<p>^^ discussing more schools doesn’t mean we can’t talk about other points as well, since we’re discussing similarities and differences in detail (something you didn’t even touch on in your suggestions). Despite wanting to help others, warblersrule, you’ve wasted more words here criticizing others for exactly what you’re doing now: quibbling over small points. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>You can attempt to reduce my statement on weather to something inconsequential in order to boost Duke, but my point stands: Durham’s weather is much colder in the winter, gets snow, and rains more than 3x as much and 2x as often; that makes it pretty different from Palo Alto’s weather.</p>
<p>Ranks in the Directors’ Cup, as with any ranking, flatten real differences. Duke’s breadth of athletic excellence falls behind by a greater margin than the difference in rank would suggest.</p>
<p>With all due respect, Warbler, based on such logic, the entire realm of schools would be divided among reaches and safeties. The term “match” is synonymous to likely, and it should encompass a pretty large percentage of one’s application package.</p>
<p>There are steps between calling Michigan and CMU a safety or a reach school for this applicant, but his stats (which I did not bother to go dig before posting my earlier comment) place him solidly in the MATCH category. Just as he should be at almost every public university in the country, including almost all listed on the first page of the USNews rankings. </p>
<p>Again, not a reach; not a safety; but a match.</p>
<p>I do not know about “magically special,” except to note the whiff of sarcasm. My point is that, just as a number of other schools in the country, it has its own characteristics that define the school. Some of those characteristics are not unique to Stanford, but I would have a real hard time to point to a school that is very similar to Stanford in terms of atmosphere. This does not mean that Stanford is better or worse. And this represents MY opinion. Others might disagree.</p>
Nonsense. I have neither the need nor desire to boost Duke. I applied to Duke but not Stanford precisely because of many of their differences, and I would be the last to emphasize similarities. It doesn’t bother me in the slightest which schools people compare Duke to or whether the OP applies there. As it happens, I think Duke’s limited engineering offerings (4 majors) and lack of a business program would make it a questionable choice, though perhaps not a wholly unreasonable one. </p>
<p>As for recommendations, I already made some but am happy to provide the OP with others. Lehigh, Penn State, UMD College Park, and Wisconsin come to mind among national universities. If the OP doesn’t mind small schools, Bucknell, Lafayette, and Union offer seasons, Greek life, engineering, and (mostly) DI athletics.</p>
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For the very best applicants, yes, I think increasingly it is mostly a reach/safety dichotomy. Finding matches - colleges with similar stats and decently high admit rates, like Chicago of a few years back or USC and Tufts today - is almost impossible these days. A school like Dartmouth admits about 8% of applicants in the RD round…not terribly good odds even if you do fit in the target/BWRK crowd (2250+, 4.00, good ecs, etc.). If you dislike my twisting of the term “reach,” perhaps you could instead say that Cornell and similar schools are highly selective matches for people like the OP; it makes no substantive difference. I agree that Michigan and probably CMU are good matches.</p>
<p>Warbler, I don’t think I was talking about Chicago and Dartmouth, or schools with admission rates well-below 20 percent. I thought I was pretty clear that I was talking about Michigan. Feel free to add schools such as UT-Austin or Wisconsin in the mix.</p>
<p>As far as the terms used in admissions, many like to play games of semantics. I like to keep it simple, as it really makes little difference in the end. Only the admission matters!</p>
<p>As far as twists and turns, please consider that a competitive applicant in Texas could consider UT-Austin his or her safety, but would have to consider Michigan a reach? Are the schools THAT different?</p>
<p>I agree with this. Berkeley does poor on class size and maybe greek scene; Harvard does poorly on weather and maybe that startup culture present in Silicon Valley.</p>
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<p>That’s surprising :rolleyes:</p>
