<p>Hi all,</p>
<p>I was accepted to Harvard RD, and my question is this: Does Harvard have a strong mathematics/comp sci departments, or is Harvard not the place for future math majors? Is MIT a better place to study math?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>Harvard has the strongest math department in USA. Most of High School math competition winners choose to come to Harvard.</p>
<p>Harvard finished first place in Putnam Math Competion 25 times. MIT finished first place only 5 times ( as of 2005) MIT math department is good but they are not at the same level as Harvard. At Harvard, you can have change to work with many Putnam fellows. </p>
<p>Math graduate program is also extremely seletive program admitting only 7-10 people per year and most of them are top winners of International Math Olympiad.. Those PhD graduate students can be your Teaching follows in your math courses at Harvard. </p>
<p>MIT graduate math department is not as selective as Harvard. MIT is PhD program is admitting about 30 students per year. </p>
<p>I can say that the 2nd best program is either Caltech or Princeton</p>
<p>Two, er, words: Math 55.</p>
<p>At Harvard, you can also have chance to take</p>
<p>THE MOST DIFFICULT UNDERGRADUATE MATH CLASS IN THE COUNTRY !!!!!</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard finished first place in Putnam Math Competion 25 times. MIT finished first place only 5 times ( as of 2005) MIT math department is good but they are not at the same level as Harvard. At Harvard, you can have change to work with many Putnam fellows.
[/quote]
This isn't quite right. MIT is currently dominating the Putnam contest - it came in 1st place the past two years, and although it came in "4th" this year, that was more due to the utter quirkiness of the Putnam team ranking system than a substantively lower performance. Don't believe me? Go to the results for this year (<a href="http://www.unl.edu/amc/a-activities/a7-problems/putnam/-html/putnam2005results.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.unl.edu/amc/a-activities/a7-problems/putnam/-html/putnam2005results.html</a>) and count the number of Harvard and MIT students in each ranking category. You'll probably notice that there are more MIT students in every single cohort, from the very elite (the Putnam fellows) down to the still very impressive (the honorable mention).</p>
<p>well, i am glad that i am majoring in math</p>
<p>AHH</p>
<p>This year's Putnam winning team is again Harvard...</p>
<p>
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This year's Putnam winning team is again Harvard...
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Yes, but I'll repeat: this is due to the quirky nature of the team ranking system, not an actual "victory" by Harvard. There are two problems with the ranking system:</p>
<p>1) It is based on the performances of a preselected team of 3 - sometimes team members can have bad days, and strong performances by others at a university are disregarded in the team ranking.</p>
<p>2) Worse, the team ranking isn't based on a combination of scores, but instead a combination of *ranks<a href="the%20team%20with%20the%20lowest%20combined%20rank%20wins">/i</a>. This vastly overemphasizes small differences in the performance of the lowest scorer on each team, while comparatively large differences in performance at the higher-scoring level mean almost nothing.</p>
<p>Look at the leaderboard yourself. MIT had more students than Harvard in every winning tier: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.</p>
<p>Please look at the historical performance of Putnam Math competitions </p>
<p>Harvard Math team has substantially more Putnam winners than any other school ( Caltech is the second ) Harvard's record is very impressvie considering very small size of Harvard math department..</p>
<p>clearly, harvard's math department has done extremely well in the putnam, handily beating its top two rivals, MIT and Caltech...however, lately there has been a shift: math oriented students are going to MIT, including the top high schoolers in the country...also, it is important to note that MIT has had 38 top scores on the putnam, while harvard has had 55...this proves that the "level" of students is about the same school, although it seems like MIT has had trouble picking the "right" teams...it has yet to be determined whether the trend of the best math students going to MIT over Harvard will continue (because it is certainly true now...)...</p>
<p><em>I offer this opinion as someone who is very familiar with both schools' math departments...i plan on attending Harvard University and majoring in math next year...go class of 2010</em></p>
<p>
[quote]
Please look at the historical performance of Putnam Math competitions.
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I think that the current performance of the teams is considerably more important than the historical record. Why shouldn't it be?</p>
<p>
[quote]
it is important to note that MIT has had 38 top scores on the putnam, while harvard has had 55...
