Northwestern vs Umichigan?

<p>Sam Lee, I do not think NU has a significant advantage over Michigan in the production of major fellowship recipients or graduate school placement, even on a per capita basis, when you factor in the relative strengths of their respective student bodies.</p>

<p>I love you guys. Especially the one(s) claiming to be a concerned parent–so funny.</p>

<p>Carry on!</p>

<p>I’ve never heard Michigan students described as friendly, and I know some pretty pompous UofM grads.</p>

<p>They were saying 300 because of the ACT average conversion since very few Michigan students took the SAT.</p>

<p>You guys are ridiculous. I think you may be the only people in the world to dispute that NU is slightly better than Mich academically. NU is always considered the best academically in B1G</p>

<p>Crimsonstained, how do you go from SAT to ACT comparison? That’s apples to oranges, don’t you think? But even if you do, the 2.5 point difference between Michigan and NU does not correspond to a 300 point difference on the SAT. It is closer to a 180 points on the SAT (out of 2400), which is consistant with the 165 point difference on the actual SAT averages. 165 (or 180 point) difference is significant to be sure, but it is not the same as 300.</p>

<p>Alexandre,</p>

<p>The figures for scholarships you used were all historic total. But in the last 2 decades, NU has at least been on par with Dartmouth. The performance in the recent years are much more indicative of what’s happening in the present.</p>

<p>Also, I don’t go around and tell people NU has better departments than Brown and Dartmouth. The success of their graduates tells me their departments are doing something right, despite what the graduate department rankings say.</p>

<p>Sam Lee, even if you look at the last 20 some years (say since 1990), Michigan and NU have performed poorly on the Rhodes scholarship front. If memory serves, both universities had three winners each. In that same time, Chicago had close to 20 winners, while Brown had 13 or 14 and Dartmouth had roughly 10. Columbia and Cornell, also laggars in this department, had 10 apiece. Heck, even UNC had like 15 and UVa 10. I did not count Duke, but I am sure they had well over 10 winners in the 1990-2013 period. Michigan and NU really do not do well on the Rhodes front. The only other heavy hitters that under-perform on this stage are Penn (with 3 or 4 winners), Cal (also 2 or 3 winners) and JHU (with 3 winners).</p>

<p>At any rate, I do not mean to promote one university over another on this forum, but I do not like it when inaccuracies are listed as fact. For example, a poster claimed that 38% of Michigan classes are taught by TAs. That’s utterly preposterous. Only 3% of classes at Michigan are taught by TAs. Others have claimed that there is a 300 point difference in the SAT average between Michigan and Northwestern. Isn’t the actual figure of 165 significant enough? </p>

<p>At any rate, you have represented Michigan and Northwestern accurately and even handedly, and I thank you for that.</p>

<p>I guess I was thinking more the last decade. Northwestern has had 4 Rhodes since 2004; Dartmouth had 5. NU has also performed pretty well in Marshall and Cambridge Gates in the time span. According to NU media, selectivity and increased resources for undergraduate research as well as fellowship office have been some of the main factors.</p>

<p>I agree with you that those inaccurate presentation of test scores was unfair but frankly, I haven’t even read those posts.</p>

<p>Alexandre, I’m just saying what the earlier quoter of that statistic said. It’s not something that I found.</p>

<p>According to Princeton Review
Classes Taught by TAs: 38%</p>

<p>I trusted Princeton Review as valid, it doesn’t mean that I was spouting some random crap.</p>

<p>Crimsonstained, I was merely saying that I had to correct the inaccuracy. You should not believe the negative things you hear about universities. Instead, look them up on the universities’ own websites. The information is all there. Only 3% of classes at Michigan are taught by TAs. PR was obviously way off. I do not think Michigan would be able to attract 2,500 relatively gifted OOS students annually (especially given its high cost and stingy FA) if 40% of its classes were taught by fellow students. The word would be out and Michigan would no longer be able to attract so many OOS students.</p>

<p>And the difference in SAT averages between Michigan and NU is not 300, even if you choose to convert ACT to SAT, which should not be done regardless. Again, you chose to believe what others were saying, but the source was not accurate to begin with. The difference between Michigan and NU is 165 points on the SAT and 2.5 points on the ACT. The 2011-2012 Common Data Sets state as much.</p>

<p>I’m surprised this had been debated to this extent. </p>

<p>I’m not in favor of either school, but I will say that, right or wrong, I think NU is by in large regarded as a notch above Umichigan in the US. Granted, a lot of Americans perceptions aren’t entirely accurate but I think if you asked random American’s throughout the US, a majority would regard NU as a stronger institution. Is that fair and or accurate? That’s debatable. But I think it is a truth that isn’t very debatable. </p>

<p>People often have this similar type debate comparing Cal and Stanford. Some insist that overall the two are virtually equal. I think this is perhaps a valid opinion, but, right or wrong, the reality is the general perception is that Stanford is the frontrunner of the two. </p>

<p>My point is you can argue that the perception is incorrect, but to argue the perception is nonexistence is, in my opinion, ignorant.</p>

