U of M Ann Arbor vs Dearborn

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Michigan
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<p>Just throwing this out there for Dearborn’s sake… I know somebody who went for EECS at U of M Dearborn and is now making six figures while working on making sensors for automobiles to detect other ones, not allowing them to hit. I mean, I’d still choose Ann Arbor (and I did), but going to Dearborn is not going to be that big of a bad deal if you don’t give a **** about prestige or you have location/money issues.</p>

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<p>Lol how is this thread.</p>

<p>This is worse than MSU vs Michigan</p>

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<p>You cannot get into the Ann Arbor campus with the same grades, ACT scores as the Dearborn/Flint schools. I have always thought of the 2 satellite schools as more like community colleges. AA is way more selective in the students that they accept.
To think that if you got into the Dearborn school means you can also go to U of M Ann Arbor is pretty laughable unless you are a top tier student.</p>

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<p>EDIT: This is a response to Alexandre 7 posts up.</p>

<p>Sorry to bump this old thread, but I’d hate for people to be misinformed. I can’t speak for business school or medical school, but for law school, where you go to school for your undergrad does not matter AT ALL. I don’t know where Alexandre got this information, but it is incorrect. When applying to law school, all that matters are your GPA and LSAT score. Everything else is minor compared to your GPA and LSAT. You only get a small boost if you went to a very top undergraduate institution, like Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and MIT. If you don’t believe me, head over to the law school section and you will see that this has been confirmed many times.</p>

<p>For someone looking to apply to law school, going to UM-Dearborn over Ann Arbor might be a good idea. If the classes at Dearborn are as easy as everyone here says, then it would be easier to get a higher GPA at Dearborn, which would make you more attractive to law schools. The smaller class sizes at Dearborn may also benefit a lot of students. You would also be able to save a lot of money going to Dearborn by living at home and with the scholarships that they offer. Also, at the Harvard Law School website, you can see the undergraduate institutions attended by their freshmen class. There is at least one student from Dearborn and Ann Arbor. Clearly they were not held back by attending UM-Dearborn.</p>

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<p>Nice job replying to a 4 month old thread. No one cares. Go away.</p>

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<p>Scotus, this OP activated this thread over 2 years ago and is now well on his way to earning his degree. As such, our posts are not going to benefit him…or anyone else since it is specific only to him.</p>

<p>This said, I think I should clarify my point. It was not my intention to imply that all that matters to law school admissions is the applicant’s undergraduate alma matter. As you point out, academic performance, LSAT and personal statements (essays) will matter a great deal. However, I do not think it is accurate to suggest that one’s undergraduate institution is not concidered seriously when evaluating academic performance. A high GPA from some schools is an accomplishment that requires great effort and intellectual horsepower while a high GPA from other schools requires much less effort and intellectual ability. The fact that both Ann Arbor and Dearborn are represented at the Harvard Law School is not telling. Ann Arbor may have 20-30 matriculants while Dearborn may have an isolated ourlier. If you look at matriculation data from law schools that actually list numbers, you will notice that the vast majority of students enrolling in top Law schools are in fact alums of (1) elite undergraduate institutions such as the Ivies, elite privates or elite publics or (2) flagship public universities such as Florida-Gainesville, Georgia-Athens, UIUC, UT-Austin or Wisconsin-Madison. Below are lists of the 20 most represented undergraduate institutions at 2 major Law schools and 2 major Medical schools:</p>

<p>Yale Law (out of ~600 Law students)

  1. Yale 89
  2. Harvard 80
  3. Stanford 37
  4. Princeton 35
  5. Brown 22
  6. Dartmouth 18
  7. Duke 18
  8. Columbia 17
  9. Chicago 16
  10. UC-Berkeley 16
  11. U. Penn 14
  12. Cornell 11
  13. NYU 11
  14. Michigan-Ann Arbor 8
  15. Swarthmore 8
  16. Amherst College 7
  17. Northwestern 7
  18. Pomona College 6
  19. Southern Cal 6
  20. UNC-Chapel Hill 6
  21. UT-Austin 6
    Michigan-Dearborn 0</p>

<p><a href=“Welcome | Office of the University Printer”>Welcome | Office of the University Printer; (pages 143-144)</p>

<p>Chicago Law (out of ~ 600 students)

