<p>I have been accepted at CAS for Penn and CALS for Cornell.</p>
<p>I have been heavily involved in science at my high school, and Cornell has offered me a Hunter Rawlings presidential scholarship. However, while I really enjoy science, I'm not sure that I want to dedicate my entire life to it. To that end I'm considering trying to double major at whichever school I go to in economics.</p>
<p>I know that they are in very different locations, but that does not mean much to me, they are both similar in terms of athletics, school size and school spirit, which is important to me as a (former) athlete.</p>
<p>My parents seem to believe that Penn has a higher "prestige" factor, but I don't care about that. I'm asking for personal experiences with both schools and if there are significant differences in the quality of education and the possibilities of careers outside of my education.</p>
<p>stop thinking of the distant future..after 13 years or preparation you
got into 2 great schools..be selfish now and do something for yourself
and enjoy the next 4 years for itself…you will work the rest of your life
and only have a quick undergrad experience..so the setting does
matter…u of p you have urban school noise and traffic and the center city
of philly nearby and ny not far away…and for cornell the breath of fresh air
and the amazing stunning campus …youll be isolated in the winter but
this does give an intense undergrad experience with fellow classmates..
now about academics stop thinking and enjoy your years there..take
a course you never heard,change your major 3 times…be blown away by
a professor…my s 08 did the ivy tour and walked onto dartmouth campus
and said this is it!!..no discussion of major..just this is how he wanted to spend his next 4 years..
hope this helps..</p>
<p>Both colleges are large and offer an incredible range of diverse educational opportunities, more than one student, or 100 students, could take advantage of in four years. The main determinant of what kind of educational experience you have in college will be you, not any of the modest academic differences one way or the other between Penn and Cornell as institutions. You could be a star or a slacker at either, and the rewards of either path will be about the same at either college.</p>
<p>So, while you are asking good questions, in this case the difference in physical context between the two colleges is so large, and it’s so impossible to be truly indifferent about that difference, that your reaction to that (and to cost differences, if any) should probably swamp any other types of comparison.</p>
<p>I’m a Cornell alumna and parent of a Cornell student. As such, I feel it’s my job to point out that you can’t have a second major in economics in CALS at Cornell. </p>
<p>You can have a second major in applied economics and management, but that’s actually business, not economics. If what you really want is a biology/economics double major, you would have to do an internal transfer to the College of Arts and Sciences. It is not difficult to do an internal transfer, but you can’t do it right away. You would have to spend at least a semester, possibly a year, in CALS. (During that time, however, you could easily take the economics major prerequisites.)</p>
<p>You may want to take this into consideration in making your decision.</p>
<p>And as for the prestige thing, your parents are probably thinking about the fact that Penn is higher ranked than Cornell in the US News rankings. This, however, is offset by the fact that if you go to Penn, for the rest of your life, whenever you mention your alma mater, people are going to think you mean Penn State. This is so prevalent that Penn students and alumni sometimes wear “Not Penn State” T-shirts. So I think things are pretty even in the prestige department.</p>
<p>In our suburb, people would say Penn, Penn, Penn!</p>
<p>People know Penn is an Ivy League school, not Penn State. Maybe not the clerk at the grocery store, but people who would hire you or admit you to the grocery store know.</p>
<p>Penn and Brown are the two Ivy League schools that kids in our suburb who are worried about being with “a bunch of intense and competitive students in a world of stress” are happy to apply to. I think that Cornell has a higher proportion of intense and competitive students in a world of stress - and the grading is very difficult at Cornell - it is a torture to your GPA. </p>
<p>At Penn you have shopping, street festivals, night clubs - it’s Philly. At Cornell, you have snowbanks. :-)</p>
<p>My subtle suggestion. The daughter of a family friend goes to Penn and she absolutely loves it. Loves the courses. The son of a family friend goes to Cornell and he is pretty stressed out. Have you read the College “rhymes with Howler” book on both campuses? I haven’t but that might help you - lots of quotes from students,</p>
