<p>Please share any pluses and minuses. Thanks!</p>
<p>Look at the bottom of this page for all the past forums related to this topic. Many such as yourself have asked this question and others have responded.</p>
<p>I give you some, but I’m admittedly biased toward Pitt but I do my best to be fair:</p>
<p>Pitt is urban, but with lots of green space. It is located in the middle of the cultural district of Pittsburgh and is adjacent to the main art and natural history museum, a major park (with great jogging trails), botanical garden, and city library, all of which are free to Pitt students. All city public transportation is free to Pitt students, and the university encourages the students to take advantage of all that it has to offer…and it has quite a bit for a city of its size because all of the steel magnates blew big chunks of the fortunes building things in the city in the early 20th Century. Pitt runs a program call PittArts ([PITT</a> ARTS : University of Pittsburgh](<a href=“http://www.pittarts.pitt.edu/]PITT”>http://www.pittarts.pitt.edu/)) which provides discounted and free tickets to a lot of events like plays and concerts, etc. So not only do have everything that is going on at Pitt, but also easy access to all the cultural and sporting events going on in the city, as well everything going on at Carnegie-Mellon University, which is adjacent to Pitt campus. Pitt and CMU have a lot of collaborative projects as well. Pitt’s campus is also in close proximity to a larger number and variety of restaurants than at PSU, which is nice when you are tired of campus food. Pitt’s primary major hospital (UPMC) and medical research facilities are right on campus allowing for easy access for students interested in obtaining research or clinical experience in the bio/health or medical fields. Penn State is rural. It is located in a medium-sized college town in the middle of Pennsylvania. The town itself is nice enough, a classic college town, but it is not close to anything urban. The campus is much more of a traditional grassy quad type of campus with plenty of trees. It’s layout is huge. Where Pitt is compact in size with many taller buildings, PSU is spread out over a large area which often requires shuttles to get from one part to another in adequate amount of time. One last thing, Pitt has way cooler buildings. You’ll not find anything like the Cathedral of Learning, inside and out, anywhere else in the world.</p>
<p>Pitt is much smaller than PSU (17,000 undergrads vs 38,000) so you won’t have as enormous of intro classes at Pitt. Pitt will have some classes that are 100-200, but at PSU you’ll have some that are 500-1000. As you progress in your major, class size whittles down at both.</p>
<p>PSU’s alumni base is huge, so it is probably superior for networking purposes, but the downside to that is one of the reasons it is so big is that it has 19 branch campus locations that have unquestionable lower standards and academics than at the main campus but everyone is getting the same diploma. Pitt has four branch campuses, two of which are ranked in their region by US News, and a much smaller percentage of Pitt diplomas originate from these regional campuses as compared to PSU.</p>
<p>Pitt, like PSU, is a major sports school. If you like sports, you have a top 20 football team and a top 10 basketball team to cheer for at Pitt. At PSU, football is king and basketball is essentially non-existant. Football and greek life a much bigger part of Penn State culture. Partying and drinking also have bigger reputations at PSU. All these aspects are at Pitt too, but life doesn’t necessarily center around them as the city provides, imo, many more diversions.</p>
<p>PSU is probably better known in business and engineering. Pitt is better known in anything in the health and biomedical sciences, but also highly regarded in philosophy, creative writing, international studies, information science, etc. Other programs at both schools are also excellent, but these are some of the best. Both schools have good reputations. Admissions scores in GPA, SAT, and class rank are higher at Pitt so it is somewhat more selective. Pitt also has a larger endowment, so often provides better financial packages. USNews rankings are slightly higher for PSU, but there are an equal number of other rankings that have Pitt higher. The overall rankings are about a wash if you average things out. You won’t go wrong attending either school, so pick the one you feel the happiest and most comfortable at.</p>