Hi - my son is interested in a theoretical math major (as opposed to an applied math major.) How can he research what are the top math programs? Most lists seem to focus on PHD programs.
thanks
With respect to undergraduate math programs, you could research colleges included in a Princeton Review sampling, “Great Schools for Mathematics Majors”:
Harvey Mudd
MIT
UChicago
Caltech
Haverford
Harvard
Hamilton
Bowdoin
Reed
Rice
Carleton
Grinnell
Macalester
URochester
St. Olaf
Holy Cross
St. Lawrence
SUNY-Albany
Virtually all of the top PhD programs have very strong undergraduate programs as well, and someone aiming for a PhD in pure math should be taking graduate classes by junior or senior year. Most math courses are small even at large universities since math is a relatively unpopular major. The most basic courses (i.e. calc, multivariable calc, etc.) are exceptions, since they’re filled with engineering students, pre-meds, and other non-math students, but he may be able to place out of those depending on his background.
Harvey Mudd, Williams, and St. Olaf are indisputably the standout options for math among liberal arts colleges. It’s only one gauge of the strength of undergraduate math programs, but here are the top liberal arts colleges for math PhD production over the past 20 years. I’ve included only those with 20+ PhDs, or on average at least one per year.
95 Harvey Mudd
71 St. Olaf
63 Williams
58 Carleton
52 Swarthmore
51 Pomona
50 Oberlin / Reed
34 Grinnell
29 Haverford
28 Amherst
27 Furman / Whitman
26 Wheaton (IL)
25 Bryn Mawr / Wellesley
23 U Puget Sound / Wesleyan
21 Davidson / Lafayette
20 Bowdoin / Smith
List would be different based on your criteria. Are you looking for school list for “just simply large group of pure Math students”, “feeder schools to any PhD Math programs”, “feeder schools to Top 10 PhD Math programs”, etc.
The list is a lot bigger than most people think. I good exercise is to look at the faculty at your state flagship (or any school if you wish). Many of them will have their CV with their undergraduate school listed. I did this recently for Wisconsin (T-20 grad program). The undergraduate schools are all over the place. One even went to a dreaded “directional” school. Another first got an Associates Degree in a different subject.
The following ranking was created by counting the number of NSF graduate research fellowships earned in math (a proxy for top graduate school candidates produced) normalized by the size of the math department
CalTech 20 27 0.74
Princeton 25 35 0.71
Harvey Mudd 13 32 0.41
MIT 36 96 0.38
Stanford 19 61 0.31
Harvard 39 156 0.25
Cornell 9 43 0.21
Duke 10 48 0.21
Williams 5 26 0.19
Yale 9 47 0.19
Oberlin 4 22 0.18
Tufts 3 17 0.18
Reed* 3 20 0.15
UChicago 17 110 0.15
Bryn Mawr 4 29 0.14
Georgia Tech 5 38 0.13
Swarthmore 2 16 0.13
Macalester 2 16 0.13
Dartmouth 3 27 0.11
RPI 4 37 0.11
Columbia 8 87 0.09
U Tulsa 2 23 0.09
Carleton 2 25 0.08
Notre Dame 4 54 0.07
St Olaf 3 43 0.07
UNC 8 115 0.07
College of NJ 2 29 0.07
U Mary CP 9 133 0.07
Colorado SOM 3 45 0.07
Pomona 2 32 0.06
Michigan 12 199 0.06
Wash U 3 54 0.06
U Pitt 5 90 0.06
U Ill Chicago 3 54 0.06
I think I think feeder school to top PHD programs
So helpful - thank you!
Princeton, Harvard an MIT are on the top, but to give advice it would be useful to know his stats, ECs, what math level he’s taken etc. Many state flagships have great math departments as well.
Math can be complex and may require more individual attention at times to master. For that reason, I think LACs can be a good choice (and often make top PHD feeder lists) for some students.
^ This is true but for students who have already taken a number of college math classes, course choice in LACs could be limiting.
On the other hand, you shouldn’t assume you’ll necessarily get more personal attention at a LAC.
IPEDS indicates that universities like Yale (28), Duke (31), and Princeton (32) and liberal arts colleges like Williams (34), Bowdoin (26), Swarthmore (26), and Grinnell (25) have similar numbers of undergraduate math majors, but the former have far larger math faculties and thus more favorable faculty:student ratios. Even if you account for each university’s ~50 or so math PhD students, those universities come out quite well in comparison. (Yale graduated 6 PhDs last year; Duke and Princeton graduated 10.)
The association of university professors with research and LAC professors with teaching is a rather dated one, IMO. This is no longer an accurate impression of academia, as the supply of new PhDs far outstrips demand. No selective college today will hire someone who does not have an exceptional track record in both areas.
In your other thread you mentioned a B average but high SAT scores. If that is the case then you probably need a different list to those being suggested above.
@Twoin18, I agree that the elite schools would be a long shot. Of the list above–St Olaf and Macalaster, Rochester and RPI all seem like schools that would potentially admit this student.
Here are the stats: SATs: 1590; SAT 2 Math: 800; not sure the GPA (school doesn’t provide this) but has taken at least 2 math classes each year with all As; B’s in some history and english classes. He’s very pointy!
Calculating GPA should be a simple math problem.
If you’d asked a few weeks ago I would have suggested Oxford, but it’s too late for fall 2019 admission now. Still worth considering other options in the UK if you have 5s in STEM APs and can afford it.