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<p>I think Warblersrule is being genuine. There are several boosters on this board, Phantasmagoric (including both of us,) but Warblersrule (at east in my experience) isn’t one of them. It’s best not to confuse warblersrule with goldenboy ;)</p>
<p>As far as UCLA is concerned, it probably isn’t a good option. No undergrad B-school (although i heard biz-econ w/ accounting minors do fairly well)</p>
<p>No “seasons” (in the traditional sense of the word) for UCLA (or Stanford) imo.</p>
<p>Greek scene is present, but certainly not dominant.</p>
<p>It does do fairly well in sports (as does USC), and start-up culture is increasing quickly (google “silicon beach”)</p>
<p>Ultimately i’d still recommend Harvard or Berkeley. The latter might be the best overall choice, however, since the former is much more competitive. It might also not hurt to add USC to the list due to sports, greek scene, undergrad b-school, and silicon beach proximity.</p>
<p>beyphy, I did not call him a booster (a term I reserve for a very specific kind of poster, and I wouldn’t consider you or him a booster, either), but said “to boost,” as in the general “to prop up” or “speak well of.” Most alums on this board are guilty of the latter, but not the former (in my use of the term). </p>
<p>warblersrule, I should have worded that differently; my response was based on your criticism of a discussion I see as highly relevant to the OP’s question. But you seemed to target only my comments about Duke, rather than the many other schools I commented on, so I assumed there was a reason for that.</p>
<p>^ i was trying to tailor my post to the OP’s general interests UCB, rather than trying to make the perfect comparison with Stanford (which others have tried, and failed, to do, it seems.)</p>
<p>^ agreed - not all the OP’s criteria can be met equally (relative to Stanford’s ‘atmosphere’), so some tradeoffs are necessary.</p>
<p>Re: the Greek scene, it’s hard to say. Over the past 2-3 years, the proportion of students who joined a fraternity or sorority has doubled (from 13% to 26%), according to the CDS. But that might be a difference in reporting, e.g. perhaps they’re now including those who are part of coed “fraternities” (like the business-focused AKPsi). On the other hand, new fraternities/sororities have been introduced to the campus recently. Regardless, the # Greek houses has remained the same, and that tends to be more imporant in deciding the prominence of the Greek system. I don’t think it’s nearly at the level of Duke, MIT, Vanderbilt, USC, etc.</p>
<p>The common sentiment on Stanford’s Greek scene is that it has a very noticeable presence, but is still avoidable without much effort.</p>
<p>Wait, I’m confused. To which school are we comparing? Stanford? Since when does Stanford have an undergrad b-school? Granted, Harvard and Stanford don’t need undergrad vocations/trades. The higher level u’s in the country generally don’t. This is the model to which UCLA subscribes, albeit probably wrongly. The U needs undergrad business; bring it back. Granted, there are UCLA grads in chem, engineering, the sciences in general, and even some of the non-econ social sciences that do well in quantitative fields, leaving the humanities majors to sales/marketing and pub relations. But it doesn’t match the success, obviously, of Harvard or Stanford. You’ll see a Harvard grad in Lit deep into quant on Wall Street. Harvard tends to taunt us with this: “See my in French degree?” “Wall Street, baby…”</p>
<p>Ah my mistake. I don’t generally keep up with business schools and only know of a few top ones that have undergraduate programs – USC, Berkeley, Michigan, Penn, NYU, etc. My mistake, I assumed (wrongly) that all (or most) of the top programs had them.</p>
<p>So I just typed this really long post, and it disappeared.
But anyways, thanks for all the responses! It’s all quite helpful.
When I said atmosphere, I was referring to the culture more so than the weather, where startups are common and the university is invested in them, too. The weather in which I’m interested probably doesn’t match Stanford’s; I’m from New England where we get snow, often. So I am looking for snow, ideally, and a nice blend of the four seasons.
But like someone noted, I’m just an average candidate for schools like Cornell—3.94/2240. I said I was interested in Greek life. It doesn’t have to have a huge presence on campus, but I do want to join a fraternity.