<p>Here in NY most kids choose Cornell over Penn. But I’m not suggesting one over the other. I do consider Cornell’s division into separate colleges a possible disadvantage. (My son is attending CMU with a somewhat similar set-up.)</p>
<p>I’m sure that’s true, statistically. But you couldn’t tell walking around the Penn campus. New York City metropolitan area residents are very well represented.</p>
<p>It is a disadvantage, but Penn has the same disadvantage.</p>
<p>One argument in favor of Cornell is that it is NOT in a major city. At both Penn and Cornell, most students eventually move off-campus. Living off-campus in Ithaca is less intimidating than doing so in a not-so-nice section of Philadelphia.</p>
<p>Kids from the New York metropolitan area are everywhere. They are the dominant group of out-of-staters at my son’s school, which is the University of Maryland.</p>
<p>My son considered both schools and is at the one in the city. He went to Cornell for a visiting weekend while he was still in high school and was very impressed. However, he now says he thinks the Cornell campus is too big and isolated and he is glad he chose Penn, even though there is a LOT he doesn’t like about the city. I have heard the grading is very hard at Cornell. Who needs that? I, personally, loved the campus and the town of Ithaca. I applied “back in the day” but didn’t get in.</p>
<p>“People know Penn is an Ivy League school, not Penn State. Maybe not the clerk at the grocery store, but people who would hire you or admit you to the grocery store know.”</p>
<p>Easily 19 out of 20 folk where I live – including employers – would think it was Penn State, and 5 of them would ask if you’d ever met Joe Paterno. However, not too many of them would mistake it for William Penn, though if they lived in Iowa, they likely would - don’t worry, though, William Penn is a very fine school. (But then if they lived in Iowa and you mentioned Cornell, they’d think the same.)</p>
<p>“I have heard the grading is very hard at Cornell. Who needs that?”</p>
<p>No longer true. In fact, during the 90s and early 2000s (I already posted the link), they had one of the highest rates of grade inflation in the country. But folks paid good money for those “A’s”, and it’s about time they got them.</p>
<p>Liberal arts and hotel management grades may be fine, but I think that the kids in pre-med, engineering, chemistry, and physics say that grading for people in the hard sciences is still pretty brutal at Cornell.</p>
<p>it’s a tough call without the scholarship offer from cornell. with the scholarship, i’d give a huge edge to cornell. cornell enjoys great prestige, agruably moreso than penn in the sciences (particularly abroad)</p>
<p>Let’s not get carried away with the scholarship thing.</p>
<p>Cornell, like the rest of the Ivy League, does not offer merit scholarships, only need-based aid. This is Ivy League policy.</p>
<p>However, Cornell, like several other schools in the Ivy League (notably, Columbia), cheats a bit by offering certain highly desired students special perks with fancy names attached. The Hunter Rawlings thing is one of these. There may or may not be a meaningful difference in the financial aid packages coming from the two universities, and the special privileges that come with the “scholarship” may or may not be of interest to a particular student.</p>
<p>In regards to financial aid, I am fortunate enough that my parents agreed that i I was accepted to an ivy league school, they would foot the bill. In regards to the scholarship, it is an 8000 dollar grant to participate in scientific research at my time at Cornell, it also offers 4000 a year loan relief to those on financial aid.
Here is the website about it
[Cornell</a> University Cornell Presidential Research Scholars: Prospective Scholars](<a href=“Cornell Commitment | Student & Campus Life | Cornell University”>Cornell Commitment | Student & Campus Life | Cornell University)</p>
<p>I thank you all for your responses so far, I’m curious about a more specific issue, how easy is it to double major at both of these universities, both in and outside the specific college I was accepted to. I believe someone said that you can only double major within your college at Cornell, is that the same as Penn?</p>
The daughter of a family friend goes to Penn and she absolutely loves it. Loves the courses. The son of a family friend goes to Cornell and he is pretty stressed out. Have you read the College “rhymes with Howler” book on both campuses? I haven’t but that might help you - lots of quotes from students,</p>