<p>Basically, schools that have [in order of most-least importance]:</p>
<p>= Excellent academics, particularly in the sciences
= Have a 'core' or something similar/don't require you to pick all of your classes/don't pidgeon-hole you into a specific major before sophomore year</p>
<p>?</p>
<p>Chicago was modeled after Johns Hopkins and they remain similar in many ways (size, excellence, urban location, intellectual faculty and students, beautiful campus, lots of Nobel prizes, etc.). Unlike Chicago, Hopkins has no required core curriculum (you can elect to take very similar courses if you wish) but it does have distribution and writing requirements. Most of the serious requirements, however, are imposed by the major as opposed to being university-wide. You don’t have to choose a major until the end of sophomore year.</p>
<p>Johns Hopkins and University of Chicago operate distinguished graduate programs that are larger than their undergraduate programs. Chicago and Hopkins began as graduate-oriented universities under the German model of the elite scientific research institute offering specialized graduate level training and a research focused environment.</p>
<p>Hopkins and Chicago students complain a lot because they go through a rigorous grad level education. :P</p>
<p>Columbia…</p>
<p>Well when you mention a core curriculum and well-respected academics, both Chicago and Columbia come to mind. They are similar in the fact that both are set in urban environments. Also, both are in the more shady / sketchy part of the city / cities.</p>
<p>Is JHU really that great outside of its Med/Bio programs, though?</p>
<p>JHU has a great history program, at least at the graduate level.</p>
<p>It also has, if I’m not mistaken, a pretty good music school.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Stop complaining. ;).</p>
<p>by the things you listed, Caltech should be up there. Caltech has an intense core in math and science (quantum mechanics is required) and is very well respected in the sciences.</p>
<p>
Yes. Excellent computer science, excellent creative writing, excellent music, excellent IR. Though the Columbia curriculum model is closer to Chicago with respect to the “core” concept. Chicago was modeled after Hopkins in 1891, but there’s been a lot of history since then.</p>
<p>Baltimore has its charms. A peculiar dialect of English is spoken there; crustaceans are a staple of the local diet. Chicago and definitely NYC are more exciting cities. Chicago winters are bitterly cold, though.</p>
<p>So would you guys say that I shouldn’t apply to schools like Yale and Princeton, then?</p>
<p>Other than Columbia (core) and Brown (open), I think all the other Ivies have some kind of distribution requirement system that sounds like too option-based for what you’re looking to do.</p>
<p>Yale’s science buildings are far from campus and really off on their own-- that turned me off quite a bit. Princeton has a drastically different environment, having far fewer graduate students around.</p>
<p>And just to be predictable, Phead, of course JHU has those kinds of numbers. They’re the first place in the country to form with research as its core mission.</p>
<p>So as it stands right now my reaches are: Stanford, UChicago, Columbia, MIT, maybe JHU. I feel weird not applying to Harvard; is it really that far from the core?</p>
<p>Rice is heavily focused on research and strong in the sciences, like Hopkins and UChicago. They don’t have a core curriculum, but they do have distribution requires in the humanities/arts/foreign language, social sciences, and science/math (typically four courses in each of these three clusters required for graduation).</p>
<p>I would also suggest that you look at Duke, even though it is probably not as intense as UChicago.</p>
<p>Yeah, I’m actually applying to Rice and Duke as well. Maybe.</p>
<p>Anyone else want to weigh in on how choice-heavy Ivy curricula is?</p>
<p>The argument as to whether a core curriculum, an open curriculum, or distribution requirements is better from an educational prospective is an interesting one for faculty to debate but, frankly, should be of little import to a student who favors a broad, general education like that imposed by the core. If that’s what you want, you can do that anywhere by enrolling in the appropriate courses. The only difference is that not all of your fellow students will be doing the same thing if you go to a school that doesn’t impose a core curriculum. </p>
<p>And to answer your question, yes, Hopkins is known and well-regarded for a lot more than Medicine and Bio. Hopkins follows a policy of “selective excellence,” meaning that, because of its size, it can’t do everything well so it doesn’t try to do everything. But what it does, it does very well. So some departments are totally missing (e.g., no Religion department) and other departments specialize in certain subfields and ignore others. But the faculty is uniformly top notch.</p>