<p>putting aside questions of land and californication, i have a question with regards to majors, as a person who is making this decision now:
which college is better know, renowned, or apt to deal with a major in neurobiology and/or human biology?
thanks</p>
<p>Stanford's biological sciences program is first in the country; our psychology program is also #1. Both programs offer vast research opportunities for undergraduates; you will find a wealth of classes and research positions with the highest-level professors. </p>
<p>Stanford offers a specific major in HumBio, a program not found at most other schools.</p>
<p>harvard hands down!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!</p>
<p>Stanford undergrad, Harvard medical school. :D</p>
<p>Or the other way around...</p>
<p>A lot of sad reviews from Harvard students....</p>
<p>Anyway, </p>
<p>The OP is interested in chemE for which Stanford has one of the top-10 programs. Harvard's chemE? Maybe 126th.</p>
<p>Of course if the OP is interested in Chemical Engineering. he ought to be looking at the top 5 in that sub-specialty - ranked by USNews in 2006:</p>
<ol>
<li> Massachusetts Institute of Technology 4.8</li>
<li> California Institute of Technology 4.7
University of CaliforniaBerkeley 4.7
University of MinnesotaTwin Cities 4.7</li>
<li> University of WisconsinMadison 4.6</li>
</ol>
<p>The OP is choosing between Stanford and Harvard. </p>
<p>Why should he be looking only top-5? Stanford's chemE is #6; if #6 is much worse than #5, then what should we say about Harvard's engineering (for those who don't know, Harvard does have an engineering program)?</p>
<p>The Harvard engineering school is small (less than 10% of the size of Stanford's) but elite: its students are more highly-qualified on average (higher GRE score), and its admit rate is about one-third (12.5%) of the admit rate at Stanford (35.5%).</p>
<p>Despite its "boutique" size and consequently limited number of offerings, the Harvard School of Engineering ranks in the top 10% nationally, according to the USNews 2006 ranking of such schools. (#20 out of 198.) Of course there is cross-enrollment with MIT, also.</p>
<p>The US News ranking puts it #20 simply because quite a few factors are normalized by size. So it's small size doesn't hurt the ranking that much. The limited # of offering can be a huge deal, depending on how limited we are talking about. In EE, for example, Harvard does have quite a few EE-related courses. So you can probably make up the difference by your sheer talent and taking couple classes at MIT. But in chemE, Harvard has almost nothing. That's too much of a stretch to get an education in that field out of practically nothing.</p>
<p>Byerly, 20/198 is not the top 10 percent. Perhaps you would know this had you taken a mathematics course at Stanford instead of Harvard. Or cross-enrolled at MIT</p>
<p>haha .</p>
<p>"The Harvard engineering school is small (less than 10% of the size of Stanford's) but elite: its students are more highly-qualified on average (higher GRE score), and its admit rate is about one-third (12.5%) of the admit rate at Stanford (35.5%)."</p>
<p>1) Stanford's engineering school has approximately 230 faculty, and Harvard's has approximately 65. Same question as above about what type of mathematics is used to deduce that this is "less than 10% of the size."</p>
<p>2) The Naval Academy and Yale often have admit rates that are lower than Harvard's, and Caltech/MIT students have higher average SAT scores. Does that mean that their students are "more highly-qualified on average" than Harvard's?</p>
<p>FWIW, Harvard's engineering division does have several extraordinary faculty and many others who are pretty good at what they do. Some of the students there are absolutely first-class, but others are very average. For better or worse, many/most Harvard engineering students aren't "real engineers" -- in contrast to those you'd find at MIT, Berkeley, or even Stanford ... in my opinion, that's not necessarily an insult.</p>
<p>But overall, it is simply delusional to try equating Harvard's DEAS to the engineering schools at Stanford or other comparable places.</p>
<p>as for the instate changing the environment there i think it does. i was chosing between stanford and harvard (now think i will attend harvard) and being a california resident i even found stanford to be surprisingly laid back, but harvard was more intense but not in the cut throat way... ultimately harvard gave me some money and stanford gave me none thus making the decision really easy</p>
<p>When I say the Harvard school of engineering is 10% of the size of Stanford's I am referring to both the number of students enrolled and the number of PhD'd awarded annually. Check the stats yourself. That the student-faculty ratio is more favorable at Harvard (ie, more than 10% of the size of the Stanford faculty) - as you point out - is interesting, but it is not a measure of the size of the program. (See USNews)</p>
<p>Selectivity, as measured - again by USNews - shows that Harvard is currently the most selective - meaning that it gets a higher fraction of the top admits, no matter howyou measure them - by SAT scores, common-admit matriculation choices or otherwise.</p>
<p>Simply speaking of the School of Engineering, both by measures of student quality and admit rate, it doesn't appear that Harvard has to take a back seat to anyone. All of which, of course, doesn't mean you'd go there if your heart was set and your mind focussed on an engineering sub-specialty it doesn't offer! </p>
<p>Note that you are mistaken if you confuse this point with an attempt to "equate" Harvard engineering - admittedly a "boutique" at the moment - with the mega-schools next door at MIT or at Stanford.</p>
