<p>I know that they are both in Chicago.... but aside from that I know nothing. Please point out big differences!! I'm considering applying to both.. but if I can narrow it down to one, that would be a great time-money-stress saver.</p>
<p>cafesimone, what's your intended major?</p>
<p>There have been many threads on this ... you may want to search each college's forum.</p>
<p>Both are excellent schools, so it really becomes a matter of personal preference / fit, and I'd strongly urge you to visit both.</p>
<p>Location: NU is in an upscale suburb/small city (Evanston) just north of the city. UChicago is in Hyde Park, which is a neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, and has more of a city feel.</p>
<p>Academics: Both excellent, but somewhat different specialties. In addition to the core liberal arts, NU has some offerings that UChicago doesn't, with specialty schools (engineering, journalism, theater, music, all tops in their fields). UChicago may very well offer majors NU doesn't; I'm just personally not aware of them. Is there a particular field of interest to you?</p>
<p>Campus Culture: While many NU students would do just fine at UChicago and vice versa, there is a qualitative difference in the overall experience. UChicago prides itself on its nonconformist, quirky, life-of-the-mind culture. NU is more "on the beaten path" insofar as that it offers a college experience more similar to what you'd find at other peer schools -- heavy Greek life, Big 10 athletics, etc. Whether those differences are appealing or not is up to the individual. </p>
<p>Oh - and it's really not NU "vs" UChicago, other than in a friendly rivalry manner. Both schools respect the other's mission and at an institutional level, work across town with one another. In fact, there was a proposal to merge them in the 1940's (with the undergrad to be in Evanston and the grad to be in Hyde Park) but that didn't come to pass. I just say this, because both schools have students with a lot of pride, but it's really not directed at establishing superiority over the other, just pointing out differences that may be of interest. </p>
<p>I would search posts by unalove - she is a UChicago student who writes very well about her experiences with the school. Good luck to you either way!</p>
<p>I personally regard both universities as peers with Chicago having a slightly better Economics program.</p>
<p>I read unalove's amazing FAQ on the U of Chicago forum, and was disappointed to see there wasn't a "similar" FAQ on the Northwestern forum. I don't know much about NU which is why I posted here... One thing that turned me off was that U of Chicago is in the city (I'm looking for a college campus feel) but I love quirkyness!!! Greek life isn't so much for me. But I heard that NU's debate "club?" is spectucular, which is a plus. So any more information about each college would be great... </p>
<p>I'm interested in a lot of things - International Relations, creative writing, math...</p>
<p>UChicago still has a campus feel to it ... it's not like an NYU.</p>
<p>Yes, NU is very well known for debate.<br>
If you're interested in creative writing, I don't know if this is up your alley, but NU offers a creative writing for the media specialty. (I'm afraid I don't have a link.) Remember that in terms of creative writing, you have the resources of the theater program and the radio/tv/film programs to integrate with, and NU's linkage with the entertainment community ("NU Mafia") is top-notch.</p>
<p>As for math, you may want to check out NU's MMSS program (again, I don't have a link, but you can google it pretty easily).</p>
<p>"One thing that turned me off was that U of Chicago is in the city (I'm looking for a college campus feel) but I love quirkyness!!! "</p>
<p>Let me expand on this ... U of Chicago is not in downtown Chicago (as in, you walk right out and you're in a business district). It's still in a neighborhood setting -- it's a neighborhood setting that tends to be off the beaten track for many / most Chicagoans, who don't tend to be in Hyde Park unless they have a specific reason to be there. So when I say it has a city feel, I'm explicitly not meaning a downtown NYU or downtown Boston Univ type of feel. I hope that helps. Unalove will have to come and bail me out of this one and contrast Evanston and Hyde Park more :-)</p>
