<p>“Are you suggesting kids from schools that don’t rank can’t get into NU, since ranking is allegedly so important?”</p>
<p>"“Very Important” for NU
Rigor of HS record
Class rank"</p>
<p>You are still not answering the question. High-stats kids from my kids’ school have gotten into Northwestern, and our school doesn’t rank. Clearly, there are exceptions.</p>
<p>Well then I guess class rank isn’t “very important” at NU afterall. I wonder what other things not mentioned are very important? Perhaps high ACT/SAT scores are very important? I mean, explain to me why a school would allowing superscoring if it wasn’t very important? Michigan allows only one sitting for test scores.</p>
<p>Again, missing the point. Class rank is important IF a student has it. Curriculum rigor is important IF a student has it. Otherwise, the adcoms have to figure out a way to determine a student’s qualifications using the information they have.</p>
<p>And you are misrepresenting Michigan’s testing policy. They don’t “allow only one sitting”–they (according to you; I couldn’t find this on the site) don’t superscore. Big difference. Kids can take the test 10 times and submit the best single sitting score they received.</p>
<p>I might have mispoken about Northwestern superscoring the college board tests. If that is the case, then I apologize for providing bad information.</p>
<p>“And you are misrepresenting Michigan’s testing policy. They don’t “allow only one sitting”–they (according to you; I couldn’t find this on the site) don’t superscore. Big difference. Kids can take the test 10 times and submit the best single sitting score they received.”</p>
<p>You know what I meant. If not, you know what I mean now.</p>
<p>“I don’t think public institutions can really be compared the same way, especially these days with all the state budget issues and education-haters in positions of power in many states.”</p>
<p>Actually sally, Michigan has an endowment of $7.6 billion to complement state funding (6th largest endowment in the country after Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton and MIT). As such, Michigan is one public institution that can be compared the same way very nicely, regardless of the state of its funding. UVa is in a similar financial situation as Michigan thanks to its large endowment.</p>
<p>bclintonk, I disagree that there are as many super smart kids at UMich as there are at Northwestern. NU has more National Merit Scholars than Michigan and has better success at producing Churchill/Truman/Goldwater scholars.</p>
<p>“bclintonk, I disagree that there are as many super smart kids at UMich as there are at Northwestern. NU has more National Merit Scholars than Michigan and has better success at producing Churchill/Truman/Goldwater scholars.”</p>
<p>goldenboy, I am not sure I agree with your assessment. Where did you get your information from? Michigan has produced at least as many, of not more, Rhodes, Marshall, Truman, Churchill and Goldwater scholars than Northwestern. </p>
<p>RHODES:
Michigan 26
Northwestern 16</p>
<p>TRUMAN
Michigan 21
Northwestern 12</p>
<p>MARSHALL
Northwestern 18
Michigan 17</p>
<p>CHURCHILL
Michigan 9
Northwestern 9</p>
<p>GOLDWATER
Michigan 61
Northwestern 58</p>
<p>TOTAL
Michigan 134
Northwestern 113</p>
<p>Michigan has also produced more Fullbright scholars (344 Michigan vs 200 Northwestern since 1990), and places more students than Northwestern in top graduate schools than NU. </p>
<p>On a per student basis, NU does better, but in an absolute terms, Michigan outperforms Northwestern.</p>
<p>“And you don’t have to just assume NU is superior because it superscores ACT tests either and places a higher emphasis on them then Michigan does when accepting students. For some, Northwestern is elitist and lacks school spirit in comparison to a place like Michigan.”</p>
<p>Then those people don’t have to go to NU!
Rfkofnovi and Alexandre - yes, I have spent time on the Michigan campus. It is too big and has too many students for my personal tastes. Others will prefer that size. I agree that Michigan as school spirit out the wazoo.</p>
<p>We are now on our sixth page of discussing whether NU is ‘better’ than Michigan.</p>
<p>There are problems with this whole discussion </p>
<p>First – I’m not sure that there is any consensus on what “better” is. Without a consensus, the discussion is pretty meaningless.</p>
<p>I mean, if we could all agree that USNWR is the ultimate arbiter de arbiters, then the discussion is trivial, we can look at the list and NU wins. Huzzah!!!</p>
<p>If we discuss quality of education, it gets harder. Much harder. I don’t know whether one can say that either school offers an advantage on the undergraduate level. Perhaps there is a difference in student bodies – but as Alexandre points out, the top students in NU and the top students in Mich are probably indistinguishable. Is there a group of very-bright-but-slightly-less-bright students who are at Michigan because it’s easier (is it easier?) to be admitted in-state? Maybe. Does it make a difference in the level of discourse in classes and the quality of education? If so, how much a difference. I have no idea.</p>
<p>We could talk about job placement. Even if we could answer this question on a university-to-university basis, I believe we’d have to delve deeper and look at student cohorts – how do Mich students with 1500 SAT Cr+M and a 3.8 GPA compared with NU students with similar stats. Anyone have any such data? Is NU better? and if so, how much.</p>
<p>What it comes down to for most of us, is we go with our gut feeling. Personally, I believe that overall NU is better than Michigan. (I could give reasons, but it would be a lengthy post, and honestly I’m not sure whether anyone really does or should care.) However, I don’t think the difference is great and am less sure as to whether it is significant in any meaningful way. </p>
