<p>This is an issue I've wrestled and continued to wrestle with throughout the application process and I'd love to hear some opinions. If it at all helps for your opinion, I have a 2300 SAT/4.0 GPA, am 5th in my class, and have slightly above average ECs. I want to go into research in neuroscience, so achieving good opportunities for research/internships in research/etc are of high importance to me.</p>
<p>Do you think, from what you've experienced if you've been or are currently in college or from what you've heard if you're not, that it is better to be an average student at a top-tier school (ivies, other top 20s) or a top student at a larger, lower-tiered university (for example, UPitt)?
How would opportunities and general success in college and in the future (grad school, jobs) compare?</p>
<p>Of course, there’s no saying you wouldn’t be a top student at top tier school either. It depends on which kind of learning environment brings out the best in you as a student - some kids hate the sharp elbows, others prefer to be in classes where a majority of kids are as academically intense as they are. Some are good at seeking out faculty attention no matter how big the class - others do better in small classes where the profs will get to know them regardless.</p>
<p>A few points:</p>
<p>1) Where you do your graduate work is much more important than where you do your undergraduate degree.</p>
<p>2) How much debt you incur at a top tier school vs. your state school could have long term ramifications for your future educational and professional choices.</p>
<p>3) It also depends to some extent on what your future plans are: Medical schools don’t care where you do your undergrad (its pretty much GPA and MCAT, then recs and state of residence). Business School - it’s about what you accomplish professionally after leaving school and who hires at your undergrad institution. A PhD-depends on the field.</p>
<p>If you want to do research in neuroscience at a university, you should probably know that academia is highly superficial with regard to graduate programs. Some programs may, and do, doubt the quality of your education based on the school that you go to. That being said, my exroommate’s brother got into Stanford from some no-name university in texas, but he graduated with a 4.0 gpa.</p>
<p>If the public is significantly cheaper, i’d go there. Price is more than enough of an incentive to attend one school over another nowadays. And i think that schools/employers are starting to take notice of that.</p>
<p>If money is not an issue, I would rather be an good student at a top university.</p>
<p>I don’t know how graduate admissions in neuroscience works, but I discovered that in mathematics, the top programs just swap their undergrads for grad school. For example, in my year MIT, Princeton and Stanford did not accept a single math graduate applicant from a university outside of the top 20.</p>
<p>I have made similar experiences on the job market. As a Stanford student, I am flooded with invitations to attend recruiting events or apply for internships. I didn’t get any of those at my previous college. In fact, I vividly remember a “how to interview for a job in finance” workshop hosted by the career development office at my previous college. At the end of the workshop, a student asked the presenter if his companies offered internships or entry-level positions. The response: “Yes, but we hire exclusively from Princeton and Wharton.”</p>
B@r!um, I’d like to drill down on this a little. You say MPS didn’t accept a math graduate student outside the top 20, then you state your school doesn’t get the same invites as Stanford. Was your UG school in the top 20?</p>
<p>^ I admit that I was intentionally vague on that point. I graduated from Bryn Mawr College, but I was also enrolled as a non-degree-seeking student at the University of Pennsylvania. I applied to graduate schools with 2 year’s worth of graduate courses and letters of recommendation from Penn. At a couple of graduate programs that admitted me, I was the only student who did not have a degree from a top 20 university, but I was still affiliated with one.</p>
<p>Well I know a math grad who went from Brown to UCLA PhD. I know Brown is super high ranked in applied math, but not sure about math.</p>
<p>complexity, its cost a factor? why do you not think you will be a great student at a top tier school? I think tiop tier large schools are good in their own way.</p>
<p>Sorry if others have read this before but maybe not you. My daughter went to Brown and majored in Math/CS (started out intending some kind of science.) She was able to have access to professors and research starting from freshman year (not always in CS but in sciences.) By Jr year she was key on a group profect with grad students under a very up and coming young professor that eventually was published (still ongoing really, though not so involved now.) She was involved in 7 or 8 projects that I can think of over 4 years including 2 summer research grants from the university. TA’d CS, semester abroad in math.</p>
<p>Did she have the best grades in CS? I doubt it, though I never saw them. Did she have the best GRE? In verbal yes, math just made it without raising eyebrows, subject GRE–skipped it. So how did she get accepted to 3 top 10-ish PhD programs? a) Proven research experience and b) LOR from well known and prominent professors is my best guess. End story.</p>
<p>I don’t know anything about UPitt, but I’d say it is important to find out about Undergraduate Research programs/access. Some schools don’t give summer research grants and you have to find them yourself via outside REU’s. Sometimes you can get on with a prof and get paid for the summer.</p>