<p>I have a young relative who is planning on applying to a bunch of schools. His qualifications should see him admitted to the 5 schools above. He is completely undecided on major but wants to pursue a professional degree (business, law, or medicine). I am a Duke student and have had to make a similar decision myself. I chose Duke for a variety of reasons but they were unique to me. I undoubtedly want him to attend Duke but ultimately it has to be his decision to make. Can someone please give us some unbiased feedback regarding the aforementioned schools. Cost is not a factor nor is location. I don't think that he is big on partying. Reputation and prestige are reasonably important.</p>
<p>I’m not sure what feedback you’re looking for since the only thing these 5 schools share in common is elite undergraduate student bodies. Everything else from location to size to social environment to job placement to faculty prowess wildly varies among these aforementioned universities.</p>
<p>Since your young relative seeks a professional degree, the illustrious WSJ survey from 5 years ago would rank these schools as 1. Duke (8.61%), 2. Pomona (6.35%) 3. Chicago (6.22%), 4. Penn (5.49%) and 5. Johns Hopkins (3.54%)
<a href=“http://www.wsjclassroomedition.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf[/url]”>http://www.wsjclassroomedition.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf</a></p>
<p>We need more information from you though.</p>
<p>Why Pomona? Seems random compared to the more prestigious options you mentioned.</p>
<p>Prestige doesn’t adhere to size. Pomona is the only liberal arts college on the list, but it’s always in the top half-dozen liberal-arts colleges in the nation. A college buff like me would argue that the education at Pomona is better/deeper/stronger than that at any of those universities.</p>
<p>tell him Duke cause I’m going to apply there. Then we can chill.</p>
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</p>
<p>All 5 are reaches for most applicants, even with good stats. When you take reputation/prestige away and look at less selective “match” schools, which ones does he like? That might tell us something about his preferences. Meanwhile, here’s a list of metrics suggesting relative student, faculty, and facility strength:</p>
<p>Chicago
Mean SAT: 2180
Average faculty salary: $127,627
Classes under 20%: 78%
Endowment/Student: $6.31 billion / 15438 ~= $409K
Library holdings: 7.8M volumes
Strengths: integrated Core curriculum
Weaknesses: surrounding urban blight; crappy weather
Strength/Weakness (you decide): requirements associated w/ Core curriculum; Chicago location; theoretical orientation; nerdy students</p>
<p>Penn
Mean SAT: 2140
Average faculty salary: $124,240
Classes under 20%: 72%
Endowment/Student: $6.58 billion /21,203 ~=$310K
Library holdings: 5.9M volumes
Strengths:
Weaknesses:
Strength/Weakness (you decide): Philadelphia location; relatively pre-professional orientation; large size</p>
<p>Duke
Mean SAT: 1475 (CR/M only)
Average faculty salary: $112,135
Classes under 20%: 71%
Endowment/Student: $5.7 billion / 14,248 ~=$400K
Library holdings: 5.7M volumes
Strengths: great weather; good balance of academics w/quality of life
Weaknesses:
Strength/Weakness (you decide): big-time collegiate sports programs, Greek scene</p>
<p>JHU
Mean SAT: 2090
Average Faculty Salary: $93,587
Classes under 20%: 67%
Endowment/Student: $2.22 billion / 19019 ~=$117K
Library holdings: 3.7M volumes
Strengths: excellent research opportunities (#1 in annual research expenditures)
Weaknesses: Baltimore location</p>
<hr>
<p>Pomona (LAC)
Mean SAT: 2200
Average faculty salary: N/A
Classes under 20%: 67%
Endowment/Student: $1.458 billion / 1548 ~= $942K
Library holdings: (not among top 50)
Strengths: Claremont consortium; great weather
Weaknesses:
Strength/Weakness (you decide): small size</p>
<p>Overall Comment:
For the best balance of academics + quality of life, Duke probably is the best pick (unless you want a smaller, more intimate environment, in which case go w/ Pomona).
If you live and breathe academics, Chicago probably is the best pick.
