<p>since you rank princeton as 1, would you consider it the hardest undergrad school to get into?? or not? (how would you rank the ivys in order from most difficult to get admitted to easiest????)</p>
<p>In the beginning, before there was a Big 10 or a Big 12 or a Big 8, there was the Big Three;
Harvard, Princeton and Yale. The Lord looked upon these Three and saw that they were good, but not in themselves sufficient for the needs of His people. Thus He caused lesser, but still wonderful, institutions to form; among these Penn, Dartmouth and Columbia. Finally He observed that even the dregs of the elite needed a place of their own and so Brown and Cornell took form. </p>
<p>At least that is what we tell the children. LOL</p>
<p>Does anyone have an answer to my Yale question?</p>
<p>Wait... I never said Cornell was a crap school, or anything of that nature. ILR is a really unique school. If that's your thing, good for you.</p>
<p>All I'm saying is it doesn't seem to measure up to HPYCBPD. Cornell has the best engineering, I will give it that. I do think, however, that there are some schools that are better that could really take Cornell's spot haha.</p>
<p>"And the guy that said it doesn't belong in the ivy league is a pretentious fraud. Wake up; in the real world Cornell is highly respected among employers which is what matters most."
-- What? Of course it's highly respected - but I would not say as much as any of the other Ivy's.</p>
<p>Quit making fun of the only Ivies that I have the slightest chance of ever getting into! (Obviously, those do not include the Triumvirate.)</p>
<p>As to which are the most difficult to get into, that question is easy to answer objectively. Check out the acceptance rates.</p>
<p>Oh, but then again, getting into princeton engineering as a girl is a bit easier...hm, I guess it depends on a few things.</p>
<p>And also, sorry about that nickel75 - didn't catch the sarcasm. My bad.</p>
<ol>
<li>Harvard</li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>UPenn / Dartmouth</li>
<li>Brown / Columbia</li>
<li>Cornell</li>
</ol>
<p>@ Oliver Tree: I think Yale's focus on undergraduate is as high as Princeton's due to the Residential College system, the high proportion of money that is given to undergraduate studies and Yale's stated intentions of continuing to place undergraduates as the top priority. Once the two new residential colleges are created, the undergraduate population will increase by 15% which will surpass the graduate population. When I visited Yale (which solidified it as my first choice), none of undergraduates felt ignored or that their professors were "untouchable". Classes were never (may there are a few that I don't know about) by TAs and the university did all that it could to provide innumerable opportunities for its college students. As Princeton doesn't really have grad schools, there aren't as many opportunities to take graduate classes, talk to grad students and get a glimpse of it on campus. This is all in my opinion and I tried to use as much fact as possible, but forgive me if I am wrong and correct me if I am. But that is why I would put Princeton and Yale at the #1 spot for undergraduate focus in the Ivy League.</p>
<p>According to US News & World Report 2009, it's:
1) Harvard
2) Princeton
3) Yale
4) UPenn
5) Columbia
6) Dartmouth
7) Cornell
8) Brown</p>
<p>But I would go more for...
1) Harvard
2) Princeton/Yale
4) Columbia/UPenn
6) Brown/Dartmouth
8) Cornell</p>
<p>
[quote]
Quit making fun of the only Ivies that I have the slightest chance of ever getting into! (Obviously, those do not include the Triumvirate.)
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Lmao. I am being pretty hard on Cornell - and sadly, that's also one of the Ivies that I have the slightest chance of getting into. That's almost partly the reason I'm being hard on it lol.</p>
<p>"As Princeton doesn't really have grad schools"</p>
<p>That's not true. Although Princeton's grad schools are smaller than H and Y, it still has excellent graduate resources. Princeton is arguably the top in graduate and undergraduate study of History, Economics (Nobel this year), Math, and Philosophy among many other fields.</p>
<p>Princeton, however, does not have the traditional professional schools of Law, Medicine, and Business. Some see the presence of these schools as a pro and others as a con.</p>
<p>That's what I meant by Princeton doesn't really have grad schools as in "professional" schools. For me personally, I would prefer to have them there, but just not as an overwhelming presence. But I also don't know whether or not I would prefer them not to be there at all, I just think I would like to have the opportunity to have exposure to them on campus as an undergraduate.</p>
<p>For example, I'm an undergraduate at Yale and I get to do research (for course credit) at the Cancer Biology Lab at the Yale School of Medicine. I get to work with twenty cell lines of human melanoma cancer cells to help develop more effective melanoma treatments. </p>
<p>I personally prefer the presence of the professional schools, especially because the university already has a commitment to undergraduate education.</p>
<p>i would say for universities as a whole </p>
<ol>
<li>Harvard</li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>Penn</li>
<li>Columbia</li>
<li>Dartmouth</li>
<li>Brown</li>
<li>Cornell</li>
</ol>
<p>for undergradutes</p>
<ol>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>Harvard</li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>Penn</li>
<li>Dartmouth</li>
<li>Brown</li>
<li>Columbia</li>
<li>Cornell</li>
</ol>
<p>I think Brown and Columbia tend to ride the coattails of their "Name Brand" type reputation, when in fact Penn and Dartmouth tend to have much stronger programs then they do. Brown gets a lot of applications because of its location in New England, its publicity from the "name." Columbia gets a lot of applications from its location in Manhattan, which I actually see as a detriment to the undergraduate experience, and again the "name." </p>
<p>And for those who talk about Penn's acceptance rate being "high" (15.9%), I think its attributed to two major reasons. People who want to go to Penn, know they want to go to Penn. They have much more specific programs and strong programs that attract a specific demographic, while many people apply to Columbia and Brown simply because of the name not because of the programs. Also, Penn's acceptance rate is really an average of 4 acceptance rates across their 4 colleges. The acceptance rate for Wharton is consistently around 10%, the College of Arts & Sciences is around 10% as well, while the less popular engineering school is around 20-25% and the small nursing school is around 40%. </p>
<p>I think that once Penn contributes to "brand" itself more like Columbia and Brown, it will see its acceptance rate plummet simply because people will throw those "oh, I'll just apply to see if I get in, who knows"-type applications that get sent more to schools like Brown, Columbia and Dartmouth. It has already branded itself well with Wharton, but the names like University of Pennsylvania, UPenn, Penn etc. all tend to blur this image they need. </p>
<p>But when it comes down to it, its not this "image" that matters when it comes to the education, but its a whole lot of what goes into acceptance rates which everyone seems to equate to quality of education.</p>
<p>Actually Penn CAS is more like 15-16% (also its overall acceptance rate went up last year to 16.4%). Whether that means anything is another issue. I personally think Penn/ Columbia/ Brown/ Dartmouth are too close to call in most cases - i.e. for the individual applicant there is essentially zero difference in selectivity between any of these.</p>
<p>Objectively :</p>
<p>1) Harvard
2) Yale
3) Princeton
4) Columbia
5) Dartmouth
6) Brown
7) Penn
8) Cornell</p>
<p>Subjectively :</p>
<p>1) Harvard
2) Columbia
3) Dartmouth
4) Brown
5) Princeton
6) Cornell
7) Yale
8) Penn</p>
<p>Oh, Harvard.</p>
<p>Wow.</p>
<p>What's with Yale being num 7 on the subjective list? Is it because they have roaches in some of their dorms, because that's pretty gross...</p>
<p>Here's a very interesting study to use it for what it's worth: SSRN-A</a> Revealed Preference Ranking of U.S. Colleges and Universities by Christopher Avery, Mark Glickman, Caroline Hoxby, Andrew Metrick .</p>
<p>@neethus1 - No, I'm just bitter because I got rejected. =P</p>