<p>I am trying to decide between Stanford and Princeton. I am more of a math science guy, and I was considering the option of going into engineering, but I don't ultimately want to find a career in engineering. I was considering the option of the "Operations Research and Financial Engineering" program and Princeton, and the similar "management engineering" major at Stanford. I know that Stanford has a more highly rated engineering department, but would the job oppotunities in financial engineering be greater our of Princeton considering its higher overall reputation and its proximity to NYC?</p>
<p>I'm sort of in the same situation as you: I just got accepted to Princeton, and got accepted to Stanford SCEA.</p>
<p>I highly doubt the job opportunities in financial engineering would be greater out of Princeton. Firstly, it's "overall reputation" isn't higher than Stanford's, especially to an employer who really wants to see your achievements in college, and not just what college you attended. You shouldn't be picking one school over the other because of reputation.</p>
<p>Secondly, Princeton is pretty far from NYC (~2 hours driving at best, but depends on traffic), whereas Stanford is placed smack-dab right in the middle of Silicon Valley and is much closer to San Francisco (~30 minutes driving at best, but depends on traffic). In terms of proximity to different job opportunities, especially those concerning finance and engineering, Stanford has Princeton soundly beat.</p>
<p>Congratulations to both of you for getting in to two awesome schools!</p>
<p>I don't quite agree with your assertions, Hrteeexz. I lived 10 minutes from Stanford for 17 years and am currently a student at Princeton. In terms of academics, they are both very reputable institutions -- I don't think that you'd have any trouble either way. I know a lot of students from ORFE go to Wall Street to work (it's one of the top programs in the country), and there are many other opportunities as well; I would expect similar results for Management Engineering at Stanford. I don't think that an employer is going to look down upon either university and I'm quite sure that there is potential for "achievements in college" at both.</p>
<p>As far as driving distances go, the train from Princeton to NYC takes about a little more than an hour (10 minutes for the dinky, 45 minutes on the train, probably ~10 waiting time) and driving would take less. Of course, with traffic it might take 1.5 to 2 hours. Driving from Stanford to San Francisco is closer; it would typically take between 45 minutes driving without traffic to 1.5-ish hours with traffic. The difference between the two is that public transportation makes it incredibly easy to get onto the train from the Princeton campus to the NYC Penn Station, while I don't think there is transportation attached to the Stanford campus. Taking the train would take just about as long as the train from Princeton to NYC, but chances are there will be a far larger number of people at Stanford who have cars. I think that NYC is pretty exciting, with the tourist sites, enormous Chinatown, and especially the Broadway shows, which Princeton offers 5-6 organized trips to each semester -- $25 for transportation, snacks, and usually orchestra center seats! But I've also grown up visiting SF every week, so my reaction is probably expected. I decided to come to Princeton to experience something new and check out the east coast (I also kind of think the Stanford area is a bit boring, but that's up to personal preference). </p>
<p>Another thing you might want to consider is what kind of weather you're looking for. The area around Palo Alto has amazing weather and it doesn't get too cold in the winter. In Princeton, it snows in the winter, but it is absolutely beautiful no matter what season it is. I got through my first white winter this year, and it was a great experience for me that I don't regret, although I would still prefer to settle down on the west coast in the future.</p>
<p>If its possible, I would go to both of the admit weekends to check out the campus for yourself. They are very different; Stanford's campus is much larger (it includes the grad school) and Princeton is pretty small. Princeton puts a lot of focus on undergraduate education, and the grad school is actually separate from campus. I'm sure you'd have a great time no matter which school you choose, let me know if you have other questions about either one.</p>
<p>anderson, I was in your [enviable] position last year, and had to decide between Princeton and Stanford (and H), and so I want to pipe in. But before I can do so in earnest, let's clear up some gross misinformation.</p>
<p>-Rant Alert -</p>
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Secondly, Princeton is pretty far from NYC (~2 hours driving at best, but depends on traffic)
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<p>Nope. If you're an undergrad at Princeton, you'll likely be using the train to go to NYC, and that takes about 45 minutes to an hour.</p>
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In terms of proximity to different job opportunities, especially those concerning finance and engineering, Stanford has Princeton soundly beat.
