Notre Dame or Dartmouth

<p>Go to whichever you like better. Dartmouth has a slight academic advantage but nothing amazing or anything.</p>

<p>"Notre Dame has NEVER been ranked higher higher than Dartmouth EVER in ANY ranking system in the United States."</p>

<p>Most Beautiful Campuses in the United States:
1. Notre Dame
2. Santa Clara
3. Fordham
4. Boston College
5. Dartmouth</p>

<p>Source: "Knights of Columbus Monthly," Sept. 2004</p>

<p>Ahhh! It seems my questions have launched things off in an undesireable direction. Slipper- I don't think you're giving ND enough credit. dsalessi- interesting statistics, although it is worth noting that ND's 50% bigger endowment is going towards twice as many students. And, Tourguide, Knights of Columbus Monthly might be a TAD biased in that regard...(also, Princeton and Colgate ought to be on that list :)) I really do appreciate you guys' help- but please don't bite each other's heads off.</p>

<p>That was a joke...</p>

<p>LOL, I thought so- it's still wrong :)</p>

<p>Dartmouth has a 5 year engineering degree, which explains the graduation rate. And anyway, that's a dumb measure for choosing a college. So what that 88% or 93% or whatever of people graduated in four years. How does that telling you anything truly meaningful about the place where you are going to spend the next stage of your life? Numbers, number, numbers.</p>

<p>Also, certain people graduate a year later because they end up spending a year studying abroad. Dartmouth has some amazing study abroad opportunities (although for the most part they last for a term, not a year). I noticed, Shellzie, that you wanted to spend a term/semester/whatever in China. Dartmouth has such a program, and apparently it's good enough that some of the people doing it are willing to forego their sophomore summer (one of the hallmarks of a Dartmouth education, supposed to be one of the best summers of your life (mine's coming up in three months :))). If you want more info:</p>

<p><a href="http://oracle-www.dartmouth.edu/ocp/prod/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.ViewProgram&Program_ID=0E0672724F0402010500727C061F73067E0B1B7A0701016B01010873750604740F06020170770206&Type=O&sType=O%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://oracle-www.dartmouth.edu/ocp/prod/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.ViewProgram&Program_ID=0E0672724F0402010500727C061F73067E0B1B7A0701016B01010873750604740F06020170770206&Type=O&sType=O&lt;/a>
<a href="http://lab.dartmouth.edu/beijing05/index.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://lab.dartmouth.edu/beijing05/index.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>The first link is some general info about the program, and the second is apparently the page of the 2005 program.</p>

<p>A good friend of mine who went to a Jesuit college for undergrad, and one of HYP for a PhD warns me that the Eastern elite look down their noses at Catholic schools (like I didn't know that, having graduated from BC). His point was that if you have pretensions of navigating the Ivy League grad schools and the Northeastern country clubs, even the best Catholic colleges are not good enough.
I think most people who entertain the thought of going to ND, Georgetown, BC, and Holy Cross are at least a little aware of this. I just want to throw it out on the table for others to comment on. There seem to be a lot of threads that this topic is relevant to...in recent days I've seen Notre Dame vs. Dartmouth, Fordham vs. Rutgers, BC vs. Hopkins, BC vs. Barnard, Holy Cross vs. Michigan, and Georgetown vs. Everybody. I think it's important for these people who are making these decisions to know if it is true that going with the Catholic college is in fact imposing on themselves a sort of social and academic glass ceiling. And does the same sort of effect happen at Brandeis, Baylor, Wake Forest, and any other college that has a religious bent? To hell with political correctness, let your true feelings out.</p>

<p>I don't think religion has anything to do with it. Dartmouth is comparable to Brown, Penn, Columbia, Duke, Amherst, Williams. Notre Dame is comparable to Wellesley, Middlebury, Emory, UNC, Vanderbilt.</p>

<p>Different categories.</p>

<p>This thread has been fun. To see people advocate each school so strongly tells you something about both places.</p>

<p>It seems to me that the decision absolutely has to be based, in the end, on what each person thinks is best for him or her. I'd again emphasize that what you do in your career is going to be much more important a few years in than where you graduated from (Dartmouth might give you an initial advantage in some circles). Heck, I graduated (BS) from a 4th tier school (U. Wisc.-Parkside), and was in charge of a peer from Brown after a few months on my first job, solely based on performance. I refuse to believe that, unless you surrounded yourself with elitist degree whores, your life is going to be defined by where you went to school. Unless you come from a rich family or are awarded big scholarships, it probably makes more sense to get a public school education (esp. Michigan, Berkeley, UNC, ...) at a fair price, and then get some sort of master's or professional education at a private school. With tuition at $32K+/yr. and increasing, that's a lot of debt, and a lot of people think it isn't worth it anymore.</p>

<p>And I do love Dartmouth. Maybe I'll go to med school there :)</p>

<p>On one side of my family, everyone goes to Dartmouth, and on the other, everyone goes to Notre Dame. From what I've noticed, there seems to be a lot more enthusiasm/spirit that follows Notre Dame students even after graduation-I think that is an awesome thing to have. Dartmouth of course is a fantastic school, but there is not much to do and the surrounding town is quite boring. As a result, there seems to be a lot of drinking. Concerning relationships, I think you will find a LOT more hookups at Dartmouth then at Notre Dame. This is just what I've been told from my family. Students at Notre Dame are a little more focused on relationships. You have two great choices and I think it depends on your personality because the two are very different, personality wise.</p>

<p>Wow, eringobraugh, you have some awesome legacy connections :). Thanks for the reply- the comparison is helpful.</p>

<p>Hey no prob. Have you made any decision yet or are you leaning towards one?</p>

<p>If you're having this much trouble deciding, and are concerned about a paltry 9-slot difference in rankings, then you'd probably be happier at Dartmouth. ND seems like a place for people who know that they love it above all others, regardless of the US News rankings. It's a unique place, it's not for everybody, it doesn't try to be for everybody, and there aren't any colleges even similar to it. Whereas Dartmouth has broader appeal, and there are similar schools...Dartmouth is sort of a supersized Williams or Princeton-Lite.</p>

<p>Tourguide446 made a very good point.</p>

<p>Excellent point, Tourguide- that one really made me think. I find it really ironic that I applied to BOTH of these schools on a whim- ND as a semi-safety that had EA (which I was looking for) and Dartmouth as a school that was similar to Pton and Williams and on the common app- and now they are the top contenders. In any case, there is something that appeals to me about Notre Dame so that I haven't been able to get it out of my head since I was accepted in December, whereas Dartmouth is probably the "best" school I got into (along with Amherst), albeit not by an earth-shattering amount. Notre Dame exceeded all the expectations I had going into the process, whereas Dartmouth, while still appealing, let me down on several points. In any case, maybe its time to admit that my gut IS telling me to go to Notre Dame, and I'm just being a prestige-whore to hang onto Dartmouth. I guess I'll find out next year if Notre Dame really is for me or not...provided I have the guts to send in my acceptance form tommorrow...</p>

<p>I once turned down Notre Dame for grad school. Now every time I see them playing football on TV, and hear that fight song, it's like torture.</p>

<p>You won't regret your decision to attend Notre Dame at all. As a kid who will be applying next year with numbers not good enough to get into my dream school of Notre Dame, I wish I were in your position. However, that's not in the cards and I just have to enjoy every minute that I am fortunate to be on campus (as a visitor). It's a very special place. Congrats on your decision - you will have a blast!</p>