Hi I know this question has been asked many times, but I wanted to see if anyone had more recent perspectives. I want to study engineering (chemical engineering at the moment but this could easily change). I know MIT would be a no-brainer for most people because of its name brand and rigor, but I have some conflicting thoughts that I’ve listed below.
Is it more beneficial to get a stronger technical education or have greater exposure to a wide variety of perspectives/issues that would allow you to better address problems? MIT would probably provide a stronger education in my chosen major, but Yale is better for obtaining a liberal arts education
Although I know that neither school is particularly cutthroat or competitive, the intensity of STEM areas is far greater at MIT. I think I would ultimately be able to handle the rigor of both schools, but I was wondering how overwhelming stress at MIT can be
Yale is investing a lot of energy and resources into its STEM areas, and engineering students at Yale could receive more individualized attention
I will visit both schools next month, but I just wanted to get some background before visiting. Thanks for any help!
I think that you would also have to consider whether are not you want to pursue a graduate degree in engineering and also how committed you are to your current major. If you are sure you want to do engineering, I would choose MIT. Great school with lots of STEM. On the other hand, Yale will most likely expose you to a greater range of perspectives outside of the STEM fields. If you want a broader education and to maybe go to a more specialized school like MIT for a graduate degree, then I would say Yale is the choice for you. At both schools, you will face challenging situations and sometimes stressful environments from the competition of those around you. Both are beautiful campuses, but upon entry you can definitely tell that MIT is very focused on the sciences from their college culture (and their “hacks” :-* ).
These are just some suggestions but I encourage you to take into account the location of the school as well and take some time to attend classes to get a feel for each school. Congratulations on your acceptances to these great schools and best of luck!
@potatoepotatoe Thank you so much for your response!
The problem is I don’t know much about what I want to do in the long run (my decision could range from going to medical school to going to grad school and pursuing academia). I’m sure I want to stay in STEM, but I’m not 100% sure about engineering itself. I think my indecisiveness makes deciding between these two schools even harder :-S
MIT actually has fairly significant humanities (at least 1), arts (at least 1), and social studies (at least 1) requirements (plus 3-4 in a concentration, plus enough to make a total of 8 subjects*): http://web.mit.edu/hassreq/
I would go to MIT. Its Social Sciences (especially Econ and Political Science), humanities (especially Linguistics and Philosophy) departments are world class. And las ucbalumnus points out, you can take up to 8 classes at Harvard, loading up on as many humanities classes as you like. So unless you are considering switching from Engineering to Art History, I would go with MIT.
