<p>The issue is the right fit for you. UConn is a good but very large state school–17,000 undergrads versus 3000 for Brandeis. Counting grad students, UConn has around 30,000 total students versus about 5000 at Brandeis. At UConn, your classes your first few years will be very large, and you will have TAs in many of your introductory classes. At Brandeis, you will have dramatically smaller class sizes and classes taught by professors, not TAs. Brandeis has all of the elements of a small liberal arts college, but set in a research environment. Undergraduate teaching is the main focus of the faculty, not research. In contrast, if your main interest is big-time athletics and partying, then you should consider UConn. But if your focus is academics, class size, quality of teaching, then Brandeis is your clear choice</p>
<p>As for your intended major, if your goal is excellent undergrad science-research opportunites within a small liberal arts school environment, Brandeis cannot be beat. Plus, if you’re pre-med, Brandeis students acceptance rates are extremely high, plus the university has the early admissions program with Tufts Medical School in Boston.</p>
<p>Brandeis is truly an amazing school. It’s a special combination of small liberal arts college and world-class research university-with the smallest student body I believe (around 800 in a class) of any top tier national research university matched with high-powered professors who actually teach in small classes. So, the research opportunities are tremendous. The Brandeis sciences faculty is excellent and committed to undergraduate education as well as cutting edge research and graduate education–the new science facilites are first rate. </p>
<p>Brandeis’s intellectual environment is comparable in many ways to its University Athletic Association sister school, U Chicago (perhaps no coincidence that the President of U Chicago is a Brandeis alum). Yet its students are down-to-earth, friendly and non-competitive with one another. With respect to success rates in admissions to the best graduate schools, including med school , it would be hard to beat Brandeis. Plus it’s located just outside of Boston, the world’s greatest college town, but on its own suburban campus.</p>
<p>It is the nurturing quality of that faculty and their mentoring that attracted and benefitted Rod MacKinnon, an undergraduate and a classmate of mine at Brandeis in the late 70’s. He returned after medical school to pursue post-doc studies there. In 2003 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Clearly, a nurturing, undergraduate-oriented atmosphere can may make the difference in a student’s future. </p>
<p>On a related note, Edward Witten, the Fields Medal winning Physicist (sometimes called “Einstein’s successor”) was an undergrad at Brandeis as well (a History major I believe) and went on to take his graduate training in physics at Princeton. Perhaps another example of how a small, nuturing undergraduate program can lead to great success in science.</p>
<p>If you haven’t seen it, you should watch the interview on the Brandeis website with Greg Petsko, Professor of Biochem, who left MIT to come to Brandeis. He discusses his reasons as to why he found Brandeis to be, in his words, “a better place” to teach and for his students to learn. Here’s a link to the “video tour” page which you may need to paste into your browser: [url=<a href=“http://www.brandeis.edu/admissions/videotour/]Tour[/url”>http://www.brandeis.edu/admissions/videotour/]Tour[/url</a>]. Then, you may need to click through to the 'Meet Brandeisians" faculty interviews to find Petsko. </p>
<p>Further on the subject of right fit, I believe the kind of person who would feel comfortable at Brandeis is an intellecutal and/or creative sort who is friendly and comfortable with himself or herself and not competitive or pretentious. Intellectual but down-to-earth and friendly I think is an apt description of the student body. Unlike some preppy place or frat-oriented environments where social interraction is based on the “exclusivity” of the frat system, Brandeis has a welcoming, relatively-nonjudgmental environment–yet there are some off-campus frats for those who like what they have to offer. There is no pressure to party, but parties are there if you want them. Often social interaction centers around the numerous clubs and other terrific extracuriculars like theater and music. </p>
<p>Forgive my enthusiasm, but as a Brandeis alum, I loved it! Good luck with your decision!</p>