<p>Sure you are.</p>
<p>^ Hey, just don't talk bad about the west coast. Give respect where its due, and just leave us alone. Californian's don't sit around and plot evil plans to make our coast better. LOL! We got too many other things to do, you know?</p>
<p>Why look at it as our coast vs your coast? KK and I belong to neither coasts. We belong the Great Lakes baby! hehe And the best universities in the nation are in our region!!! LOL</p>
<p>LOL, how true Alexandre!!!!!</p>
<p>sorry guys i didnt mean this to be a perfect list, i did it in like 3 minutes just to insight some discussion. </p>
<p>Alexandre - Duke and UPenn are about where they are in the USNWR. I would agree if you wanted to bump Duke down a few slots, mainly because its possible some of their prestige is coming from theyre applicant popularity over the past several years. UPenn IMHO is about where it should be, but if it dropped a slot i wouldnt have a problem, cuz as i said sometimes they have access problems</p>
<p>I think GTown and Hopkins are at good spots, personally, but if you wanted to drop Hopkins a slot or 2 id be ok with that. THe reason i have JHU where it is, is because if you ignore admissions rates (this is the same for UChicago), their academics are really really strong. Their graduate placement is incredible, their professors are the best in their field, and they are extremely influential in areas ranging from BME to neuroscience to IR to politics to Creative Writing and so on. Students from JHU are at the top of their professions, in business, medicine, science, art and definately government, although they don't flaunt it the way others might. </p>
<p>Georgetown gets somewhat of an undeserved bad rap, and personally when i was there i felt that it was a bit of a cold campus (not temperature wise). If you wanted to drop them a 2 slots, like JHU, i wouldnt debate that mainly becuase they are especially strong in a few categories (Law, US and foreign policy, medicine...), but i think it does belong below UChic and JHU and that it belongs above many other schools</p>
<p>As for MIT, maybe i over compensated, but i dont think a lop sided academic school should be given as much credit on a list for overall academics. Are they one of the if not the best in science and technology? yes of course, but that doesnt make them the best overall academic experience, especially if we are going to hurt other schools for not being strong across the board.</p>
<p>UMich i put in the 11-20 range because thats where i think it belongs, its still higher than USNWR, and UMich is an excellent school but is not a Top 10, if we're being realistic.</p>
<p>New List</p>
<ol>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>Stanford </li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>Duke/Harvard</li>
<li>Columbia/University of Pennsylvania</li>
<li>University of Chicago/Johns Hopkins</li>
<li>MIT</li>
<li>Georgetown</li>
<li>Brown/Cornell</li>
<li>Northwestern/Dartmouth</li>
<li>CMU/UCB</li>
<li>UVA/UMich</li>
<li>WUSTL</li>
</ol>
<p>It's funny how University of Chicago/WUSTL is perceived to be an underrated university and its in your overrated list. All the ivyleagues are overrated including the big nacho Harvard. I really don't think Northwestern is overrated and University of Michigan. If U of M is overrated on the hype of sports, which it deserves credits. Academics, I really think it deserves more credit.</p>
<p>Abrendel, you mentioned that Stanford had ties to Princeton. I was unaware of the close connection. </p>
<p>Before founding the school, Leland Stanford visited Yale, Harvard, MIT, and Cornell. Most of Stanford's initial faculty came from Cornell. Their first president was also a Cornell grad. Was there a later connection?</p>
<p>I may be incorrect but was told by an someone in the admissions business that some of the people that went to work on setting the University up following its opening in 1891 were alumni of Princeton. Nonetheless, the two institutions (and Yale) are part of modern alliance, and share some basic philosophies on education that differ somewhat from the Harvard model (and are more inline, as i denoted with the Oxford model, though Princeton borrows much more heavily), including the prevelance of hands on education and some seminars. I may have my facts crossed however as to the Pton alumn who went to help out</p>
<p>If we look at schools and take an average/median of many different rankings out there, we should get a good picture of where schools should actually fall. Based on this, we can compare the true ranking to US News.</p>
<p>In no particular order:</p>
<p>Overated:
Penn
Brown
Dartmouth
Washington University</p>
<p>Underrated:
U of Chicago
U of Michigan
Berkeley
UCLA
UCSD</p>
<p>Using the average ranking criteria, it is hard for people to successfullyargue with that list.</p>
<p>In Medieval times, people argued about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin.</p>
<p>That said, I think LAC's are generally underrated because they're not as well known and thus don't carry the "prestige" factor that seems so important for many people.</p>
<p>I always thought U Berkeley was underrated. But it is supposed to be the best public university in the US !! Well atleast its the best university for engineering</p>
<p>Underrated most LAC's- Bowdoin, Holy Cross, Colgate, and Davidson. Overrated -UPENN, Boston College, Emory, and WashU.</p>
<p>Underrated(and not known by most people) - Soka University of America <em>great school</em>!</p>
<p>Overrated: UPenn
Underrated: Northeastern, Babson</p>
<p>okytdy :</p>
<p>Where the heck is that? Soka; sounds native american.</p>
<p>is this real? im looking at the campus video and i cant really tell lol...a physically new school? its kind of a cool idea to start a new school, but don't you think itd be tough for any modern university to gain respect?</p>
<p>It sounds like a very odd school.... They teach peace???
It sounds like a very liberal school (no pun intended). Also the fact that they only offer the BA in liberal arts would not make me think very highly of the school. Seriously, how in the world is this school underrated if it is not even rated???</p>
<p>Hahaha...sorry, i have to apologize.
I'm promoting this college because of religious reasons.
This college was built by the most rapidly growing religion in the world right now. It's called the "Soka Gakkai"(meaning Value Creation). It's a Buddhist religion and it spread from just Japan to 190 countries in 40 years.
If you are a humanist, or if you're a fan of the United Nations or something, which promotes this new humanitarian school, maybe you should look into it.
AND, if you have an open mind and believe in the beauty of life and becoming happy by making others happy...you would probably love it there.</p>