<p>Comprende?</p>
<p>
[quote]
FWIW, Harvard's engineering division does have several extraordinary faculty and many others who are pretty good at what they do. Some of the students there are absolutely first-class, but others are very average
[/quote]
</p>
<p>If you are referring to the undergrad engineers at Harvard, then I find this assertion to be dubious. If nothing else, these students managed to win admission to Harvard College which is clearly no walk in the park. I doubt that you'd find too many truly 'average' engineering undergrads at Harvard just like you're not going to find too many 'average' undergrads in any major at Harvard College.</p>
<p>The issue with Harvard DEAS is mostly a matter of resources - clearly DEAS doesn't have the breadth of engineering offerings that the mega-eng schools offer. It's also a matter of student intent. I am fairly certain that a lot of Harvard engineering students don't actually intend to work as regular engineers, but would rather either proceed onwards to their PhD's, or get jobs in consulting or banking. However, the truth is, plenty of engineering students at MIT do the same. For example, out of all of the undergrads of the EECS department of MIT, about 1/4 go on to graduate school, and another 1/4 take jobs in consulting or banking (and many of these people will later go to grad school, usually for an MBA). Many Stanford engineers do the same.</p>
<p>Byerly, that was a weak attempt to spin the facts, and I strongly suspect that you know it.</p>
<p>"Harvard is currently the most selective - meaning that it gets a higher fraction of the top admits, no matter howyou measure them - by SAT scores, common-admit matriculation choices or otherwise."</p>
<p>Your original post referred to graduate engineering school admission rates, and had no relevance to your feeble explanation above. And even if it did, I'd counter that (a) GRE scores have little to do with the quality of graduate student, and (b) As I posted before, Harvard undergrads usually don't have the highest SAT scores or lowest admit rates anyway (which were the metrics you mentioned in your original post). And HMS students have neither the highest MCATs, GPAs, or admit rates compared to peer schools -- and are often not even close. Comprende?? :)</p>
<p>"When I say the Harvard school of engineering is 10% of the size of Stanford's I am referring to both the number of students enrolled and the number of PhD'd awarded annually."</p>
<p>Number of students is an arbitrary and relatively meaningless way to characterize the size of a program, and you know it. Clearly the # of faculty and students are both important. IMO the # of faculty is much more important in characterizing the true size and resources of a department. But in any case, it's silly and chidish for you to cite statistics as gospel ("H is only 10% of the size") when they're misleading and convenient only to support your point to readers who don't know any better.</p>
<p>Look, I was a Harvard alum and loved it there. My younger sibling was actually a DEAS undergrad (computer science). However, I'm always amazed to see folks like you who are apparently unable to look at things objectively and constantly need to try convincing others that they're "the best." You really need to give up on this one.</p>
<p>get the facts in honest way folks. Harvard is toughest to get in and some time MIT even acts tougher. Here is story of a top Nj schooler. Applied ED to MIT, guess what got deferred. So in RD, applied Harvard, Penn, Princeton Yale Stanford and Duke. Got every one of them. Then came MIT saying u are in. Doing all the admit days and wanting to be a engineer, chose Harvard.</p>
<p>U get it now. It very very very hard to say no to Harvard for all the right reasons. There are tons of good tech schools MIT, UCB, Sford, Cornell but there is only on Harvard.</p>
<p>"If you are referring to the undergrad engineers at Harvard, then I find this assertion to be dubious."</p>
<p>I was referring to the undergraduate engineers from the perspective of being "engineers." The "absolutely first-class" students I wrote about are ones who are so smart that they can succeed academically in any environment (these top DEAS undergrads at Harvard tend to study CS rather than ES). Others are only mediocre engineers and computer scientists, but are generally smart and capable in other respects. Of course, one of the aims of a Harvard education is to provide a liberal arts education ... so this isn't necessarily a weakness depending on one's goals.</p>
<p>"I am fairly certain that a lot of Harvard engineering students don't actually intend to work as regular engineers, but would rather either proceed onwards to their PhD's, or get jobs in consulting or banking."</p>
<p>I don't know the most recent data. But a few years ago, only a small number became "real" engineers (or even pursued PhDs in engineering). Most would get jobs in consulting/banking/etc ... or attend medical school, law school, or graduate schools in non-engineering disciplines. But the total number of DEAS undergrads is <em>so</em> small that it may be tough to generalize.</p>
<p>Now Mr. "Snack": exactly how is it "a weak attempt to spin the facts" in emphasizing how much smaller the Harvard school of engineering is compared to Stanford, by saying that it's program is "10% of the size"?</p>
<p>Total enrollment at Stanford: 3,218
total enroillment at Harvard: 302</p>
<p>Total PhD's granted 2004-2005:</p>
<p>At Stanford: 260
At Harvard: 20.</p>
<p>[source: USNews, America's Best Graduate Schools, 2007]</p>