<p>@ Medman,</p>
<p>Note that roughly half of Tufts (uphill) is in Medford and the other half (downhill) is in Somerville. The Tufts Post Office (which, as you might imagine, does not get used that much anymore) is on the Medford side - hence the Medford postal address. When the Red Line (subway) was extended to Davis Square and the student center was built several decades ago, the center of gravity of the social scene at Tufts starting migrating downhill and into Somerville as Davis Square expanded. </p>
<p>Just curious Medman- by any chance are you old enough to predate the Red Line extension, or am I reading too much into your message?</p>
1 Like
<p>Donāt know about Medman, but I predate the Red Line extension to Davis Square ;- )
We used to take a bus to Harvard Square and pick up the Red Line there to get into Boston.
The other major difference is Davis Square itself. Today it is awesome! Full of ethnic restaurants, bakeries, coffeehouses etc. Back when I went, there were only smoky dark barrooms and the only redeeming feature was Steveās Ice cream store. And the Venice Cafe.
Even the āhillsideā on Boston Avenue has better restaurants than it used to.
I would love to be a Tufts student now!</p>
<p>Davis Square is awesomeā¦Evanston has nothing like it. Go to Tufts!!!</p>
<p>In terms of reputation of the pre-med program, I am not qualified to judge, but one of my friends is a professor at Harvard Med School and he is considered a world leader in your field Ā Neuroscience. He also periodically sits on the admissions committee. One of his children was recently in your position and had to choose an undergrad premed program. Their Āshort listĀ contained three schools. Harvard, Tufts and Amherst. In the context of these three schools, he spoke very highly of the Tufts premed program, and the final decision between Tufts and Amherst went right down to the wire. Amherst was ultimately chosen based on better fit (more rural). This should in no way be interpreted as a relative ranking of any schools, but if Tufts was good enough for the child of one of the world experts in your field, who sits on the admissions committee of one of the top med schools in the country, then it will probably be good enough for you. Also note that the final decisions were made based on fit rather any perceived ranking, so that should be an important part of your decision. It should be noted that in Massachusetts, the selection of NESCAC schools over Ivy schools by prominent researchers is somewhat common. It seems to fly under the radar because it happens in the context of early decision and probably does not show up in the cross admit tables. This phenomenon was also mentioned by a local educational consultant on one of the threads on the Harvard board.</p>
<p>Here is the information on The Tufts Summer Scholar Program. It pays $4500 for the summer and is quite flexible in that it can be used at: the Medford/Somerville campus, the Med school campus/hospital in Downtown Boston, a couple of local area hospitals, or abroad doing field research. Other departmental programs may also be available.</p>
<p>[Undergraduate</a> Education at Tufts University](<a href=āHomepage | AS&E Studentsā>Homepage | AS&E Students)</p>
<p>[Undergraduate</a> Education at Tufts University](<a href=āHomepage | AS&E Studentsā>Homepage | AS&E Students)</p>
<p>Note that both Tufts and Northwestern have downtown med school campuses. Tufts med school is about 6-7 miles from the undergrad campus while NorthwesternĀs is about 12-14 miles. I was not a pre-med, but I had an engineering summer internship downtown (a block from the med school) between my junior and senior years. I was able to continue it throughout my senior year (at reduced hours) by using public transportation to commute between the two campuses. Commuting between the campuses at Tufts is a pain, but certainly doable, even with a full engineering course load. I do not know if it can be done at Northwestern, but someone out there must know. I suspect that the Northwestern bus that goes downtown stops at the downtown campus, but I do not know how long it takes. Also make sure the frequency is sufficient to support convenient commuting and that Chicago traffic during commuting hours is manageable. </p>
<p>Note also that the Cambridge area is one of the hottest regions in the world for Biotech, so all the biotech companies can present opportunities for research, internships or an alternative career path if you decide you do not like pre-med. </p>
<p>Finally, at Tufts, because of the small size, there is little or no boundary between the engineering and liberal arts schools. Engineers will be taking science classes with you and you can take classes in the engineering school. One of the tricks to making Pre-med easier at Tufts is to form study groups with engineers Ā they tend to have a high science/math aptitude and are very collaborative, because they have less pressure for grades.</p>