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Indeed, if you’re talking about US News rankings, Penn actually has been ranked higher than Columbia for 13 of the last 17 years, and their rankings have always been very close. For all intents and purposes, these two schools are essentially ranked the same, and splitting hairs over a couple of ranking places one way or the other would be rather silly.</p>
<p>OP here. </p>
<p>One thing that I have noticed is that when I googled “student Reviews Columbia University” and read several of them, it seems like overall, the students were not as positive as the average Penn student was about Penn. This could be because of the limited sample size? idk. </p>
<p>I noticed that the acceptance rate is lower at Columbia, which seems to imply a higher degree of interested students, but I also noticed that the Penn applications increased significantly since last year and Columibia’s did not. </p>
<p>I also read that if you are interested in getting a double major, that it is more doable with the more flexible curriculum at Penn, and that a large percentage of students have a double major. </p>
<p>I think I am going to read about some of the clubs and activities at the two schools now and see how those compare.</p>
<p>Columbia is a smaller school so the acceptance rate is lower than Penn, but I think Penn received more applicants this year.</p>
<p>I have heard that many students at Columbia are very unhappy. I think this has to do with the decentralized campus life. I have also heard that the bureaucracy there is very hard to navigate, even more so than the average Ivy/top school. I just don’t think NYC is the best place to go to college.</p>
<p>I had lunch with a 2008 SEAS graduate (who BTW is a very talented engineer) a couple of weeks ago and found out that his younger brother who also went to Penn and graduated from SEAS and Wharton (dual degree). To make a long story short, the brother with the SEAS/Wharton degree who graduated in 2010 is making a bigger salary than his older brother. If getting a good high paying job is important, I think being closely linked to Wharton (and their graduates) and including the possibility to attend the school could be important . Wharton graduates are highly respected from employers just about everywhere.</p>