I will be a transfer student from a CC for Fall 2015. Right now I am purely thinking of the academics, so lets not factor in money for this discussion. I have not seen much in the context of undergrad psych preparation about any of these 3 universities. How would you rate these (in what order) and what are some pro -cons (excluding cost) that you can see? Interested in research, but also thinking of graduate school opportunities (of course with good grades) Will there be any advantages going to one over the other?
Any of them would be good for undergraduate psychology. You would not have a significant advantage going to any one of these wrt graduate school in psychology. All of them are top-notch research universities at which you can get good research experiences with psychology faculty.
I will say that at the graduate level, Rochester and NYU are better-reputed than Cornell for psychology (but are probably even with each other). That doesn’t necessarily have much to do with the undergraduate level of education.
Personally, if I were making the choice, I would go for Rochester. Not because of the academics - I would say you could get a roughly equal education at any of these schools - but because of the combination of the academics and a sort of traditional campus experience at a medium-sized university. Cornell would be my next choice - more than twice the size, but still a pretty traditional campus experience. If you prefer a more urban university without a defined campus and the sort of urbane, artsy students that NYU attracts - that might be the place for you.