<p>My son was looking forward to going to UVa, but has just been accepted to Duke. He is going in undecided and plans to major in some combination of electrical engineering, physics and/or computer science. He struggled trying to decide on UVa in the first place, since no school was THE school. Any insight and opinions would be appreciated.</p>
<p>Well, is Duke THE school? Or does it have potential? If possible, maybe a visit to both? If you only went to the admitted students day, or open houses, you can get a skewed perception of what it's really like. UVa has a pretty interesting engineering program that many people find pretty appealing (small, focused, good opportunities). I don't know about Duke's, probably good too I would guess. Actually if you go on the UVA board and look back a few pages, someone's son just finished up engineering with something about computers (sorry obviously this isn't an area I know anything about LOL) and had some honest insight into the good and bad parts of the program. I imagine you could hook yourself up with someone here who can give the same about Duke. </p>
<p>But, unless the fit is inadequate, it seems to me that when someone decides on a school that is a good fit, but maybe they don't think they got the "sign" they expected, once they get there and everything gets underway, it becomes THE school. I'm a senior now but I know so many people from last year that thought somewhere else was the school, weren't really sure, and a couple months later, all they'll talk about is how reat their school is ;) I don't think it's necessarily unusual to entertain some doubts, it is an overwhelming decision.</p>
<p>S1 has just finished his soph year at Duke. He is an Electical/Computer Engineering major in Pratt, with a second major in Computer Science. He is LOVING everything about Duke--never gave UVA a glance (and we live in VA). The Engineering School added a fantastic amount of new state-of-the-art space the year before S1 started, and they are right next to the Med Center--beautiful buildings and lots of innovative programs. Check out the Engineering School info on the Duke website. </p>
<p>If he hasn't visited both schools this might not be the best weekend--it's Duke's graduation and hotels might be booked up! UVA's graduation is next weekend, so same would hold true re: hotels.</p>
<p>we are also Virginians. son turned down Echols at UVa for Duke. And we know many happy fulfilled UVa grads. Feel free to PM if you want any of our impressions or pros and cons. The obvious contrast is that Charlottesville is the superior dreamy zen college small town in a gorgeous county. Sports venues are actually pretty great at UVa and obviously are outstanding at Duke. Both schools have loyal alum and a lot of school spirit and pride. Both schools have fratty cultures and also equally interesting non Greek cultures for students. Both have superior graduate schools. But Duke has more of a mix of small intensive classrooms, more access to full professors, and is generally is a more intimate medium sized college community with 3 years of everyone on campus...kids in Charlottesville tend to disperse off campus after year one or two. Freshman year at Duke is particularly strong in my parental opinion. Although I am disappointed Duke has right many classes with 100 students in them, UVa's same courses are much larger. My son is on the reserved side and has made friends with many teachers at Duke anyway. He loved the FOCUS program and is going abroad. The East Campus thing works really well to serve almost as if Duke was an even smaller college for year one. Virginia has a remarkably diverse student body for a state institution but Duke students will be from every nook and cranny of the USA.<br>
Duke is a very tough school academically but I think our son is learning as much from his peers as he is from his teachers. He admires his classmates. He did not have as strong a high school background as most Duke students but he has said he won't be afraid of anything after four years at Duke among so many talented kids. Duke has a pretty great fun factor but I would have to give UVa the same positive for being an upbeat place. I like the mental health atmosphere at UVa but not the class sizes.
good luck with your son's great choices. Pratt is a very cool school.</p>
<p>if ur from virginia, i would say its a no brainer to go to uva over duke.</p>
<p>if you're paying full (oos) freight at both places, u should go visit both and see which one you like. i personally didn't find duke appealing, but obviously thats not the case with everyone. if your son has already made up his mind about UVa, and you've obviously already sent ur money in, i would just recommend going there unless you or he thinks duke is going to offer something that UVa isn't. I can tell you in the areas your son is interested in, it most likely doesn't.</p>
<p>in response to faline's post,</p>
<p>average class sizes may be smaller at duke, but they arn't really large at UVa. while it may sound like a big difference--a class with 100 students is no different then a class with 500 students. and a class with 30 students is taught the same way a class with 15 students is.</p>
<p>i don't understand what faline means by duke having "more access to full professors," i've never had a problem meeting with my professors at uva.</p>
<p>moving off campus at uva is the thing to do--so its not necessarily a bad thing. off grounds housing at UVa is great, and living in dorms is a drag after your first year anyway, imo. the party scene at UVa is not reliant on dorms. the dorms i've seen at duke are nicer then the ones at Uva though...although UVa is in the process of building brand new first year dorms (2 of which are already available).</p>
<p>diversity wise, UVa obviously has a ton of kids from virginia--but it also has students from all 50 states, just like duke. however, virginia, like north carolina is a huge state. the difference between fairfax virginia and danville virginia is night and day.</p>
<p>Well, if populations at the schools are a concern, I wouldn't say they are extremely different. Most of Va and NC are pretty similar. Duke also has a to take a certain percentage of NC students by their charter, right? (maybe that's ended, I don't know). I don't think of Duke as having significantly more people from non mid-atlantic/southern areas, and most of the people I know who applied there didn't seem to think it was so different from Va culture wise either, but I don't know. I know people who chose Duke and people who liked UVA more. I agree that class size at UVA is not such a big concern, IMO it is acceptable. At many places freshmen classes are going to be large but as ou progress you will probably be in more focused and smaller classes. The person who posted about UVA engineering recently indicated the classes were small by the later years, introductory classes are going to be large in either case I imagine.</p>
<p>To be very honest, deciding about the final choice based on the 'fit' factor, after a brief visit, imo, needs to be weighed very carefully. This becomes more relevant, if the choice is between two places which are not very different in most of the parameters. Duke and UVa, in terms of academics,campus life, student body are not so widely different! However, my personal observation are as follows:</p>
<ol>
<li>The Duke campus (including the buildings) is much more attractive.</li>
<li>The student body of Duke, is indeed better, primarily due to the "prestige factor" that attracts a large number of highly qualified oos and international students.</li>
<li>The engineering faculty is not very great. Biomed could be an exception!</li>
</ol>
<h2>4. Investigate the career/job prospect, on graduation.You may not be as impressed as you would like to be.</h2>
<ol>
<li>The engineering faculty in UVa, is very helpful. However,the level of interaction depends on the initiative of the student.</li>
</ol>
<h2>2. The student body is better galvanized, and very proud of the university. Most of them appear to be very happy and enjoying their college experience.</h2>
<p>Yes. Most of the students would like to join Duke, because of the perceived 'brand name' that it carries for the rest of the life.</p>
<p>Our S just finished his first year at UVA as an engineering major and he has been ecstatic about the program, the school, and the community. There was a thread a few months ago on the one thing wrong with your school and I love to contribute to stuff like that. I work as an analyst whose job is to find fault with things. The fact that I just couldn't find anything bad to say about his program is saying a lot. </p>
<p>S1 is headed to Peru next week for an 8 week Spanish immerision UVA summer school program. I love the fact that he is getting lots of liberal arts opportunities on top of the engineering. In fact, he loved an English class for the first time in his life. I feel like kissing the ground that teacher walks on.</p>
<p>I'm sure Duke has a great program too, but I don't know anything about it. Good luck with your decision.</p>