So I want some matches/safeties for my list that are similar to my first choice, Cornell. </p>
<p>Here’s my list of definites:
Cornell, CMU, UMich, Northwestern, UMass
Also considering (so far):
Vandy, Duke</p>
<p>This would bring Berkeley, Caltech, and Stanford to mind.</p>
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<p>This would rule all three out lol. </p>
<p>Most top schools have research programs, along with students who’d be interested in startups. Blizzard, for example, was started at UCLA for example by 3 alumni; Imgur was started at tOSU. Yet, i doubt either university was actively invested in it. That’s something you’d find near Silicon Valley, and perhaps other top schools (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, etc.)</p>
<p>As i stated above, although Silicon Valley’s much more established, due to it being so new, you might have a much easier time, and more plentiful opportunities, over at Silicon Beach for actively being part of a start up. Google’s already here, and i expect it won’t be long for the others to follow suit.</p>
<p>As per your request, matches/safeties:</p>
<p>UCLA, USC, Berkeley. This is more conjecture (since i’m not as familiar with the universities) but maybe UIUC and Georgia tech?</p>
<p>Average Low Temperature in Fahrenheit by Year
Durham: 46.8 degrees
Palo Alto: 46.7 degrees</p>
<p>Duke does get 10 more inches of precipitation per year on average and has much hotter summers (about 20 degrees on average) than Stanford but most college students will be off campus during the summers so the latter point is moot. With regards to the former, some students may prefer more rain so this difference could swing the tables either way depending on what a particular student wants.</p>
<p>Sports</p>
<p>Duke’s major weaknesses in athletics in comparison to places like Stanford and USC rest largely in Track & Field and Swimming which are overrepresented in events like the Olympics and even the Director’s Cup. As far as major team sports, Football is the only one that Duke is “weak” in and lets not forget that Stanford has been largely mediocre in football for almost the entire last decade. Its record until recently wasn’t meaningfully better than Duke’s.</p>
<p>Duke has very strong Lacrosse, Golf, Tennis, Soccer, and Basketball programs (Men’s and Women’s). Its Track & Field, Swimming, Wrestling, and Baseball programs could use some work but Stanford isn’t a standout in the latter two sports either.</p>
<p>Unlike most other schools, Duke doesn’t participate at the Division 1 level in Men’s Volleyball, Water Polo, Men’s Rowing, and Men’s Ice Hockey.</p>
<p>At any rate, the only sports that meaningfully impact an undergraduate spectator’s experience is Men’s Football and Men’s Basketball, the latter of which Duke is an undisputed top 5 program.</p>
<p>Academics</p>
<p>Almost all of Duke’s academic programs are ranked within the top 30 so it really doesn’t have any weaknesses in this area. Stanford is stronger in most but Duke isn’t weak enough in any area to claim that it has “weak academics”.</p>
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Harvard and Berkeley are nothing like Stanford with the latter being about 3x times larger and being public school while the former has a vastly different climate and athletic culture. Duke and Vanderbilt are perhaps the closest overall to Stanford but the OP will most likely not be able to get into any of these schools.</p>
<p>The Harvard(s) of the South aren’t very similar to the Harvard of the West ;)</p>
<p>Neither Duke nor Vanderbilt is renown for its startup culture (Something that’s probably more common at Berkeley and Harvard.) Engineering was also emphasized in the OP. Duke is mediocre in engineering, whereas Berkeley’s is world class. While Harvard’s engineering program isn’t amazing, MIT is basically just up the street. No other schools in Duke’s triangle have a comparable engineering program.</p>
<p>And since engineering was mentioned, it isn’t unreasonable to assume that the OP would be interested in a tech start up. There are certain schools that are very good for that (Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan, etc.) but Duke probably isn’t one of them.</p>
<p>Your weather comparison is also laughable since it doesn’t take into account things like humidity. How anyone can reasonably think that two universities which are on opposite sides of the country can have similar weather is beyond me.</p>
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<p>Yes, yes, Duke and Vanderbilt are similar to Stanford; And UCSF is Berkeley’s medical school. If you say anything long enough, i’m sure some people will believe you :D</p>