<p>To be honest, even us NU fans recognize that Michigan was a great school. If someone were to start a thread and ask whether Podunk is better than NU, we’d elther laugh her off or dismiss him as a ■■■■■.</p>
<p>Anyway, when you have schools that are relatively close, I think fit is much more important than which is slightly better.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Of course, there is exactly zero evidence that for a given motivate student that NU is better than Podunk. Laugh away.</p>
<p>rjkofnovi,</p>
<p>It makes perfect sense to consider academic GPA and class rank together. 4.0 doesn’t mean much if the school has a lot of grade inflation. Class rank provides a proper context for the GPA; if GPA is very important, so should the class rank be. That’s just being consistent given their close relationship. In most cases, the two are in sync anyway. There’s nothing stats-driven about it. Also, according to their CDS, essays and recommendation letters are both “very important” for NU but only “important” for UMich and NU places higher value on ECs and talent/ability. NU also asks for an additional “Why NU” essay. Considering all of these, NU admission does seem to be more holistic. </p>
<p>Although UMich places higher value on “first generation”, I think it is just their way to get around Michigan’s Prop 2 that bars race as a factor. In fact, it looks a bit odd to be in the “very important” category; but once you recall the Prop 2; it doesn’t look odd anymore. NU can and does consider race, so it doesn’t need to place as much emphasis on “first generation”.</p>
<p>There are five items that are more important than test scores for NU but for UMich, only two are more important. So the claim that NU puts more emphasis on test scores is not only baseless but wrong.</p>
<p>I believe that both NU and Michigan have relatively holistic admissions processes. That does not mean that they do not have their strategic preferences (Michigan favors high school class rigor and unweighed GPA while NU favors another set of metrics). </p>
<p>This said, I find it disingenuous that people can so vehemently deny that a university with a mid 50% ACT/SAT ranges at the level of Harvard and Stanford (such as NU, Vanderbilt and WUSTL) do not actively seek students with high scores, regardless of what they may say. </p>
<p>Providing sources from those universities that list test scores as merely “important” as opposed to “very important” cannot conceal this. It is not like those universities can come out and say that they weigh SAT/ACT scores heavily because it would seriously reduce the number of applicants, raise their acceptance rates and in all other ways contradict their marketing efforts (WUSTL encourages students with slightly above average test scores to apply).</p>
<p>^Alexandre,</p>
<p>NU is not at the level of Harvard. It’s about 40 points lower on a 1600 scale (M+V). How much lower do you need so you would stop going around to tell others the reason behind the difference between UMich and NU’s test scores is that NU “actively seek[s] student with high scores” more than UMich does? Just browse around decision threads on CC, you’d notice NU’s decisions appear more “random” than UMich, including the decision of rejecting high-scoring kids. There’s really no evidence whatsoever behind your allegation.</p>
<p>As my link showed earlier, over half the NU APPLICANTS scored over 1420/4.0 for the 2011 cycle; NU didn’t really need to “actively seek them”, so many and large fraction were already in that application pile. NU ended up with a 1460 median for the enrolled, not much higher than the 1420 median from the applicant pool. NU could easily get it higher if it really wanted to.</p>
<p>NU’s acceptance rate is closer to Harvard than UMich and NU is a private like Harvard; it shouldn’t be surprising that NU’s test scores are closer than those of Harvard than UMich.</p>
<p>As for Vandy and WashU, Vandy’s increase has been much more dramatic and sudden while WashU is indeed at the level of Harvard. I don’t think you should keep putting NU and them in the same sentence. You should analyze them separately.</p>
<p>@anna’s dad</p>
<p>If we really want to be honest – the famous Princeton study suggests that the natural ability of the student is the most important factor in success (measured, I think as lifetime earnings) and that what undergrad school one goes to may make relatively little difference.</p>
<p>So let’s all root for the Podunk Opossums – Go Possums!!!</p>
<p>Overal, Northwestern is a better school than Michigan. The difference is not significant though.</p>
<p>^^^^I disagree. :-)</p>
<p>Alexandre, Wash U can enroll a student body as gifted as Stanford’s because there’s a much greater supply of high stats students in the country than there are admissions seats in the 8 Ivies, Stanford, MIT, UChicago, Duke, Caltech, and Northwestern. These 2200-2400 SAT scorers will then filter down to Wash U, Hopkins, Emory, Vandy, etc.</p>
<p>Michigan admits a lot of high test scorers but a bulk of them choose to enroll somewhere higher ranked and you end up with a student body that is less gifted than that of the top private school. Part of it has to do with the fact that Michigan is a much larger school so it can’t be as selective and the other part has to do with the fact that its reputation is weaker.</p>
<p>“Part of it has to do with the fact that Michigan is a much larger school so it can’t be as selective and the other part has to do with the fact that its reputation is weaker.”</p>
<p>Is Michigan’s reputation really weaker goldenboy? Peruse this listing:</p>
<p>[Top</a> universities by reputation 2013 - Times Higher Education](<a href=“http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2013/reputation-ranking]Top”>World Reputation Rankings 2013 | Times Higher Education (THE))</p>
<p>Notice how Michigan is ranked 12th in the world and Duke is a lowly 31? </p>
<p>I would say Michigan does have a weaker reputation among teenagers, their parents, and some arrogant posters here on CC.</p>