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<p>Are you serious here? Engineering, I can see you arguing the Stanford's reputation trumps Princeton. That's not to say that "Stanford has Princeton soundly beat". Princeton does quite well by whatever measure you choose to use...plenty of grads go on to Boeing, Microsoft, Lockheed Martin (formerly Princeton CEO), and Google (may have been founded by Stanford [graduate] students, but run by a Princeton man today), and graduate school placement is impeccable.</p>
<p>But finance? Princeton's very, very heavy into finance. Each year, of the students that go into the workplace, roughly 65% head to investment banking and management consulting. And if you scan Alexandre's posts, you'll see that at Wharton's MBA program, the only one that releases such figures, Princeton's the best represented school after Penn itself. Note also that Princeton's the smallest amongst its direct competitors (H, Y, S). I'm aware that Stanford GSB has its own appeal, and I don't mean to discredit Stanford students in any way, shape, or form, but to say Princeton doesn't do well is hogwash.</p>
<p>You also have multiple options here to get involved in finance: Operations Research and Financial Engineering, the Finance Certificate, the Engineering Management Systems certificate, etc. If you've checked Career Services placement information at Princeton, you know that over 10% of ORFE graduates go on to Goldman Sachs. Not just finance, but Goldman Sachs, the biggest brand name in investment banking. Of course, nowadays, many are even turning down Goldman to go to PE and HF shops like Blackstone, D.E. Shaw, and Bridgewater. And the scary thing is that ORFE's not even unique...Economics has even better placement numbers into these places, and many kids from the gamut of majors end up in the financial services industry.</p>
<p>Look, again, I don't mean to discredit Stanford in any way, and several of my closest friends go there. As a result of this, though, I know the opportunities you have there (straight from their Career Services folks), and they are far from few. I would even be inclined to agree that if your goal is to get a job in, say, Google, Stanford may be the way to go (though again, Princeton's not going to handicap you in any way). But in finance, Princeton gets the cake (though not to say that Stanford handicaps you in any way, either). The only numbers I've seen that match the alumni presence, immediate post-graduation opportunities, etc are those at Wharton UG and at Harvard.</p>
<p></p>
<p>I'm really sorry if I came across as angry or the like there, but the facts there simply DO NOT support the assertions Hrteeexz makes, and I want to be perfectly clear about that.</p>
<p>ALL THAT SAID...
Please, please do not make your decision on the place more likely to land you a Silicon Valley job or a Wall Street job. College is so much more than that, and when you pick a place to spend the next four years of your life, please make sure it's some place you can truly call home. Talk to students, talk to alumni, talk to professors; visit the campus...little psychological things really DO matter. Everyone told me "fit" was crucial, and it seemed like a very cliche thing to say, but now that I've followed that advice, I'm incredibly glad I did.</p>
<p>In short, I'd love to see you love Princeton as much as I do and come here, but if you feel that your heart's made for Stanford, go for it and be happy. Just make sure you filter the truth from the propaganda (and come persuasion time, you'll get plenty of this from BOTH places) and misinformation.</p>
<p>Good luck, and feel free to PM me!</p>
<p>The other concern I had about Princeton is the idea of "grade deflation". I hear that the average GPA at Princeton is much lower than Stanford. (3.2 vs about 3.75), but the caliber of students is about the same. Does this mean that a student with a higher GPA from stanford would have more opportunities than an equivalent student with the lower Princeton GPA??</p>
<p>Other minor concerns:
-Girls
-Social Life
-School Spirit</p>
<p>Any comments?</p>
<p>I really dont care about the whether, I'm used to the cold.</p>
<p>I wouldn't worry about the grade deflation; in fact, I think what you are describing would be grade inflation on Stanford's part and not grade deflation on Princeton's. </p>
<p>Princeton traditionally has the strongest alumni base of any of the Ivies, Stanford, Cal Tech, MIT, etc. I forget what the numbers are but a significant percent of each graduating class contributes to the annual fund/shows up to all of the reunions as well.</p>
<p>As for girls and social life, I doubt that you can compare the two; there are girls and plenty of social activities at both places.</p>