<p>Alexandre, I am not trying to say you’re wrong, but the table (containing 3% GSI teaching) you are looking at is misleading. In fact, they even provide a more relevant table right below: GSI Teaching as a percent of total credit hours taught is 21 percent. That was in 2006-2007 and based on my personal observation, it seems quite higher that 21 percent in recent years. </p>

<p>[Information</a> About Graduate Student Instructors at the University of Michigan](<a href=“http://www.vpcomm.umich.edu/gsi-sa/teach.html]Information”>http://www.vpcomm.umich.edu/gsi-sa/teach.html)</p>

<p>153fish, your point about credit hours taught vs classes taught is certainly relevant, but it does not apply to the purposes of this discussion. The comparison on this thread was for classes, not credits, taught by TAs. At NU, it is 2% while at Michigan, it is 3%. That’s fair, don’t you think? If NU had a statistic for both classes and credit hours taught, only then would credit hours taught by TAs at Michigan be relevant. The fact is, we do not know how many credit hours were taught by TAs at NU, only the percentage of classes.</p>

<p>Also, I am not sure how you came to the conclusion that TAs are teaching more at Michigan now than they were 5 years ago. Do you have proof of this? If so, please share an official link from the university that demonstrates it.</p>

<p>At NU, 1 credit = 1 course for virtually all courses. The only exception to this is musical performance (instruments). So credits and courses are the same thing. </p>

<p>Perhaps I am missing and misunderstanding something, Alexandre. Aren’t most classes worth 3 credit-hour with only a small minority being 2 or 4 credit-hour anyway at UMich? So % credit hours taught is not materiality different from % classes taught?</p>

<p>If there were some classes that worth 100 credit hours while others were worth only 1 credit hour, then we’d have had a situation where % credit hours and % classes could be very different. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.</p>

<p>Edit: I understand what those credit hours on that table mean, now that I am looking at the table more closely.</p>

<p>What are the ones that classes taught by “Faculty & GSI”? Are they the ones that have faculty doing the lectures but TA doing the discussion sessions? If so, then I agree that 3% is the right number.</p>

<p>That is correct Sam Lee, in the case where you have faculty and TAs together, it is the professor who teaches the large lecture and the TA who leads the smaller discussion sections.</p>

<p>At Michigan, you have 1, 2, 3 and 4 credit courses. The vast majority of courses are for 3 and 4 courses.</p>

<p>Alexandre, I understand you were discussing classes, but credit hours taught are an important measure for teaching. As you pointed out, the item “Faculty and GSI” means a professor teaches the large class and the TAs lead the smaller discussion sections. This particular item can be misleading. Here’s a simple example: Suppose a 4-credit hour course, is taught by a prof and there are 10 sections led by 10 different TAs. In this case, by “Faculty and GSI” count, this is counted as one class under “Faculty and GSI.” Does it truly reflect the teaching efforts of ten TAs? I don’t think so. If you consider credit hours taught, TA’s teaching is counted as 40 (4x10) credit hours, which I think is more reflective of what these graduate students have done. </p>

<p>Furthermore, for the “Faculty and GSI” case, the question is who is the real teacher to the students. Students in big classes rarely go see the faculty when they have questions; it is the TAs from whom most students learn the course material through discussion, practice questions, etc. </p>

<p>I never said that we need to compare teaching at Northwestern and Michigan in terms of credit hours taught by profs and TAs. I simply pointed out the importance of credit hours taught for teaching evaluation.</p>

<p>You said “I am not sure how you came to the conclusion that TAs are teaching more at Michigan now than they were 5 years ago.” As I said earlier, this is based on my personal observation. I am in academics and often visit Michigan. Again, based on my personal observation and conversation with my colleagues at Michigan, I see a fewer and fewer number of faculty who really care about educating their undergraduate students. But, this trend is not just at Michigan, but also at many large universities. </p>

<p>As a side note, while I am here, I would like to point out that I am not saying that teaching by graduate students are inferior to teaching by professors. There are many (native and non-native speakers) graduate students who are excellent teachers and there are many (native and non-native speakers) professors who are pretty bad teachers.</p>

<p>fish, like I said, your observation is interesting, but pointless since we have no way of comparing it to Northwestern. All we can do, is compare data that is available at both universities, in this case, classes taught by TAs. 2% at NU and 3% at Michigan. </p>

<p>Secondly, I have seen no evidence that faculty at Michigan care less (or more) about educating undergrads now than they did in 2007, and I have really kept up with such matters. Like any research university, large or small, faculty at Michigan are very involved in research and will not always prioritize undergraduate instruction. I do not think you can adequately and accurately evaluate or gauge how dedicated an entire faculty is to undergraduate instruction, and pointing a finger of blame only at large universities is unfounded.</p>

<p>Alexandre,</p>

<p>“All we can do, is compare data that is available at both universities, in this case, classes taught by TAs. 2% at NU and 3% at Michigan.”</p>

<p>Do you have the link of the 2% at NU?</p>

<p>I do not have a link. The 2% figure was provided to us by several of the Northwestern students/alums. I have no reason to doubt it.</p>

<p>The 2% was provided by one of the posters who got the figures from Princeton Review. But then PR had 38% for Michigan. So if the number is wrong for Michigan, the number for NU could be wrong too. PR is garbage.</p>