<p>OP, if your daughter is interested in ethics, you may want to know that Hopkins offers a minor in Bioethics. As a freshman, my daughter was planning to major in Neuroscience and minor in Bioethics. Looks like your daughter has similar interest as my daughter. Here is the URL for [Hopkins</a>’ Majors/Minors](<a href=“http://apply.jhu.edu/academics/majors.html]Hopkins”>http://apply.jhu.edu/academics/majors.html) if you want to check out additional information on their Bioethics minor along with Neuroscience, Cognitive Science, and Behavioral Biology majors.</p>
<p>Re: your other questions on Columbia’s neuroscience program and comparison between different schools (MIT, Stanford, Princeton, Yale, etc.), I think whatever comments you receive here will be the perspectives that are very specific to that particular person. They may or may not apply for your daughter. In my opinion, you are really splitting hair to compare schools in the top 10-20. It really boils down to fit, which no one can really tell you for sure except for your daughter to experience it herself. Have you guys visited any campus yet? If so, I would strongly encourage you to do that. With the exception of MIT, we visited all of the schools that you mentioned (along with Penn, Brown, Emory, and Duke - to name a few others that are also strong in neuroscience) with our daughter. Hopkins (and one other school) clearly came up on top of her list after our visits to a total of 14 schools. She couldn’t really explain it objectively - it was more a feel that she got when she was on campus. I guess it is what the “vibe” is all about. Also, different schools may have a different approach to the whole college education concept (e.g, Core Curriculum at Columbia vs. Open Curriculum at Brown vs. Distribution Requirements at Hopkins). Which approach does your daughter prefer? There are all questions that only your daughter can answer and she will have a clear picture and better understanding if she has the opportunity to visit the campus.</p>