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This is not correct informations</p>
<p>First Place Finishes ( as of 2005)</p>
<p>Harvard :: 25 times
Caltech :: 9 times
MIT ::5 times
...</p>
<p>I don't think Harvard and MIT are at the same level...</p>
<p>
[quote]
This is not correct informations
[/quote]
First of all, I think he was talking about individual top scores, not team ones, but you weren't reading very carefully. But to make my point more clearly, I'll reference the number of Harvard and MIT students in each winning tier this year:</p>
<p>Putnam Fellows:
MIT - 3
Harvard - 2</p>
<p>Next Ten Highest Ranking Individuals:
MIT - 4
Harvard - 2</p>
<p>Next Eight Highest Ranking Individuals:
MIT - 2
Harvard - 0</p>
<p>Honorable Mention:
MIT - 14
Harvard - 4</p>
<p>Go see for yourself at <a href="http://www.unl.edu/amc/a-activities/a7-problems/putnam/-html/putnam2005results.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.unl.edu/amc/a-activities/a7-problems/putnam/-html/putnam2005results.html</a></p>
<p>Sure, Harvard has historically been the best school in the Putnam, but what's happening now is far more revelant to current applicants.</p>
<p>About 25 Harvard undergrads are graduating with degree in mathematics each year, whereas about 110 MIT undergrads are graduating with degree in math. </p>
<p>Even though MIT math dept. is more than 4 times bigger than Harvard math, Harvard math team have finished first place most of the time. and Again this year's winning team is from Harvard. Historically, number of putnam fellows from Harvard is considerably larger than any other school in USA. </p>
<p>Someone mentioned that this year, MIT had more high ranking people than Harvard. However, the top best performers at Putnam math competition are from Harvard. That is why Harvard is #1 again this year, not MIT even though MIT has 4 times bigger math students than Harvard.</p>
<p>MIT has more higher ranking people because more people entered that that competition. But the top performers are from Harvard, which ranked #1..</p>
<p>Both schools have best math dept in the US. 'nuff said.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Someone mentioned that this year, MIT had more high ranking people than Harvard. However, the top best performers at Putnam math competition are from Harvard. That is why Harvard is #1 again this year, not MIT even though MIT has 4 times bigger math students than Harvard.</p>
<p>MIT has more higher ranking people because more people entered that that competition. But the top performers are from Harvard, which ranked #1..
[/quote]
Frankly, this is a pretty simplistic analysis. Are you honestly going to claim that the rankings accurately reflect the performance of the teams? Because then you'd have to say that Duke did better than MIT - and looking at the individual leaderboard, that's completely unjustifiable. As I've already outlined, there are absurd quirks in the Putnam team ranking system.</p>
<p>Guys, this is just a math competition (yes, I know this is PUTNAM, but still), not a contest to select who will get to live on Mars when an asteriod destroys earth next week. Anyways, a lot of math genius (myself included ;) ) do miserably on competition math.</p>
<p>Math geniuses don't do poorly on math competitions. People who are very good at math do.</p>
<p>hahaha. this is so pathetic.</p>
<p>I can't believe this was said:</p>
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I don't think Harvard and MIT are at the same level...
[/quote]
</p>
<p>based on some math competition that involves a single-digit number of students from both schools. are YOU in the putnam? are you trying just a little too hard to live vicariously through the three best math students in your school?</p>
<p>Why does it concern us at all? Having some brilliant kid win the putnam 3 out of the last 4 years doesn't give you or us a better curriculum, better research opportunities, a more brilliant student body as a whole, more attentive professors, a greater depth/breadth of coursework... These are outliers, they mean nothing statistically.</p>
<p>This entire discussion is pointless.</p>
<p>What are we talking about in comparing math departments? Great professors, number of top math students, the quality of the very best math students at each school, research opportunities?</p>
<p>What?</p>
<p>All I've seen so far is comparisons on a certain math competition. That's not an accurate way to judge math departments.</p>
<p>Regarding the Putnam, Harvard has historically dominated, but they've done considerably worse than MIT the past few years, as they have rejected a number of IMO gold medalists. </p>
<p>Nothing wrong with that, but it does tend to lower one's performance on intercollegiate math competitions. </p>
<p>And saying that Harvard is clearly better than MIT in math is ridiculous. </p>
<p>Each school has unique advantages in their undergraduate math departments. </p>
<p>It depends on what a student is most interested in.</p>