<p>How do you guys feel about the two schools in terms of these 5 factors?</p>
<p>-Reputation (National)
-Value
-Grad. School Acceptance
-Job Placement
-Undergraduate Experience</p>
<p>S is a rising ND senior; his good HS friend just graduated from Brown and was a sports recruit. My opinion after research, visits, and applications: </p>
<p>Reputation: nationwide, and to the general public, ND is more well known, especially outside of the NE corridor and outside of people Ivy-aware/obsessed.</p>
<p>Value: my guess is toss-up. They are both comparably priced. Great education at either.</p>
<p>Grad school acceptance: don’t know. I do know ND’s med school acceptance is very good.</p>
<p>Job Placement: Probably both good and probably depends on major. ND does have an incredible alumni network, and we have seen it in place at far ends of the country.</p>
<p>Undergrad experience: Good, but different, at each school. Brown students seemed very happy, and that seems to be repeated on lots of lists/college guides/etc. ND, IMO, is unparalled in some respects: combination of academics and sports, and emphasis on family, faith, and community in addition to excellence in academics.</p>
<p>ND is among the top few colleges in terms of % of students at their 1st choice school, and I feel this really resonates in the attitude of students.</p>
<p>Best advice: visit!! These two schools are very far apart in multiples areas, including core requirements, political bent, social conservatism, Catholic student body, dorm rules–you name it. A visit may be very telling in which school appeals most to you.</p>
<p>Thank you! I am a Catholic student and it’s just a lot of money to spend on a school, and I just want to make the right decision. Brown is “Ivy” but also ND is ND haha. Hopefully I get into one of them, and I am more politically and religiously in tune with ND, but also I wouldn’t mind being in a city environment like Providence. I have heard over and over how happy the Brown students are, which was a huge thing in sparking my interest.</p>
<p>Asking this in a Notre Dame forum would be one of the worst decisions you did. You will get mostly bias answers like above. If you can see, she rooted for ND because her children went there. That’s not good. Brown has a better job potential, and Brown is much more recognized then ND. To be honest, I never heard of ND before I came to CC.</p>
<p>Well, I certainly heard about ND before I came to CC. I also posted this thread in the Brown forum to get both sides.</p>
<p>If you are more “polically and religiously in tune” with ND you may also want to consider Boston College, since it will have more of a city environment that you said you liked. It has a slightly higher acceptance rate than ND also, which may be to your advantage. It is a wonderful school, in a great city!</p>
<p>I’m quite familiar with both; I went to ND and have a child who goes there, and I live close to Brown and have family members there too. Brown’s neighborhood is one of the most impressive assemblages of eighteenth-century architecture in the country, but the campus is a bit claustrophobic for my taste. Providence is a fairly vibrant city, but it’s on the small side and it’s certainly no Boston. It wasn’t that long ago that Brown was considered a poor cousin of the major Ivies, but there’s a new snobbery that views an Ivy education so unrealistically that students are desperate to get it into ANYof them (consider what’s happened to Penn). Brown is of course known for having a cafeteria-style “curriculum,” and for being a haven for children of celebrities who probably couldn’t get into THE Ivies.
Notre Dame does have a core curriculum, which I happen to think is a good idea. Its campus is far more beautiful than Brown’s; you know there’s something mysteriously special about the place the moment you enter its confines. I don’t think South Bend is anywhere near as bad as so many posters say it is, and of course there are extensive run-down neighborhoods near Brown too. Obviously both schools are good academically, but I think there’s no contest when it comes to those intangibles that make college a life-changing experience; Notre Dame hands down.</p>
<p>from living in RI for my entire life, I can tell you that brown and ND actually could almost be considered opposites. Visit both and you will be able to make an easy decision.</p>