  1. Chicago 30
  2. Northwestern 25
  3. Notre Dame 23
  4. Yale 21
  5. Stanford 20
  6. Cornell 19
  7. Michigan-Ann Arbor 19
  8. BYU 18
  9. UC-Berkeley 18
  10. UIUC 17
  11. Wisconsin-Madison 17
  12. UT-Austin 16
  13. Duke 12
  14. U. Penn 12
  15. Dartmouth 11
  16. Harvard 11
  17. Georgetown 10
  18. Princeton 10
  19. UCLA 10
  20. Southern Cal 9
    Michign-Dearborn 0</p>

<p><a href=“Course Catalogs | University Registrar”>Course Catalogs | University Registrar; (pages 134-136)</p>

<p>Johns Hopkins Medical (out of ~ 500 students)

  1. Johns Hopkins 65
  2. Yale 40
  3. Harvard 39
  4. Stanford 23
  5. UC-Berkeley 17
  6. Cornell 16
  7. Duke 14
  8. MIT 14
  9. Maryland-College Park 12
  10. Michigan-Ann Arbor 12
  11. Princeton 12
  12. U. Penn 12
  13. UVa 11
  14. Columbia 10
  15. Dartmouth 9
  16. UNC-Chapel Hill 9
  17. Chicago 8
  18. Georgia 8
  19. UT-Austin 8
  20. Brown 7
  21. Notre Dame 7
  22. Penn State 7
  23. Wisconsin-Madison 7
    Michigan-Dearborn 0 or 1 (the is 1 University of Michigan student listed with no campus affiliation, could be Ann Arbor, Dearborn or Flint)</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/bin/u/p/SOMCatalog0910.pdf[/url]”>http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/bin/u/p/SOMCatalog0910.pdf&lt;/a&gt; (pages 460-461)</p>

<p>WUSTL Medical (from 1995-2011)

  1. WUSTL 207
  2. Harvard 88
  3. Duke 79
  4. Stanford 72
  5. UC-Berleley 51
  6. Michigan-Ann Arbor 48
  7. Northwestern 48
  8. Cornell 46
  9. Yale 46
  10. UIUC 42
  11. Princeton 41
  12. MIT 39
  13. Brown 38
  14. Johns Hopkins 37
  15. UCLA 36
  16. U. Penn 36
  17. Rice 33
  18. Dartmouth 28
  19. UVa 28
  20. BYU 27
    Michigan-Dearborn 0 (in the last 15 years)</p>

<p>[url=&lt;a href=“http://medadmissions.wustl.edu/HowtoApply/selectionprocess/Pages/WhoChoosesWU.aspx]Who”&gt;http://medadmissions.wustl.edu/HowtoApply/selectionprocess/Pages/WhoChoosesWU.aspx]Who</a> Chooses WU<a href=“click%20on” title=“undergraduate institutions represented”>/url</a></p>

<p>As one can clearly see, the vast majority of students at most elite graduate programs attended either elite universities and colleges or flagship publics. There is no comparison between Ann Arbor and Dearborn.</p>

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<p>

There’s no question that UM-Ann Arbor is clearly heads and shoulders above it’s cousin in Dearborn but SCOTUS is correct when he says that the reputation of an undergraduate institution doesn’t matter for law school admissions. It all comes down to the applicant’s GPA and LSAT and it’s almost inconceivable that there’s more than say 1-2 students from UM-Dearborn who are capable of scoring over a 170 on the LSAT which is essentially a prerequisite for Harvard Law School.</p>

<p>The reason elite private and public schools are the most represented at the top law and med schools is that quite simply have the strongest students, not because the admissions committee adds points for going to a more presitgious school.</p>

<p>I would argue that if someone was qualified to go to Harvard Law from Dearborn, why wouldn’t that person just be in Ann Arbor? These schools aren’t even seen to be on the same level in the state of Michigan. I’ve never heard of someone going to UM-Dearborn to save money or boost their chances of getting high grades over Ann Arbor.</p>

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<p>Alexandre is correct. The top tier law schools look at more than GPA and LSAT score and the prestige of the undergraduate institution will make a difference.</p>

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<p>^No, not really. A 4.0 Sociology major from UM-Dearborn with a 173 on his LSAT will get into Harvard Law every single time while a 3.6 Physics major from MIT with a 173 on his LSAT will get rejected every single time since Harvard has a soft GPA floor of 3.7.</p>

<p>I just basically provided you with the most example ever but even here, the vast different in undergraduate reputation (MIT vs. UM-Dearborn) will give the MIT grad maybe a leeway of 0.2 GPA max or perhaps 0.1 but never never as high as 0.3.</p>

