I visited both Johns Hopkins and UPenn and fell in love with both, but I have no idea which one I want to apply early decision to. I want to do premed, and I was just wondering if anyone knew which school would be better for that. I’ve heard that JHU is extremely cutthroat in compared to all other premed programs, which kind of scares me applying ED. Also does anyone know if it’s true that JHU isn’t in a safe location? Any comments would help, thank you!
My D17 was accepted at both. Penn seemed much safer to me. The Chief of police for Penn is doing a great job. She has a large force and cameras all over the place. Good luck.
Both are great for pre-med path. I don’t think there is a much difference in the safety. Given majority of students who enter college with medical school plans end up changing their mind, whether it’s because of pre-med weeding our or new found interests in other fields, I would pick based on your secondary interests.
I would expect similar safety issues at both JHU and Penn, as well as at other urban campuses like USC, Chicago, or Yale.
The campus itself will be quite safe. There will also be a safe “bubble” zone extending several blocks from campus that contains student-oriented housing and services. The bubble may be larger on some sides of the campus, and smaller on others. There will be neighborhoods within walking distance of all of these campuses, but outside of the bubble, that will not be safe, particularly after dark. You will have to learn where it is and is not appropriate to go.
I knew a long-distance runner who went to JHU-Homewood as a grad student, and he had no problems with safety while running off-campus. However, he restricted his running routes to the north of campus, where there are miles of affluent residential neighborhoods. It probably wouldn’t be a good idea to run long distances from the campus in other directions.
JHU has multiple campuses in the Baltimore-Washington area. Presumably the OP means the Homewood campus in north Baltimore, where most of the undergraduates are. The JHU medical campus, a few miles away in east Baltimore, is in a worse neighborhood where the safety rules would be more restrictive.
@ks2018 I would say Penn because the premed it said to be less cutthroat than Hopkins and in general Penn will give you a more well-rounded undergrad education. Another significant point is that at Penn the medical school is right on campus, in fact right next to where most undergrads live. So you will have easy access to one of the best med schools in the country. There are many opportunities at Penn for undergrads to do research in the med school, and this can be a big plus in your med school applications later on.
In terms of location, neither is the safest but I think at penn it is safer, especially in the last couple of decades because the campus and has been transformed, Penn police have been doing a great job and the west-philly area around campus is rapidly being gentrified.
Both are great for pre-med. Penn’s humanities departments are stronger on the whole so if you are looking for the best professors in fields that span your premed requirements AND english, history, economics , etc. then Penn is a better choice. Additionally, as Penn95 said, you’ll have access to all of Penn’s graduate/professional schools as well as the other undergrad schools and research institutes on campus to add to your education as well. So you can do research with professors at Penn Med, CHOP, the Wistar Institute, etc. while fulfilling your pre-med requirements and taking classes in Penn’s many wonderful departments.
As for safety, Baltimore and Hopkins are improving but they’re not quite there yet. JHU has actually modeled its neighborhood improvement plans on those that were extremely successful for Penn:
""Where Hopkins is now, Penn was, say, in 1996,” says Anthony Sorrentino, assistant vice-president in the office of the executive vice-president at Penn.
He adds that 20 years ago “urban decay had enveloped our campus and West Philadelphia was embattled, [by] violent crime, blight, low educational attainment in the public schools, the general decay that comes with the white flight…for the country and the suburbs”."
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/university-as-pillar-of-community#survey-answer
That being said, Baltimore, like most east coast urban centers, is on the rise! Don’t underestimate the power of an exceptional university like JHU to change the city very, very quickly. And as it is now, students seem plenty happy and safe on the JHU campus so if you really prefer it over Penn, I wouldn’t be too fearful of attending.
Feel free to check out my other posts about Penn for more info and I’m always happy to answer any questions you might have! Good luck 
This is true, but if you read the linked story, it’s talking about neighborhood improvement at JHU’s East Baltimore campus (the medical campus). It’s not talking about the Homewood campus, where nearly all JHU undergraduates are located (except for the Peabody music students, who are at yet another campus).
The East Baltimore campus is not in a good area, as noted in post #3 above. However, Homewood is literally miles from the East Baltimore campus, and is adjacent to much better neighborhoods. Admittedly it would be easy to get confused, because the JHU stock photos that were used for the story show the Homewood campus, rather than the East Baltimore campus.