<p>Princeton has a new, fantastic "Integrated Science" program or something like that that fulfills a whole bunch of requirements for a science/math major in addition to integrating science and math. I am sure you can find it on the website. The great thing about that program is that you learn how to do all of the lab experiments with computers as opposed to the "old fashioned way"...basically they are teaching science the 21st century way as opposed to a 19th century manner (where you don't use computers.)</p>
<p>In fact, my twin brother applied to Princeton early over MIT specifically because of that program, and I truly think that it tops any of MIT's stuff in that regard. </p>
<p>So to answer your original question, I'm not advocating Stanford or Princeton over the other but I can assure you that Princeton is not a shabby place to learn about math or science.</p>
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The other concern I had about Princeton is the idea of "grade deflation". I hear that the average GPA at Princeton is much lower than Stanford. (3.2 vs about 3.75), but the caliber of students is about the same.
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<p>The caliber of students is roughly the same, yes, and I'd argue that the GPA's aren't all that different. First, I'd check your source for the average Stanford GPA - 3.75 seems MUCH too high from everything I've heard (not to mention that if this was the case, Stanford would also have law/med acceptance rates that would dwarf those at HYP, but we don't see that, either). I know where the 3.2 median Princeton number comes from (unscientific survey by the Daily Princetonian), but I'd say that this is probably slightly closer to 3.3. And from what I understand (though I won't pretend this is a formal survey of any kind), Yale probably has the greatest grade inflation of the elites, and they've got a median GPA of around 3.5. I'd imagine that Harvard and Stanford are probably somewhere in between (Harvard's median being closer to Princeton's, and Stanford's being closer to Yale's).</p>
<p>So yes, while grade deflation exists, it isn't NEARLY that dramatic. I'll say again what I've said before - grade deflation's biggest effect is that provides a rallying point for Princeton students against "the man". Keep in mind also that if you're interested in going to business, a slight GPA difference will likely not be a very big deal in the grand scheme of things. It might matter more if you're interested in med school (the most GPA sensitive of post-grad plans), and maybe even for law schools (though the big law school deans deny this). But even there, it's hard to say, and I'd wait and see how the numbers pan out.</p>
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In terms of proximity to different job opportunities, especially those concerning finance and engineering, Stanford has Princeton soundly beat.
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I also disagree with this statement. The proximity of NYC and Wall Street (which is about 40 minutes away by train, which is accessible on campus) to Princeton means the opportunities for financial engineering are just about impossible to beat.</p>
<p>I can't say if Princeton or Stanford is better overall, since they each have unique strengths, but I will advocate for Princeton if financial engineering is what you are looking for. You will find not only a specially designed major (ORFE - operations research and financial engineering), but you will find very strong extracurricular support. Business Today and the Princeton Pre-Business Society are some of the largest groups on campus, and due to the proximity of NYC, they can bring in speakers like the president of Lehman Brothers and arrange for student trips to the NYC corporate headquarters of major firms.</p>
<p>Stanford has great weather...for everything else there's Princeton.</p>
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Stanford has great weather...for everything else there's Princeton.
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Hehe, even as someone who has lived in southern California my entire life, I wouldn't say that the Princeton weather is that bad. :)</p>
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But finance? Princeton's very, very heavy into finance. Each year, of the students that go into the workplace, roughly 65% head to investment banking and management consulting. And if you scan Alexandre's posts, you'll see that at Wharton's MBA program, the only one that releases such figures, Princeton's the best represented school after Penn itself. Note also that Princeton's the smallest amongst its direct competitors (H, Y, S). I'm aware that Stanford GSB has its own appeal, and I don't mean to discredit Stanford students in any way, shape, or form, but to say Princeton doesn't do well is hogwash.