<p>While the U of Chicago is in the City of Chicago and is surrounded on a couple of sides by marginal southside neighborhoods, the campus is gorgeous and is more akin to an Ivy league campus such as Yale. So you do get the campus experience with gothic buildings and many quads with gorgeous plantings, lawns and trees. In fact, the campus is designated as a national botanic garden.When on campus, you would be hard pressed to know that you are in a city. Northwestern tends to be somewhat more spread out , more modern and suburban with a gorgeous location right on Lake Michigan. The other posts have really hit on the differences. Check both schools out and see which appeals to you as they are different, but equally excellent. Note that U of Chicago has a required core curriculum requirement for the first couple of years, so you really have to be into that, i.e. you must take math, science, art,sociology,etc, although there are numerous options available to do so.</p>
<p>I'm here!</p>
<p>First things first: I agree with everything pg has said regarding the two schools (as I always agree with her), and just reiterate that because the schools are of similar qualities, they attract similar or the same students. And remember that no school is monolithic-- you can find frat parties at Chicago and people arguing in coffee shops at NU. Anybody who says otherwise is either ignorantly presented a misinformed opinion or willfully perpetrating a stereotype.</p>
<p>Hyde Park and campus: The U of C's main quadrangles are pretty much closed off to traffic and are their own little Hogwartsian bubble. Immediately beyond the quads is Hyde Park and the neighborhood-- real streets with lots of University buildings. I've lived in New York City and a suburb, and in a lot of ways I like HP better than either. It's quieter than the city, much more like a suburb than a city, has lots of trees (!!!!!!) and houses (!!!!!!) and charm (!!!!!) and it's walking distance to shopping and public transportation.</p>
<p>For a more visual appreciation, search "University of Chicago," "UChicago," and "Hyde Park" on Flickr.</p>
<p>Also, you can read this piece about our neighbor, Barack, and an outsider's appraisal of the neighborhood: Mr</a>. Obama's Neighborhood</p>
<p>I've been to NU and Evanston a couple of times, and I noticed a few things that differ or seem interesting to note:</p>
<ol>
<li> The campus is very long and thin. And pretty. Verrrrrry pretty.</li>
<li> Lots of chain stores (Chicago ones and national ones) shackle up in Evanston. Hyde Park residents are fighting the U of C on this issue; so currently we have a few chain stores and retail, but the University wants to add more. (We currently have a lot of bookstores and restaurants). Personally, I think this adds to Hyde Park's charm, but if you want to buy clothing, particularly, you'll have to go downtown.</li>
</ol>
<p>People like Hyde Park? Seriously? I'm afraid of getting out of my car in that place. My mom's friend was almost shot there in the middle of the day. Another person I know was robbed. As far as neighborhoods go, Evanston all the way!</p>
<p>Eh, there are plenty of Neighboorhoods in Evanston (albeit far removed from NU's campus) that I'm uncomfortable walking alone in at night, and I'm a fairly broad shouldered guy. Smart girls simply don't risk it.</p>
<p>Really, the schools are both outstanding, but are practically polar opposites in terms of campus culture, and fairly different in campus feel (albeit both are different shades of "classic" campuses).</p>
<p>Visit both! They're in the same city, so it'd only be one trip if you're from out of town. That's really the only way to go about it. In the meantime, you could always apply to both...</p>
<p>Both schools are completely different, although you really can't go wrong
in terms of education, as they are both really great schools.</p>
<p>1) They are in completely different neighborhoods. Hyde Park has a reputation for being unsafe(although I think that's completely overblown). Evanston is in a very nice part of town, and NU is still very convenient with the purple line of the "L" being right there.</p>
<p>2)The Core at Uchicago. Are you willing to go through this? Do realize, that if you are accepted to the University of Chicago, that you will be entering arguably one of the three most difficult curriculums among American undergraduate universities (the other two being MIT and Cal Tech). </p>
<p>3) PLACE CAREER / GRAD SCHOOL PROSPECTS OUT OF THE WINDOW!