Hopkins is certainly no slouch in the humanities, though very few choose to major in those subjects. Writing, history, and art history are all extremely strong, as are several of the language departments (German, Near Eastern studies, etc.). In the arts, Peabody is highly regarded for music. Penn really only has a noticeable edge in classics and to a lesser extent philosophy, though neither is particularly strong in the latter. Any differences between Hopkins and Penn in the humanities are minimal to nonexistent, especially at the undergraduate level.
The social sciences are a different case, as Penn dominates in that arena. Penn is especially strong in anthropology and linguistics but also fares well in econ, psych, sociology, and poli sci. The main standout program in the social sciences at Hopkins is IR.
@warblersrule In terms of the humanities, Penn also has a clear edge in English and communication. English is one of Penn’s key liberal arts strengths. For philosophy the difference is smaller. For the rest of the humanities there is not much difference.
thank you everyone! although I’m still applying to Johns Hopkins regular decision, I decided to apply to Penn early decision!
This is definitely a first world problem. These are both world class programs. Penn students are definitely tend to be cooperative. The social network at pen would rapidly shutdown any cutthroat behavior.
I very much agree that JHU is no slouch in the humanities. Though Penn does have the edge in the areas mentioned (classics and philosophy) as well as in English, Economics, Anthropology, Art History, Politics, Religious Studies (though I’m not sure JHU has a religious studies department at all), and Spanish language and lit. Penn is also a bit stronger in Comparative lit and French and Francophone Language and Literature. JHU tends to be stronger in German, Linguistics, and music. Both are considered equally exemplary for history. Whether that matters at the undergraduate level can vary and is partially up to the students themselves. It’s not a secret that the best scholars go to the schools with the strongest departments in their fields. Going to a school with more top programs in the humanities means more access to the best scholars in the humanities. And at Penn, because of the one university policy, students are permitted to take classes in both the graduate and undergraduate schools, in addition to having permission to do research with professors across school boundaries. Stronger departments also tend to mean more scholarly specializations in addition to the bread and butter knowledge bases, allowing for a broader array of class options beyond the intros and standard upper levels.
For example, compare the undergraduate course offerings of the Penn English Department with those at JHU. Penn is offering 117 english courses in the fall and 110 in the spring. JHU appears to be offering 51 in the fall (not including the 2 internships, 2 independent studies, and 2 senior essays they list as a course offerings-- but still including the multiple sections of the same course that they list separately cause I don’t feel like counting them all)
https://www.english.upenn.edu/courses/undergraduate
http://english.jhu.edu/undergraduate/courses/
And it’s not just quantity, there’s a difference in the types of course offerings there as well. Penn’s span many interdisciplinary boundaries and focus on super niche areas of literature and writing that JHU’s department doesn’t seem to be offering.
And the same is true in History where scholars tend to think of both programs as pretty equally outstanding. In terms of undergrad course offerings (still allowing JHU to double count multiple sections of the same class cause i’m too lazy to count them out… though the comparison would be more striking if I did) you have 76 Penn courses and 52 JHU classes (minus a couple of independent studies).
http://www.history.upenn.edu/courses/undergraduate/pc/term/2017c
http://history.jhu.edu/undergraduate/courses/
So yes, you can definitely get a top tier humanities education at JHU, but what JHU can offer in the traditional humanities may be more limited than what Penn can offer because of the greater strength of Penn’s humanities departments on the whole.
What is it about penn posters and insecurity? it’s pervasive throughout this site. JHU is markedly better in most things medical related including the following majors (but hey - why talk about something relevant):
Neurosci, Public Health, Biophysics, Biology, Biochem, etc. etc.
Let’s not even get into undergrad engineering as a topic.
@stevensPR I don’t think that #3 vs. #5 research medical school is really “markedly better in most things medical related.” If so, why do they have a smaller medical school with a lower average MCAT to get in?
