Strong Math/Science Students at Yale

Colleges and Universities A-Z Yale University
1

<p>Hi all!</p>

<p>Yale is renowned for its excellent Humanities programs, and as such draws many talented historians / linguists / anthropologists to its campus. I'm interested in the humanities, but also in math and science. I have no doubt that the courses in these departments will be challenging enough, and that the professors will be brilliant. My question is this: because Yale is not well-known for its sciences and especially its math, is there a lack of strong science/math students at the university? Or does Yale succeed in attracting a good number of top mathematicians/scientists too? I know there are students at Yale who would happily stay up into the late hours of the night discussing politics, philosophy and literature. But are there students who would stay up discussing beautiful proofs and difficult problems? Or do most of those students matriculate at other schools (MIT, Caltech, UChicago, Princeton, Harvard)?</p>

<p>Any insight is appreciated!</p>

<p>EDIT: Specifically, I'd like to know about strong math students at Yale; Yale has a pretty good reputation in the sciences, I think.</p>

2

<p>I’m interested in the sciences so if anyone had some insight on that, that would be great</p>

3

<p>[Yale</a> Daily News - Yalie in top five for math contest](<a href=“http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2010/03/24/yalie-top-five-math-contest/]Yale”>http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2010/03/24/yalie-top-five-math-contest/)</p>

<p>My RSI roomie, who was a brilliant mathematician, ended up at Yale. I am matriculating at Yale too.</p>

4

<p>One measure of the relative strength of the math/science program:</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1060921377-post1.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1060921377-post1.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Sorry, no narrower set of statistics on math alone.</p>

5

<p>A Putnam fellow student is currently residing at Yale.</p>

6

<p>Thank you all for your answers! I read the article about the Putnam Fellow – very impressive! I guess my question is not whether there are <em>any</em> top math students at Yale; I’m sure there are. I’m more interested in whether there is at all a culture of “math appreciation” – ie, would I be able to find at least a few (5 or 6) kids in my residential college who were really into math?</p>

<p>I know that if I asked this question about philosophy, English, politics, or law the answer would be a no-brainer: Of course! I’m just worried that this is not the case with math. The worry is admittedly almost completely unfounded, though, which is why I decided to ask here. Could any current or past students provide some insight?</p>

7

<p>I was accepted to Yale and Princeton, and I’ve always had the notion that Princeton was really all about math and that Yale was like a desert for “math culture” you might say. So I’m wondering the same thing. I’m inclined toward Yale though, so if I do end up there, here’s one fellow math lover, haha. Also, I know that Benoit Mandelbrot used to be at Yale, so maybe the math culture there has stepped up in the last decade? I don’t have anything to back this up though.</p>