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<p>I'm not sure you understood what I was saying, because you're arguing something I never refuted. I was talking about PROXIMITY. What I was saying was that there were many opportunities for an undergraduate looking for work (though I now realize the OP was talking about opportunities after having graduated from said schools), given Stanford's location in the heart of Silicon Valley. You know...Nerd Capital, USA? Arguably the most significant hub of burgeoning enterprises in the country? Start-ups, big companies, venture capitalists, consulting firms? All around you without having to take an hour-long train ride? So, when comparing an undergraduate studying at Stanford and an undergraduate studying at Princeton, I will stick by my word when I say that the Stanford undergraduate has more internship and job opportunities.</p>
<p>I can't speak for job opportunities after graduation. Although, given the fact that my dad's cousin (who works at Microsoft) tells us that the top colleges they recruit from are Stanford and MIT, I would believe the advantage in engineering opportunities from Stanford to be substantially greater than Princeton's.</p>
<p>Graduate from Stanford comp sci, graduate from Princeton comp sci - it'd be equal. And then you gotta go through the interviews with the software architects and they will have disdain for your fancy degree anyway because the educated among them have PhDs from Cornell and the uneducated but brilliant went to San Jose State:).</p>
<p>Do not choose between Stanford and Princeton on raw opportunity. However, if upon graduation you would rather be in Silicon Valley, go to Stanford. If upon graduation you would rather be in NYC, go to Princeton. You can reverse this of course but this would be going with the flow.</p>
<p>Yes, Silicon Valley definitely provides many internship/job opportunities - that virtually all have to do with technology. While this is good since the OP expressed interest in engineering, the OP seems more interested in ultimately pursuing financial engineering, not physical sciences engineering. NYC's opportunities for financial engineering are undoubtedly greater than anywhere else in the world, except for perhaps London and maybe Tokyo or Hong Kong.</p>
<p>So the 40 minute train ride is hardly a cost for all the opportunities available. Thus, I stick with my word that Princeton undergrads have more internship and job opportunities. :)</p>
<p>Stanford does not even come close to trumping Princeton as much as you say. Stanford may be in Silicon Valley, but Princeton is near (commutable) to both Philadelphia AND New York. I don't think many places can beat that. </p>
<p>In addition, many big companies and TOP firms have their either their headquarters or major branches in Princeton or the immediate surrounding area. The whole area around Princeton on US-1 and NJ 571 is all Business Parks, and corporate campuses, home to Johnson and Johnson (New Brunswick), Tyco International (Princeton), Dow Jones (Princeton), and the area is one of the fastest growing High-Tech/R&D corridors in the United States.</p>
<p>Here are some articles describing the rapid High-Tech growth in the Princeton area:
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8893170%5B/url%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8893170</a>
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8895858%5B/url%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8895858</a>
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8891806%5B/url%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3697/is_200002/ai_n8891806</a></p>
<p>Even a joint group between the Princeton Chamber of Commerce and the Princeton University School of Engineering is considering trademarking a name for the area, "Einstein Alley" or the "Einstein Corridor", very appropriate if I do say so. </p>
<p>I predict that in 5 years, the "Einstein Corridor" will be one of the most significant regions for Medical and Biomedical R&D in the nation, not to mention Chemical and Aerospace firms.</p>
<p>fwiw I know several people working at google over the summer. The larger silicon valley companies recruit heavily on campus (princeton). I'm sure the tech opportunities at Stanford are just as good, but its definitely a well traveled career path from princeton</p>
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Stanford does not even come close to trumping Princeton as much as you say. Stanford may be in Silicon Valley, but Princeton is near (commutable) to both Philadelphia AND New York. I don't think many places can beat that.
