Hi, I need help. I need to decide by Friday if I am changing my decision plan to UChicago. I don’t think I have a chance Rd, but I am so scared that if I do ED and go there, I will just fail. Everyone says its a brutal school, with little social activity and whatnot. What if I go any find out that I am too stupid and actually can’t keep up? I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to have mental breakdowns every night over homework loads, but I also really want to go to the #3 school in the country, and I love Chicago, and the campus is beautiful and they have all the things I want to study. My dream was NU, but I got rejected. Please, what should I do?
Thanks
If you get in, the powers that be have decided you can do the work, so I wouldn’t worry too much about that. It’s a hard school but most people can manage it. It depends on what you mean by mental breakdowns I guess…some people are pretty stressed over schoolwork and this place can be a handful. It’s up to you to decide whether that’s worth it.
What is plan C? If you are chasing schools based on magazine rankings odds are your odds are long.
Have a solid balanced list of schools you would be happy to attend.
As for culture and homework: Do you like taking your homework to the beach? Do you feel it makes it easier to be in a place where the culture prioritizes school work over partying or do you feel that would be depressing? My kid was relieved that doing school work is basically part of social life there.
^^ That’s true, and that is actually different from NU. Not that kids don’t study at NU but the culture doesn’t necessarily support classwork as a frequent social topic. So, OP, if you love talking about your schoolwork with your pals in the dining hall or at the Starbucks (and I mean really talking about it, not just asking who has Prof. X’s notes from the lecture the other day or comparing finals schedules), then apply ED II. If what is driving you to consider ED II is that UChicago is #3 on the USNews rankings, then don’t apply ED II. If loving the ranking were the main criterion for “good fit”, the first year class would be about eight times its current size.
@JBStillFlying one of the starbucks* 
We have a caffeine problem. And many, many coffee shops.
@HydeSnark, that’s one of the nice features about Hyde Park now. Those didn’t exist when I lived there.
Thanks everyone! I just uploaded my ED form onto the site.
Fingers crossed till decisions come out!!
It’s really interesting to see more students applying to UChicago just because it’s now so far up in the rankings in a magazine. I don’t think that was the type of student that was applying not that far back.
^^Totally agree, @goingnutsmom.
I view this differently. I think the high rankings will get more people to consider UChicago and determine if there is a fit there. At least that is what happened in D’s case. She has visited most of the top schools, but found that UChicago had a distinctly different culture that she really liked. In contrast she had absolutely no interest in Princeton.
Please don’t misunderstand-- I love UChicago for its academics and the campus environment, not just the number ranking. However, the fact that the ranking is so high makes it that much more appealing, and also daunting, seeing as this means it it more competitive. I suppose it is the “want what you can’t have” mentality of a reach school. @JBStillFlying @goingnutsmom
@goingnutsmom “It’s really interesting to see more students applying to UChicago just because it’s now so far up in the rankings in a magazine. I don’t think that was the type of student that was applying not that far back.”
I think you have it backwards.
The marketing by the school gave UChicago more of brand awareness among high school students, something that the Ivies, MIT, Stanford and Duke always have had in spades. As a result, interest among students went up and applications went up - and better USNews rankings followed that rise. UChicago still is full of self-selected intellectual (rather than pre-professional) applicants that fit the UChicago profile. The difference now is that every single top applicant in the country that fits that profile now has UChicago on their radar right next to Yale and Columbia - that simply was not the case in the past.
No. . . .in the past it was Brown - at least when I was in college. There will always be some university that is Flavor of the Decade. Really hoping the attraction to UChicago is genuine and not just another fad. The rapid rise in the USNews ranking does make me a bit suspicious.
If you are looking for flavor of the decade, it’s more likely to be Stanford than UChicago. That’s everybody’s dream school now. Chicago is competing with Yale, Columbia and MIT for the intellectuals/purists/nerds. Stanford is making its play to pass Harvard and be Numero Uno.
Fact is, UChicago always had the faculty and academic rigor, but didn’t get the applications that its academic quality warranted. Now it is getting the applications because high school students finally have the school on their radar.
@ThankyouforHelp it took Stanford awhile but by now it’s probably better established among the tippy top schools at this point than is UChicago. Guess I never considered it Flavor of the Decade but rather saw it as a steady march to the top - a bit more slowly than UChicago.
Definitely agree that the latter was way under-represented at the undergrad. level for decades.
@ThankYouforHelp, there is no disputing that UChicago made a concerted effort to go up in the rankings. It was always an academic heavyweight but without the cultural prestige/cache that obviously Ivies and some other selective schools had.
But I disagree with your observation that it didn’t get the applications that were warranted. The students applying there were in fact very informed about the school and not applying to impress others because that was just not a priority. Perhaps it did not get a high number of applications true.
Also, your comment that the students now applying still fit the UChicago environment is somewhat iffy. I’m seeing the kids who apply based on rankings applying when they actually have done little to no research on the school. Really, no kidding. They say “like because now it’s so high on the list I’m applying”. Some have the credentials but some don’t. But they have the chase to prestige a a common factor.
Part of the reason UChicago is competing with Yale and not Harvard for the intellectuals/nerds/purists is that Harvard has ceased to be as much of a magnet for those kids. It’s seen as more focused on prestige and networking (from an undergrad perspective) than academics. Harvard has always had both elements, but the mix/emphasis seems to have changed. I’ve heard that from both faculty and applicants.
The flip side of this is, when I went to school, any intellectually-oriented kid would have known to apply to Harvard if they were looking for/could afford/had the stats for a hardcore intellectual environment. Fewer of these kids would have known they should apply to Chicago (whether they did was probably a function of where they grew up and/or their parents’ class/educational background)
I don’t know about this. I think Harvard still gets some of the very best minds out there.
For example, Harvard has Math 55, often considered to be the nation’s hardest math course. And many of the kids that attend MIT PRIMES, a highly selective program where HS kids perform math research, end up at Harvard.
http://math.mit.edu/research/highschool/primes/alumni.php
@hebegebe you just offended a bunch of people in Honors Analysis, lol.
I do agree with you Harvard still gets eggheads. My impression is they even get more than Yale. I don’t think you can really use PRIMES to say much, though. It’s a program for kids in the Boston area. College admissions is still very regionalized, so most end up going to Boston schools or elsewhere in the Northeast.