy and he did not reach out at first. Once he did, WOW., His mentor helped him learn about his field, got him into a summer position at U of Maryland, wrote papers with my son and still stays in touch.
Thats the beauty of a smaller campus like Case Western. Take advantage of it, please, you are paying for this personal service from world class professors. Get to know at least one in your four years, and it will pay off for you, too. My son got into his first choice graduate program. Case is known to get students into top medical, law, business and PhD programs, if thats what you want. There is a co op program too, if you want to work over the summers, but research work is king at Case Western.
@SuperAzn69 . Some reasons why Case Western is better academically than many public engineering programs
Class size is smaller
students are much smarter so you have more competition, compare average ACT scores
Professors CARE about undergrads, not just the PhD students
Even if you earn Bs at Case Western you can get a research project , Ohio State? only the tippy top get one
Classes are much more demanding than a most public programs in engineering, besides Michigan, Illinois and GT
With that, I have respect for Purdue in engineering, but its huge , like a thousand
in the freshman math classes. Its hard to get a quality education when the classes are so large.
Ohio State is known as a great school for statistics research, not so much engineering, is my take.
Ohio State is famous for football.
Its about selectivity and personal attention you get at Case Western.