<p>I was incredibly lucky to get into many of my top choice schools.. and I have narrowed down my acceptances to 3 top choices. I currently plan to study computer science and have applied to Engineering where applicable. </p>
<p>I have visited all three schools however I know the least about Princeton since I never considered myself a viable applicant. Hopefully I'll be able to visit the schools again soon.</p>
<p>I care about a social scene, I care about academics, I care about location. Most of my family and friends tell me to go for Princeton since it's apparently hailed as "THE undergraduate experience" But Brown was the first school I 'loved' (although I visited years ago) and I relish over the idea of living in NYC at Columbia. I was worried about the social scene at Princeton compared to these two schools, but at the same time I know that anything is better than my high school situation (ultra strict parents). </p>
<p>Then there's academics. As far as I know Princeton has the best CS of these schools, while Columbia and Brown are relatively close to each other. All three are great. Not super pumped about the idea of a core curriculum but for NYC I feel like I'd get over it. Brown's open curriculum sounds like a less stressful environment (although I get the feeling that it'll have little effect on CS)</p>
<p>Princeton…it has the best of all worlds: the most highly regarded school academically, the best social life (Eating Clubs), the prettiest campus, the most undergraduate focus, the best financial aid, etc. etc.</p>
<p>Princeton does have grade deflation though which Brown does not have so that could be a concern.</p>
<p>Did you get into any other schools? Usually, prospective CS majors with top end stats tend to include schools like MIT, CMU, Stanford, Berkeley, and Caltech in their application lists, although Princeton, Columbia, and Brown are perfectly good schools for CS.</p>
<p>@goldenboy Thanks, but what really makes Eating Clubs a better social option then what’s available at Brown and Columbia? </p>
<p>@ucbalumnus I get scholarship through my father’s employment, so I am additionally fortunate that financial aid is not a concern. I applied early to Stanford but was rejected and was wait-listed at CMU for comp-sci. The other schools available to me are UPenn, Duke, Wash U, Carnegie Mellon Engineering, UNC, and Pomona.</p>
<p>You may want to check the courses, curricula, and research activity offered in each school’s computer science department to see if any of them have something of particular interest to you that the others do not have.</p>
<p>In addition, you may want to ask the career centers of each school about job and graduate school placement for computer science majors. The computer science departments may also have some information in this area. Note that the Ivy League schools tend to be heavily recruited by investment banking employers (jobs pay well, but [may</a> be hazardous to your health](<a href=“Warning: Banking May Be Hazardous to Your Health - WSJ”>Warning: Banking May Be Hazardous to Your Health - WSJ)), and may not be as heavily recruited by computer industry employers, due to smaller numbers of computer science majors (compared to big state schools) and more competition from investment banking employers.</p>
<p>Thanks, that sounds like a good idea, I believe that Princeton’s curriculum stood out a little more to me when I initially researched the schools, but I’ll look more closely.</p>
<p>Why are you disregarding Duke and Penn so quickly? My freshman roommate was a Computer Science major at Duke and he got a job working at Cisco as a Software Engineer. He told me that the PhD and job placement was phenominal and there are Comp Sci majors from my graduating class going to Stanford, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, and Harvard for their PhDs. As far as job placement goes, it runs the gamut: traditional engineering jobs (Cisco, Clark Construction, GE, Northrop Grumman, etc.), management consulting jobs (BCG, Bain, McKinsey, Deloitte, etc.), exciting tech companies (Google, Twitter, Funzio, Zynga, etc.), sales and trading as well as investment banking (JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, Barclays, etc.).</p>
<p>I can’t speak to Philly but of all the places you got accepted to, Duke is located in the most high-profile area for tech companies, research organizations, etc. (The Research Triangle). Duke is great about letting you double major to so you can study Computer Science and Economics or Computer Science and Math or Computer Science and Biology.</p>
<p>That’s a good question: I actually live in Durham about a mile from Duke’s campus and I really would prefer to be in school elsewhere. As for Penn I have a sibling there and for some irrational reason I think I don’t want to attend the same school. I like both a lot, and Duke might be a top choice if I didn’t live here.</p>
<p>^Fair enough, that’s very mature thinking on your part. Duke appealed to me initially because it would allow me to explore a new part of the country as well. It’s always good to expand your perspective. I would go to Brown or Princeton in your shoes, probably Princeton though. Columbia’s curriculum in engineering/computer science seems to be geared to purely shuttling students into Finance.</p>
<p>I intend on majoring in Computer Science myself and I am fortunate to have friends in all three schools who are majoring in Computer Science or who have taken the courses. So I’ve been able to get a feel for the schools.
Things are far more expensive in NYC (if you ever want to go out on a date or go to a club it costs a lot) and the Computer Science courses at Columbia don’t compare to either of the other two schools.
Princeton and Brown both have amazing courses and professors for Computer Science so you can’t really choose between the two solely based on that.
If you relish the idea of being near the city, neither of the two is more than a 45 minute drive away, and I believe that there are trains that run between as well, so that shouldn’t be a concern.
As far as social life, I’ve been told that most people at Princeton are openly friendly and that there are a lot of social events occurring at all times on campus. Brown is similar but my friend there told me that starting toward the end of sophomore year things begin to become very clique-ie. I’m not sure which you prefer.
The work is a lot more intense at Princeton from what I’ve heard and it does have grade deflation (both things to consider). Also Brown has a slightly better ratio of girls to guys.
The schools are comparable on almost all levels so I think you should revisit the schools, check out the foods, the teachers, the people, and the campus.
I don’t think that there is any single factor that would let you decide between the two just by hearing about it over the internet. I think you should make your decision based on your opinions of the campus and the people and things you see when you revisit. Chances are it will be a close decision.</p>
<p>Thanks for the feedback! I think this has been helpful enough that if I’m not able to visit all three schools, and I most likely won’t, I’ll be sure to visit Princeton and Brown over Columbia. I hate that I’m going to have to turn down some of these schools :P</p>
Duke appealed to me initially because it would allow me to explore a new part of the country as well. It’s always good to expand your perspective. I would go to Brown or Princeton in your shoes, probably Princeton though. Columbia’s curriculum in engineering/computer science seems to be geared to purely shuttling students into Finance.</p>