I am ecstatic that I have opportunity to choose between my top choices and I realize that I could not make a wrong choice either way, but this decision will influence the rest of my life so I want to be as informed as possible.
Academics -
If you had asked me two months ago which school I would attend if admitted to both, I would have easily said Rice, but recently I have been looking at WashU’s Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology interdisciplinary program and it looks incredibly interesting, especially since I would have the opportunity to get a second major is sysE. If attended Rice I would most likely major in either ChemE or Biochemistry (I realize just how different these are). If anyone has any input on the academics of these programs at either schools, please tell :). Just a note: I plan on doing pre-med at either institution.
Social Atmosphere -
I hear that both schools are relatively laid-back compared to other top institutions, especially the relative laid-backness of the pre-med students, but how true is this from personal experience? My family from TX also has raised concerns about the social atmosphere at Rice. They say that many of the kids there are “socially awkward and introverted.” This was not my experience when I visited campus, but I’ll double check at the upcoming owl days. How is the party scene at either campus? If anyone has an opinion of the social atmosphere at the two, please tell me everything you know.
Acceptance of both City and School-
My sexuality kind of flip-flops a lot. I guess most people would call that bisexual, but I am usually either attracted to females only or males only. This changes randomly and the time intervals between changes is not predictable. I know this sounds odd, but just accept it. I’m not in denial or anything, just weird. My question is, how accepting are these two schools of homosexuals? What about the city? I feel that Houston would have a better overall gay scene, but I am not as familiar with St. Louis so I could be wrong. I don’t ask about the acceptance of heterosexuals because I feel that they are probably equally accepted at either place
I’m a parent of a WashU grad and a cousin of a Rice student. Both kids had/are having a good experience. Both schools are known as places where the students are really happy to be there.
In terms of LGBT, I remember reading in the WashU newspaper that the school was listed in the Campus Pride list of top LGBT-friendly schools. I don’t know anything about LGBT at Rice.
One difference (which may not matter to you) is that WashU has a bit of a more national student body, whereas close to half the Rice students come from Texas.
I did some poking and Rice is on some lists of top LGBT-friendly schools, too - both Wash U and Rice are. Rice is on the Princeton Review list of the 20 most LGBT-friendly schools.
I think people tend to stereotype students at top schools as socially awkward, and often local lore has stereotyped students at a certain school even if it has no basis in reality or changed decades ago. My own alma mater was stereotyped by the city residents as full of snobby, stuck-up, wealthy African American women - but our average family income was under $40,000, with 50% of our students were receiving Pell grants and I definitely don’t think my classmates were snobby; on the contrary, we were super-involved in community service and outreach. So Rice students may not be socially awkward and introverted as a whole. Some of them probably are, but I think a visit is in order to see how you fit in.
Wash U’s PNP program does look really interesting. I was going to comment that you could recreate the coursework at Rice, but it looks like their program is not only very well integrated and established but also has faculty, student, and grad student support - there’s lots of research in that area, there are colloquia and brown bags, etc. If that interests you then I think Wash U would be a good place to check it out - and you still have the excellent engineering.
I agree that the warnings my family gave me are somewhat questionable. When I was visiting Rice last year a current student there came up and asked if I was a prospective student and then continued to give me advice on what was good and bad about the school and he was incredibly sociable, but it would also make sense that the social students would be the ones I ended up talking to.
I enjoy learning about neuroscience, but if I do not go to medical or grad school, I don’t think there is much I could do with it. I actually have a lot of interest in computational neuroscience/cognitive computer systems, but I know that an undergrad in EE and then grad in neuro would probably be better suited to that. In addition, I am not supportive of the direction that intelligent machines would take our economy or society, so it’s more like a fire that draws me so close that it burns my wings. so upon further thought, I will probably avoid neuroscience as a primary major during undergrad. Does anyone know how the engineering at the institutions compare? Specifically EE and ChemE? Maybe even biomedE? And at which institution would one of the engineerings mesh better with pre-med?
And I figured that both schools would have accepting students (who would hopefully not view my sexuality as my defining quality), but how about St. Louis vs Houston? Does St. Louis have a decent bar/club scene that isn’t dominated by drugs?
I would personally choose Rice, and Houston over SL. Rice is right next to the largest medical campus so there are lots of opportunities there. Based on my research, I would say it is one of the top 3 happiest campuses in the country.