For prospective ibankers/consultants. Yes- Chicago ECON is incredible, but you won't get any more recruited coming out of chicago than you will out of NU.</p>
<p>4)Greek Scene/Big Time sports- if you need these, then obviously NU would be a great fit. </p>
<p>5)Quirkiness- Advantage Uchicago, although honestly, I wouldn't put too much emphasis on 4 and 5.</p>
<p>Same applies to aspiring lawyers/doctors/scientists/etc. Both schools have a solid reputation. </p>
<p>Finally.. Financial aid- Friend's son had a 5k per year discrepancy between Uchicago aid and NU aid, in favor of Uchicago. He chose Chicago.</p>
<p>Just a short note about the safety of Hyde Park and the area surrounding the University of Chicago. The areas surrounding the U of Chicago to the North and the East (Hyde Park and Kenwood) have million dollar homes and condos,etc. and are really among the safest neighborhoods crime wise in Chicago. Of course you need to use common sense as you would in any urban area. The areas to the south and west (which are on the other side of parks which surround the University on those sides) are not quite as safe, but frankly there is no reason for a U of Chicago student to be walking in those areas as most of the commercial and university activity is to the north and west of campus. The University has the largest private police department in America and is becoming much more proactive. You can get escorts and van services at night so that you don't have to walk alone. My child is now entering her third year at the U of Chicago, is well educated as to the situation surrounding the University and through the use of common sense has had no security problems whatsoever. Crime on the campus itself is extremely rare and dormitories are well guarded with lots of security. I live on the Yale campus in New Haven and frankly, the crime problem surrounding Yale is far worse than the situation around the U of Chicago. Northwestern is in a wealthy suburb of Chicago, so I would agree that the crime situation is probably much less apparent, but I would suspect muggings and robberies do occur as the school is not that far from Northern Chicago neighborhoods that do have crime and people with cars will travel to wealthy areas to commit crimes where people have money. I wouldn't let the fear of crime dissuade you from the U of Chicago if the school is a fit for you in all of the other areas you desire.</p>
<p>I very much agree with nep's assessment of Hyde Park. I have walked alone at night many times, and while it's not something I necessarily recommend, I also haven't felt like my safety was threatened. I saw other people out, walking dogs, on bikes, etc. Even late at night.</p>
<p>To me, the Hyde Park stigma comes largely from reputation and not from fact. I never feel uncomfortable during the day in Hyde Park, and even on public transportation that goes into other neighborhoods, I never feel unsafe. Part of that is because I've gotten over the racial and economic anxieties of being a rich white girl on a bus that might not have that many other rich white people and might instead have a lot of working-class black people. This is something that's probably difficult for somebody to adjust to if they are from a homogenous neighborhood, but the truth of the matter is that the people on the bus pose no more or less a threat to your personal sense of security if they were white instead of black. They are interested in the same thing you are interested in-- a way to get from point A to point B as smoothly and quietly as possible.</p>
<p>Residents of the city of Chicago-- even posters on this forum who are from Chicago and Chicagoland-- have this mental divide: the North Side is good, the South Side is bad. This mental divide is not reflective of the actual experience of either the North Side or the South Side-- there are lots of places on the South Side (not only Hyde Park) that are home to middle, upper-middle, and upper-class residents; there are places on the North Side that get very sketchy at night (think: lots of homeless people loitering, abandoned homes, few stores, etc.) that make me long for the safety and protection of Hyde Park. I don't know how Evanston is at night, but I'm sure that arbiter has a better feel for it, and it sounds like even there it's not a hermetically sealed environment.</p>
<p>Also, a lot of people forget how unusual Chicago is as a city, that rich people live on one block and poor people live one block over-- these populations tend to live in ignorance of one another. It's a more dramatic socioeconomic divide than any suburb, I'm sure, and probably a more dramatic divide than New York City. It's also important to point out that a lot of these "unsafe" neighborhoods city-wide... I'm thinking about neighborhoods like Uptown and Pilsen-- are undergoing major gentrification by the milisecond.</p>