But don’t count on being admitted to all 5.</p>
<p>Sources:
[50</a> Top Colleges](<a href=“http://50topcolleges.com/]50”>http://50topcolleges.com/)
[url=<a href=“The Best College Rankings and Lists | Inside College | CollegeXpress”>The Best College Rankings and Lists | Inside College | CollegeXpress]The</a> Top 50 Largest College Libraries | InsideCollege.com<a href=“plus%20individual%20college%20Wiki%20pages%20for%20endowment%20&%20enrollment%20numbers”>/url</a></p>
<p>They are all excellent schools. The only real way to tell would be to visit each school and see which feels right. The schools have important differences in terms of size (LAC up to large research university), location (east coast to west coast) etc. and there will certainly be different vibes of each campus. A person needs more than statistics on paper to find the best fit.</p>
<p>Interesting !</p>
<p>[50</a> Top Colleges](<a href=“http://50topcolleges.com/UnivofChicago.html]50”>http://50topcolleges.com/UnivofChicago.html)</p>
<p>University of Chicago</p>
<p>MOST POPULAR MAJORS</p>
<pre><code>* Biology: 11%
- Foreign Languages & Literature: 8%
- Mathematics & Statistics: 7%
- Pysical Sciences: 7%
- English & Literature: 6%
- Psychology: 6%
- History: 5%
</code></pre>
<p>No ECON major ?</p>
<p>You’re crazy if you think he is a lock on any of those schools. They are reaches for everyone. Instead of pretending he has a choice to make, wait to see where he gets in and then worry about it. The decision may be made for him.</p>
<p>I think the question may have been misinterpreted a bit. Yes, he does have exceptional stats, however I am by no means suggesting that he is a lock at any of these fine institutions, we just want to be completely prepared to make the right decision IF and when it comes down to it. There have been some great replies thus far, keep them coming.</p>
<p>that 50colleges.com website has a bunch of wrong information and is outdated by a year. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t use it and would stick to US News and Common Data Sets for more accurate info.</p>
<p>Some of the info is also completely misleading. If you actually want to compare apples to apples, you would use this for faculty salary, not some aggregate that includes all assistant/associate/full time professors:</p>
<p>[Faculty</a> Salaries at Research (Very High Research Activity) and AAU* Institutions, 2010-2011 - Office of Institutional Research and Assessment](<a href=“http://oira.unc.edu/faculty-salaries-at-research-and-aau-universities.html]Faculty”>http://oira.unc.edu/faculty-salaries-at-research-and-aau-universities.html)</p>
<p>You can tell from there, the gap between Penn/Chicago vs. Duke is larger than the other post would lead you to assume. Duke also doesn’t even have an average SAT:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.admissions.duke.edu/faq/index9c50.html?iQuestionID=524%20&iCategoryID=0[/url]”>http://www.admissions.duke.edu/faq/index9c50.html?iQuestionID=524%20&iCategoryID=0</a></p>
<p>Their admitted applicant range is also between 1370 to 1560 (suggesting an admitted student median of 1465) meaning their enrolled average should be well below 1475. Probably closer to 1430. The numbers reported above are outdated and sometimes wrong estimates of enrolled student averages.</p>
<p>I went to Duke as well; while UPenn does have a reputation for being pre-professional, it’s hard for me to imagine Duke can be all that far behind in that regard. I saw many go on to med, law, or business school. </p>
<p>There’s tons of statistical info out there, but it’s hard for me to imagine that the number of library books is very relevant. How many do you check out in 4 years? Oh sure, I know it’s a matter of whether they have the one you seek. But it’s easier than ever to get info through inter-library loans; much is being digitized, too. Putting much weight on that and faculty salaries is a bit like the tail wagging the dog. I’d say your young relative’s criteria are the most important factors. </p>
<p>If you want to help him decide, look at the major things distinguishing the schools. The role of big-time athletics certainly distinguishes Duke from the others. Location/size/weather distinguishes Pomona. Off the scale intellectualism distinguishes UChicago. And so forth.</p>
<p>^^ I like 50topcolleges.com for its clear, 1 page presentation of data. The fact that information is 1 year out of date isn’t too important to me. If it’s wrong, or not consistently calculated from school to school, that’s a different matter. </p>
<p>They really should clearly cite the sources and dates of their information. I assume it all comes from the 6 rankings they aggregate, or from the CDS files. The faculty salaries are consistent with the 2010 numbers at stateuniversity.com.</p>
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<p>Where library holdings become relevant is not in the undergraduate check-outs. It’s in the breadth and depth of original scholarship the facilities can support, and in turn, how attractive they are to top faculty. This in turn can affect the overall intellectual atmosphere of the school. </p>
<p>Chicago puts a lot of money into faculty salaries and library systems ([University</a> of Chicago alumni give $25 million in support of new Library | The University of Chicago](<a href=“Page Not Found | University of Chicago”>Page Not Found | University of Chicago)). The numbers tell you something about what is most important to the school.</p>
<p>That’s all true, but it’s also really indirect. Talk about trickle-down effects. I think most qualitative descriptions of the school would convey what is important just as effectively. Look at interviews with undergrads, with admissions officers, read the student newspaper. </p>
<p>Moreover, those faculty salaries don’t appear to adjust for cost of living, and there’s a world of difference between the cost of living in Chicago and the cost of living in, say, Durham, NC. </p>
<p>It’s all good - I love libraries myself and donate to my alma mater’s library fund annually. But when deciding between undergraduate schools, there are, IMO, many more important factors.</p>
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<p>True enough.
According to Bankrate.com’s COL calculator, $190,000 in Chicago (the average UofC full professor’s salary cited in your link) would be comparable to $157,000 in the Durham NC area. So, at ~$163K, a full professor at Duke would in fact be bringing in slightly higher real income than his counterparts at Chicago. </p>
<p>How do these differences play out in real life competition for the best faculty? Hard to say. It’s true, there are many issues with college rankings and the statistics that drive them. So at best they are a useful starting point for identifying clusters of peer schools before you dig deep into the kind of sources cspan suggests (college newspaper, etc.) </p>
<p>But you do have to dig. Based on the admissions office hype and web site boilerplate alone, you might think any number of colleges have world class faculty, highly competitive admissions, award-winning programs, cutting-edge research, etc. Rankings and statistics can help expose more-or-less significant differences beneath the hype. Then it’s up to you to decide which differences matter. Between Penn, Duke and Chicago? No, I don’t see very significant differences in these numbers.</p>