@StevensPR sorry if I offended you. I was just correcting a misconception about the strength of the Humanities at Penn compared to JHU. It doesn’t come from insecurity but rather I think it’s important that CC readers be aware that Penn has some of the strongest humanities departments. It would be a shame if someone were to overlook those opportunities because people on CC paper over genuine differences between universities in favor of broad generalizations about “pre professional” and “cut throat premed” schools. Additionally, I wasn’t just listing departments that are great at Penn, I was further clarifying my point on this thread that Penn has wonderful opportunities for pre-med students coupled with broad strength outside of those departments as well-- it was actually highly relevant to what I was saying. It’s also especially relevant to the types of pre-meds who I met at Penn; they don’t JUST care about their pre-med requirements but they reveled in the unique opportunities to study Classics and Philosophy at the highest levels, with the best scholars, as well.
JHU is a wonderful university and I think very highly of it. But it doesn’t have the same strength of scholars, scholarship, and departmental offerings that Penn has in most of the traditional humanities, which is extremely pertinent to pre-med students looking for the breadth and depth of a liberal arts education. It doesn’t mean JHU isn’t a wonderful place to go to school! It’s a truly exceptional institution and I misspoke if I indicated or implied anything to the contrary.
I’m confused how you can say Penn is stronger at the undergraduate level for humanities? Based on what exactly? Dubious translated graduate rankings and looking at number of course offerings?
You also say Penn is better at JHU at French. Yet, where is Penn on this pretty established and reputed list sponsored by none other than France itself?
http://highereducation.frenchculture.org/centers-of-excellence
I can lay claim that JHU is also stronger at Writing Seminars, Romance Languages, International Relations, East Asian Studies and a myriad of other non-STEM majors vs Penn, but that doesn’t make what I say unequivocal fact.
- Graduate rankings can be quite relevant in the humanities because they represent the faculty strength and draw other great faculty to already established programs. And many of the best universities have humanities professors that teach at both the graduate and undergraduate level so undergrads can be quite impacted by those graduate strengths. Yes, my opinion of some of these programs is partially based on doctoral program rankings because they represent general understandings of departmental strengths that are seen and trusted by the people who have to go teach and research at these institutions and who have devoted their lives to these disciplines. The best departments attract the best faculty which is what makes them the best.
- Graduate rankings are also highly relevant at Penn because undergrads are encouraged to take classes in the graduate departments as a consequence of Penn's One University Policy that allows students to take classes/do research/network/etc. in Penn's undergraduate/graduate/professional schools and research centers all housed on Penn's one, contiguous, idyllic urban campus. So undergrads DO have access to the strengths of these graduate programs at Penn.
- The link you posted relates to a relatively new French public relations program to which universities must submit proposals. I don't know if Penn applied, do you? There also isn't a lot of information about the methodology used to evaluate the criteria. Do you have anything better? Any info like a 4 year long evaluation of departmental strength? Plus, that's only a reference to one department; there are many listed there...
- Course offerings matter quite a bit and it's not just about more courses- it's about more courses of specialization in addition to the bread and butter. And that's why I offered them in addition to my reference to the most trusted rankings in the humanities that exist. If you can take more, unique courses in addition to getting a great foundational education in the humanities, then yes, that's indeed better than being able to take fewer, run-of-the-mill courses in addition to standard foundational courses. The hallmarks of a great humanities education are breadth and depth-- can you study broadly but also specialize deeply? Better humanities programs allow you to do that...better.
Feel free to ignore those rankings if you want; but scholar’s don’t ignore them. They consider which schools will (1) pay them the most to (2) work in the most renowned departments (3) in the nicest places to live. I’m not just laying claim to departmental strength; I’m bringing up differences represented in a 4 year long departmental evaluation and then showing you evidence that Penn is translating the greater quality of its humanities departments into genuine opportunities to take more, unique classes.
And with that, I’m done because this is now becoming (actually) irrelevant to OP who has already chosen Penn. au revoir! (picked that one up in the french dep’t at Penn)
@stevensPR It’s real simple, if you have your alma mater in your sign on name, that is the best school to go to no matter what. Not going to get a lot of objectivity.
@CU123 Very true - the absence of fact and rationale is telling
I’m talking about much more than the med school. See anything bio related, cancer or health research funding, public health, neuro sci, the hospital, bio physics, etc etc. JHU med is 36 MCAT (old - Harvard has a 35 for reference), 518 (new), 3.9 GPA (Harvard is 3.91) versus Penn Med at 38 MCAT (old scale) and 3.84 average GPA, and 517 (new MCAT scale). Penn is not harder to get in for med.