Prestigious schools that you do/don't have to work prestigiously hard in?

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hi am looking at mainly well-rounded overall respected colleges, and I am afraid that the Ivy/Ivy-like name means that you have have heavy workloads. I have worked really hard to be at the level that I can even consider Ivy-league schools, and I want to have at least some kind of break. I know that you normally take less classes in college, and do not take them every day, but I constantly here about ppl at UChicago or reed that do not have time to relax because they work all the time. </p>

<p>If anyone knows which top schools you are likely to have the most/least work in, that would help me a great lot.</p>

<p>Currently my list is:
Dartmouth
Brown
Bowdoin
Colgate
Tufts
Bucknell
URochester</p>

2

<p>o also i want to be a neuroscience major</p>

3

<p>Among the Ivies:
Brown, Penn, and Dartmouth...but any of them can be very hard depending on your major</p>

4

<p>That's a misconception about Chicago and Reed. They do indeed relax. There's the supposedly "nerdy" atmosphere, but those who don't like the schools, more so Chicago than Reed, constantly jab at them by saying they don't know how to have fun. They do. They also work hard, which you'll be doing at any top university.</p>

<p>Now, regarding the colleges on your list, just from general perception (though I have no way to back any of this up, and some of it is probably wrong):</p>

<p>Dartmouth is an intellectual but laid-back school that you can relax in, but you will have to work, as at any school.</p>

<p>Brown is very much the same.</p>

<p>At Tufts and URochester, you'll work to get your degree, but there's plenty of relaxation and "college life" things. They seem rather neutral to me.</p>

<p>I'm not sure about the others.</p>

<p>Remember that your major is very important to how hard you have to work. MIT is known for being very rigorous (going to MIT is like "drinking from a firehose," I've heard), in large part because engineering/hard sciences are among of the most difficult majors, even for the smartest students.</p>

<p>I think neuroscience would be rigorous, but not as difficult as, say, electrical engineering. It's definitely not a "fluff" major. Remember, also, that neuroscience isn't a common major -- more of a grad program. If it is an undergrad major, it's often a very interdisciplinary one. (This is just my perception -- I'm not completely sure about all of the colleges you list.)</p>

5

<p>s snack, were u reffering to penn brown and dartmouth as harder or more laid back?</p>

6

<p>and kyle, are u saying that if i went to tufts or urochester(my "likely") I would work harder than if i went to brown or dartmouth?</p>

<p>not criticizing just pointing out the possible irony</p>

7

<p>No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying Tufts and Rochester seem "neutral" to me -- neither the academically most difficult, nor the easiest. And I'm saying the Dartmouth and Brown seem to have a more intellectual environment that's very LAC-like, but they also seem laid-back. But, just as at Tufts and Rochester and indeed any university, you're going to have to work to get the degree.</p>

8

<p>alright gotcha.</p>

<p>I do think its unfair that some higher ranked schools give out the same degrees for less work than at less popular schools, and companies/recruiters see the name first.</p>

<p>BUt i guess it all comes back when you take the grad entrance exams</p>

9

<p>You can go to any school and not do the work. But you really cannot go to any of the schools on your list, especially for neuroscience, not do the work and then expect to do well.</p>

10

<p>ses, i dont mean not do the work, but i am trying to point out that there are schools of the same prestige/tier that demand alot more from their undergrads than other schools, such as UChicago and Reed.</p>

<p>I have also heard, maybe it is a generalization, that Harvards freshman academics is not as difficult as one might think, and u may get a better undergrad experience elsewhere, if ur going for the sole purpose of education</p>

11

<p>Many have said that of Harvard, which is constantly criticized for focusing much more on its grads than its undergrads.</p>

12

<p>Penn's undergrad neuroscience major is called Biological Basis of Behavior. It's an extremely popular major, with the professors drawn from the College of Arts and Sciences and Penn's top-ranked medical and veterinary schools:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.psych.upenn.edu/bbb/BBBFacultyandStaff.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.psych.upenn.edu/bbb/BBBFacultyandStaff.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>If you're interested, check out the entire site--lots of interesting courses and research opportunities for undergrads:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.psych.upenn.edu/bbb/AboutBBB.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.psych.upenn.edu/bbb/AboutBBB.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I'm not sure how generally difficult this major is--probably depends on whether you're gunning for medical school. :) But I believe a lot of kids at Penn do this major, so it can't be all that bad.</p>

13

<p>that is exactly what this post is for, a prestigious school where the hardest thing you will have to do is get accepted.</p>

14

<p>thanks 45%er what exactly does ur name mean?</p>

15

<p>Generally, the hardest thing at the top universities is getting in. Many have said that college is easier than high school (considering that Ivies, etc. want highschool students to be practically demigods).</p>

16

<p>

A poster in one of the Penn threads once commented that people who went to Penn back in the days when its acceptance rate was something like 45%, owe a debt of gratitude to the current students who face much lower acceptance rates which enhance the school's prestige. Since I'm one of those hapless old farts, I adopted the name. It seemed funny at the time. Then again, I hadn't yet started posting in the general non-Penn forums where it makes even less sense.</p>

17

<p>Just go to Harvard, they are extremely easy about grades as over 60% of the grades given are A's. They dont want to make all the spoiled rich kids unhappy by blocking their way to Harvard Law School, and so give them 4.0 GPAs for little work.</p>

<p>Boston University is nasty, grade deflation....</p>

18

<p>I think that there are fewer 4.0s than one would think. However, the preponderance of As is also, probably, a result of the strength of the student body.</p>

19

<p>hmm good to know about BU, i actualy almost considered it <em>shudder</em></p>

<p>ur still cool 45%er</p>

<p>ses, where did u go?</p>

20

<p>Thanks. :)</p>

<p>If you're considering Brown and Dartmouth, though, you should definitely check out Penn. That BBB major, with its inclusion of so many medical school and vet school professors and all the research opportunities, is really extraordinary. And Penn's supposed to have a great social scene (from what I hear), so it can't be all work.</p>