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<p>Princeton is hardly "near" Philadelphia or New York. An hour-long train ride, which results in 2-3 hours round trip, is hardly a feasible commute for the common undergraduate. The difference between "in" and "near" is the difference between working and not working for a college student.</p>
<p>If you're gonna count "commutable" areas, let's count in San Francisco, which is a 30 minute train ride from Stanford's Caltrain station. San Francisco + Silicon Valley provide financial and technological opportunities that are not only close to Stanford, but also plentiful.</p>
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Here are some articles describing the rapid High-Tech growth in the Princeton area:
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8893170%5B/url%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8893170</a>
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8895858%5B/url%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8895858</a>
<a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8891806%5B/url%5D%5B/quote%5D">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...02/ai_n8891806
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<p>Those articles are all nearly a decade old, from the year 2000. And they're by "Mercer Business," which is only a local publication. It's been 7 years and Mercer County, in terms of its significance in high-tech, has yet to be more than a blip on anyone else's radar. Silicon Valley, on the other hand, has boasted 10 of the top 20 most inventive towns in the US in a 2006 issue of The Wall Street Journal.</p>
<p>There's hardly any reason to begin throwing heaps of praise at Mercer County's high-tech significance, especially in comparison to Silicon Valley. Sure, it's a significant region and there are plenty of job opportunities there, enough for any college student, but in comparison to Silicon Valley?</p>
<p>I mean, hey, I could name a bunch of huuuuge companies and firms in Silicon Valley too. Problem is, I wouldn't have enough room in one of my posts to do so. :-)</p>
<p>The CEO of Google is a Princeton graduate, and his kid a current sophomore. The CEOs of Amazon and eBay are Princeton grads. So. Geographic proximity is a little bitty part of this. Please don't start saying dumb things guys.</p>
<p>Probably it's a little easier to go to Silicon Valley from Stanford - in the sense of taking the mainstream path of your undergraduate institution. But if you know you want to go to Silicon Valley now, you can get there from Princeton absolutely just as easily.</p>
<p>Hrteeexz, the train ride, which is 40-45 minutes each way, is not as difficult and inconvenient as you imagine. There is a train stop right on campus and it leads straight to Penn Station in NYC. Many, many Princeton students commute frequently on the train, whether for conferences, weekend excursions, Broadway shows, etc. I have a suitemate that takes a dance class in NYC! And he's from California, as am I, where public transportation isn't as commonly used as on the east coast. We (and a great number of other Princeton students) still find the whole set up very convenient.</p>
<p>So let's just say that NYC and Philadelphia are definitely close to Princeton, because a lot of Princeton actually do frequent those cities.</p>
<p>Half of my professors commute to Princeton from New York every day...I think its commutable mind you, *** AND our train station is practically on campus ***. Again your argument is not a good one Hrteeexz.</p>
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The CEO of Google is a Princeton graduate, and his kid a current sophomore. The CEOs of Amazon and eBay are Princeton grads. So. Geographic proximity is a little bitty part of this. Please don't start saying dumb things guys.
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<p><em>whoosh</em> Way to completely miss the point of argument.</p>
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Half of my professors commute to Princeton from New York every day...I think its commutable mind you, AND our train station is practically on campus . Again your argument is not a good one Hrteeexz.
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<p>Stanford's train station is practically on campus too, and it's just as accessible as any old classroom.</p>
<p>But I hope you do realize professors have less of an obligation to actually be on campus than undergraduates? You do realize undergraduates have to juggle classtime with work time and extracurriculars and regular old socializing?</p>
<p>After all, I know a professor at Yale who lives in the Bay Area. He teaches at YALE and he lives in the Bay Area. What you're saying is not much.</p>
<p>But really, the argument is getting sidetracked here. Though there may be the odd pickle that commutes occasionally for whatever reason, you know just as well as I that job/internship opportunities available in NYC or Philadelphia are hardly feasible for undergraduates studying at Princeton.</p>