<p>If you go a few blocks west of Northwestern's campus, you're not in such a great neighborhood either. Evanston is <em>mostly</em> upscale, but not all. And the presence of the El does mean that anyone with a buck can get there. </p>
<p>OP, are we helping you out here? What kind of feel do you tend to like? What do you envision when you think about the kind of experience that is appealing to you? Because academically, it's really a wash (unless you're interested in a particular program that only one school has).</p>
<p>Wow - a pretty sane and cordial discussion on the 2 schools - who would have thunk?</p>
<p>Btw, I pretty much agree w/ everything that has been posted.</p>
<p>I live in Chicago, and although Evanston is much nicer than Hyde Park, the U of C area is not dangerous at all. Just don't buy weed from people on the street and don't walk alone really late at night. There are much worse areas of Chicago (ie: West Side, Wild Hundreds) Like one poster said, bad neighborhoods tend to be small and scattered throughout the city.</p>
<p>I don't know much about the academic quality of each institution because I'm still in high school. I do know a little about the local reputation of each school. These two are hands down the best schools in the Chicagoland area, so people who go to them are immediately pegged as smart. The difference is that U of C people are perceived as being either really nerdy or pompous, and NU people are considered more "normal". This is not necessarily true in any way, just what people tend to think.</p>
<p>
[quote]
3) PLACE CAREER / GRAD SCHOOL PROSPECTS OUT OF THE WINDOW!
[/quote]
AdmissCounseling, could you clarify this a little more? Are you saying that both schools are equal in career/grad school prospects? (when I first read this I thought you meant throw them out of the window...as in I won't get into grad school haha)</p>
<p>Pizzagirl, if you could specify specific programs at each school that the other school lacks?? This would be a great help! </p>
<p>How far is University of Chicago from downtown? Does anyone know how far each school is from the airport?</p>
<p>NU is 35 minutes from O'hare, about 40-45 to Midway.</p>
<p>Programs NU has that Chicago doesn't, most notably: Journalism, Education (undergraduate), Music, Theater, Film. That would be the broadest examples.</p>
<p>I can only speak for NU. NU has 6 undergrad schools: WCAS (Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences), Engineering, Medill School of Journalism, School of Speech (encompasses the well-known theater and radio/tv/film programs), Music, and Education. If you are an aspiring engineer, journalist, actor / director, or musician, then NU is the way to go. Chicago is less pre-professional in spirit and would not have schools of that nature. Which is not a knock on UChicago -- the schools just "grew up" differently.</p>
<p>I will leave it to a UChicago person to speak to their specific programs. Offhand, one of the great resources that UChicago has is having the Museum of Science and Industry close to campus. If you're into a field where access to that museum might be important for research purposes, then I think UChicago has the edge.</p>
<p>Oh, the two schools are not really close to one another -- probably a good hour in rush hour traffic -- so don't go thinking there's a consortium type of thing, as there are with other schools that are in the same area. I can't imagine that undergrads would be able to take classes in the other location and I would think the logistics would be problematic, but I could be wrong. </p>
<p>Distance-wise as the crow flies, UChicago is closer to downtown, but either way, you could take public transportation from each campus to get downtown in 20-30 minutes. NU is closer to the "fun" neighborhoods of Chicago (Wrigleyville, Lincoln Park, Lake View, etc.) which are typically north of downtown (that is, lying between Evanston and downtown). </p>
<p>There are two airports in Chicago -- O'Hare, the big one, is northwest of the city, and Midway is on the south side, fairly close to UChicago. Generally speaking, O'Hare is more convenient for NU and Midway for UChicago, but either one is doable. I think this is a minor consideration, to be honest. Pick whatever airport you have the best / cheapest flights into. </p>
<p>In general, NU is a bit more preprofessional focused than UChicago, but the world's your oyster coming out of either.</p>