<p>No reason to fret though, nobody at Dearborn is smart enough to score that high on the LSAT so it doesn’t really matter while at least the top 10% of MIT LSAT takes will get 170+.</p>

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<p>Do you work in Harvard Law admissions? Do you personally know every undergrad at Dearborn? No need to answer.</p>

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<p>This is just common knowledge for those who know law school admissions well and have personally been through the process or know friends that have. As far as Dearborn, no one in the top 200 of my graduating class of approximately 600 from a top Michigan public school went there. That should tell you the caliber of the students enrolling there.</p>

<p>It’s very hard to get admitted to a top law school; more University of Michigan graduates will end up at dead-end law schools like Michigan State, Wayne State, Cooley, Thomas Jefferson, DePaul and Chicago-Kent than they will a T-14 law school ranging from Yale to Georgetown.</p>

<p>Only at Harvard will every student more or less go to a T-14 law schools. I know plenty of students at places like Penn and Duke that are going to strong regional law schools like George Washington, BU, Vandy and UCLA since they struck out at the top 14.</p>

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<p>“I know plenty of students at places like Penn and Duke that are going to strong regional law schools like George Washington, BU, Vandy and UCLA since they struck out at the top 14.”</p>

<p>I bet quite a few Dukies also will be end up at so called “dead end” law schools too. You really need to get over yourself already goldenboy8784. The act is getting old.</p>

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<p>Novi, I don’t think goldenboy was trying to insinuate that the majority of law school-bound students from Duke or any other Michigan peer matriculated into top 14 Law schools or that none of them enrolled in “dead-end” law schools, whatever that means.</p>

<p>Obviously, Michigan’s smaller peers, such as Brown, Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern and Penn are going to be more selective and have stronger student bodies on average. As such, it is reasonable to expect that a significantly higher percentage of law school matriculants from smaller peers will enroll in top 14 Law schools and that a significantly smaller percentage will end up at lower ranked law school.</p>

<p>For example, approximately 20% of law school-bound Michigan students end up at top 14 law schools while roughly 65% end up at law schools ranked out of the top 30.</p>

<p>In contrast, Stanford places approximately 50% in top 14 Law schools and approximately 30% in law schools ranked out of the top 30.</p>

<p>I suspect HYP do a little better than Stanford (~60%-20%) while Michigan’s smaller peers, Duke included, have placement figures somewhere between Stanford and Michigan (~35%-50%).</p>

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<p>if im in LSA in ann arbor, shouldn’t I take orgo 1 and 2 at dearborn over the summer? the grades apparently transfer.</p>

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<p>@Alexadre;</p>

<p>I have to point out that this situation is EXACTLY the same as mine, even to the distance away from each school. It appears your logic is simply flawed.</p>

<p>Thanks to everyone else who has contributed to this thread in a positive, straightforward way.</p>

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<p>I went to two satellite campuses - PSU, Erie and UM, Dearborn (for grad school). I went to school with about 5 people who are pursuing degrees at top law schools. In addition, I know a handful pursuing PhDs at top schools. It really comes down to test scores. The students who were accepted to these schools chose to stay at the satellite campuses for different reasons. </p>

<p>Some wanted to be close to home and recognized they could get a solid education at the satellite. Others (I suspected) wanted to graduate with a 4.0 and knew it would be harder if they transferred to the main campuses or elite private schools (although they were clearly qualified to do so). </p>

<p>Other advantages were unique research opportunities with faculty. Many faculty at the satellite campuses have PhDs from Ivy league universities. The exceptional students got glowing recommendations from these professors, had brilliant test scores, and had quality research to put on their applications. From what I understand, it is much harder to get close to professors at the main campuses. But the bottom line, the thing that distinguished them, was ultimately test scores, which is why they exist in the first place. A 170 on the LSAT means you’re weird smart and anything else is just ancillary. It is clear to me that people on this site are underestimating the top students at satalite campuses. There is a huge discrepancy between the top and bottom students at the sattelite campuses - but smart is smart. </p>

<p>I don’t pretend that I went to the Ann Arbor campus and I did not apply. I graduated from UMD with a 4.0 and had a wonderful experience. I am confident that if did go to Ann Arbor, I would have done just fine. I chose Dearborn beacuse I was offered a unique research opportunity. My decision paid off. I am gainfully employed at a job I love. The job I have now is the same one I would have coveted if I went through Ann Arbor. I have worked with many people who did graduate work in Ann Arbor, and I am often not really that impressed. That said, obviously there are many really smart and successful people who are alumni from Ann Arbor - this is no secret.</p>