<p>I originally posted this in the College Search & Selection forum, but it got buried there in no time. Hopefully it’ll get more of a response here.</p>
<p>Anyway, Stanford has been my dream school for many years, and I was lucky enough to get accepted there. I’ve stayed on campus for a few days in the past and absolutely loved it, so I’m fairly certain that I’ll end up going there. However, I was also accepted to Brown, so I want to give it a good look before deciding on Stanford for sure. I’ve never visited Brown and am not very familiar with it though, so I was wondering if anyone here who’s familiar with both schools could tell me some advantages Brown may have over Stanford (besides the Open Curriculum, of course) or some differences between the two schools. Any help would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>BTW, I’m not sure what I’m going to major in, but probably something in humanities or social sciences. I’m especially interested in languages and linguistics (particularly East Asian Studies).</p>
<p>Lazy, I am exactly in the same situation... I've gotten alot of response in college searc as well as in admissions.. people have mostly said to go to stanford for the prestige.. but I am infatuated witth the open curriculum.. i dunno.. AAGHH</p>
<p>hmmmmmmm...I think it depends a bit on what you want to study. Don't completely trust me on this, but Brown seems a bit better for English/humanities (which are what I'm interested in)</p>
<p>i like this site! studentsreview.com (dunno how accurate/trustworthy it is tho, so browse at your own risk!)</p>
<p>It's pretty straightforward to propose your own major which you create and speaking as a person who has done five or six independent studies for credit, I think I can say the real question about Brown should be: Do you trust yourself to create your own education and/or path? This should mean both glorious success and glaring failure at varying points but it is a rare chance to test what you believe in and to explore where you want to go with it. But if you aren't going to make the most of that opportunity don't come here because it is really a waste if you aren't willing to roll the dice on your own capacities. After all, Brown did and is confident that you would contribute to the environment. </p>
<p>Anyone who make a decision about four years of their life and considerable financial burdens based on reputations alone are not really making a decision and that applies both ways</p>
<p>I mean I could say more and try to be profound but that's the big picture bottom line about Brown.</p>
<p>I don't know about Stanford being more prestigious than Brown. It really depends on the part of the country you're in. On the West Coast and the Midwest, I would have to give Stanford the edge. However, in the Northeast, particularly New England and New York, I'd give Brown a decided edge because it's old school New England Ivy League, and you can't beat the imprimatur of the Ivy League on the East Coast.</p>
<p>yea, acdiaz89. I agree with Pinderhughes. I have found that people's perception of "prestige" sometimes may have something to do with "familiarity". In the west coast is Standford and in the south Duke. However, in spite of their academic excellence, those schools ( just like so many other excellent institutions) do not belong to the ivy club..</p>
<p>If directed towards me, I think choosing Brown or not choosing Brown due to a percieved reputation would ill-suit the student and the school alike.</p>
<p>I agree, moviebuff - it's the same for Northwestern in the Midwest. In the northeast everyone gets it confused with Northeastern, but in the Midwest it's a big deal.</p>
<p>I'm not very concerned with prestige. I know both Stanford and Brown are amazing schools, so I'm not going to choose one over the other based on a slight difference in prestige. What I'm more concerned with is the difference in atmosphere and student body. I love Stanford because of its laid-back West coast atmosphere and weather, but I've never lived on the East coast and don't know that much about the culture there.</p>
<p>for what it's worth, Stanford is certainly more prestigious than Brown (and I wouldn't be surprised if many people here, especially people from the west, applied to both), although it's not like it's a huge gap or anything. although, I will say, I definitely miss warm weather</p>
<p>there was a previous poster named jamesah1 who grew up on the stanford campus, was admitted there and ultimately chose brown over stanford mainly because of the environment</p>
<p>you should do a search for his comments on old threads</p>