<p>why harvard, besides the obvious name and prestige... Whats so good about it compared to other ivy league schools like yale, princeton, or cornell?</p>
<p>^^It's so influencial, the mere thought of its name prodded you to ask this question...</p>
<p>Money....... There's a lot of financial aid waiting in those halls.</p>
<p>Overseas Harvard has more name recognition. It definitely got me a job when I was in Germany. I like Cambridge better than New Haven or Princeton. But otherwise I think it's a matter of personal taste. From reading CC I worry that kids at Harvard care more about prestige than those at the other Ivy's. I'm not sure I'd like it as much now as I did 30 years ago. I like its House system. (But Yale has that as well, and some would argue a better version.) And of course some professors/majors may be stronger at H than other places.</p>
<p>agree
money</p>
<p>From a previous thread:</p>
<ol>
<li>Cambridge/Boston</li>
<li>Prestige</li>
<li>best for South Asian Studies and Sanskrit (my personal reasons)</li>
<li>Awesome Ivy League goodness (1st college in America)</li>
<li>duh, Elle Woods went there</li>
<li>I look darn good in crimson</li>
<li>You can go to Estonia and people will know what Harvard is. lol but seriously, its true</li>
<li>Conan O'Brien</li>
<li>The people.</li>
<li>The exposure/different opportunities.</li>
<li>The fact that you can do ANYTHING here. Literally. (Providing that you can find time in what is guaranteed to be a rather packed schedule for most people.)</li>
<li>Natalie Portman, lol</li>
<li>New England attitude....love it!</li>
<li>PHENOMENAL art museums right on campus.</li>
<li>Um... because along with all of these, it's actually a pretty good college?</li>
<li>The House system</li>
<li>Connections</li>
<li>Annenberg Hall: <a href="http://www.fas.harvard.edu/%7Ememhall/images2/annen1.jpg%5B/url%5D">http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~memhall/images2/annen1.jpg</a></li>
<li>Math 55</li>
<li>Living in the same dorm that John Adams and John Quincy Adams did</li>
<li>Roland Fryer (Prof. in Economics Dept)</li>
<li>work hard play hard mentality</li>
<li>Opportunities for an Edward Gorey experience</li>
<li>The Harvard Lampoon</li>
<li>For the Money (for the presence and future).</li>
<li>LIBRARIES! BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS! OLD BOOKS! ANCIENT BOOKS!</li>
<li>Sanders Theater: <a href="http://www.fas.harvard.edu/%7Ememhall/images2/sanaudg.jpg%5B/url%5D">http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~memhall/images2/sanaudg.jpg</a></li>
<li>To actually park your car in Harvard Yard the day you move in</li>
<li>The incredible glass flower exhibit:<a href="http://www.journalofantiques.com/Feb04/featurefeb04.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.journalofantiques.com/Feb04/featurefeb04.htm</a></li>
<li>The Hasty Pudding Awards</li>
<li>>>>>>>>>>>>TO BEAT YALE IN "THE GAME"!!<<<<<<<<<< WOOT</li>
<li>Dropping the H-Bomb (except really you "go to a school in Boston")</li>
<li>Because it's almost as good as Yale</li>
<li>Prof. Dan Gilbert</li>
<li>natalie portman gets a second vote</li>
<li>Just to be able to actually write A.B (Harvard) on my resume for real!</li>
<li>beautiful campus</li>
<li>the Crimson</li>
<li>Primal Scream</li>
<li>The IOP</li>
<li>the annenberg hall looks like something from a harry potter movie</li>
<li>Harvard University Band</li>
<li>Great Arabic program, as far as I can tell.</li>
<li>The constant flow of amazing and famous guest speakers every week</li>
<li>Because it's Harvard!</li>
<li>Prof. Robert Langton</li>
<li>The hilarious IgNobel Prize ceremony every year</li>
<li>The many a capella singing groups</li>
<li>The Head of the Charles</li>
<li>Its a good back up.</li>
<li>Pinnochio's (best pizza place in New England)</li>
<li>When your professor says, "Sorry I have to miss class next week. I'm getting a Nobel Prize in Physics. You guys will have a guest lecturer though."</li>
<li>Larry Summers dancing with Elisa New at the President's Study Break over reading period.</li>
<li>Because you managed to get in!</li>
<li>The Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra</li>
<li>FOP</li>
<li>Because it rhymes with success</li>
<li>awesome commencement guest speakers</li>
<li>clam chowder</li>
<li>Cause second best just won't do</li>
<li>HARVARD SOCCER</li>
<li>forget that, how about HARVARD FENCING, 1st place last year! =D</li>
<li>Cross register courses at MIT.</li>
<li>All those great restaurants in N. Boston especially Dom's!</li>
<li>The Diversity</li>
</ol>
<p>. . . and a second vote for Harvard financial aid - very generous, and very willing to work with you.</p>
<p>And yet another vote for Harvard's financial aid. While I haven't had experience with financial aid departments at other schools, it's hard for me to imagine that you'll find any that are more reasonable, generous, and responsive than Harvard's.</p>
<p>Another thing: </p>
<p>Between Harvard, Cambridge, and Boston, the array of interesting and stimulating opportunities outside of class - readings, concerts, talks, debates, panel discussions, museums, etc., etc., etc. - is simply staggering.</p>
<p>epistrophy is totally right. As a junior, I really came to see how I've underappreciated how much Harvard has to offer to its students. Therefore, I decided to really attend all the different events that are always going on that interest me, shop more obscure classes, explore more, etc. etc. </p>
<p>Already in the past week, I heard Paul Farmer speak as well as Michael Leavitt, the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Next week, I'll get to hear from the Iraqi Foreign Prime Minister about what his country is planning to do in the future! I think being able to just hear the awesome stuff that these people are doing makes it worth coming here for more than just 4 years.</p>
<p>ok thanks guys, I didn't know there was such a vibrant community down there..., but coureur what exactly is the "new england attitude?"</p>
<p>^^Not sure. That list was compiled by many posters, and I don't remember who put New England Attitude. My personal experience of New England is that the attitudes there are no better or worse than the rest of the country.</p>
<p>I posted item 14 in the list coureur has quoted. You have got to see the art on campus at Harvard to believe it. Item 19 is pretty cool to would-be math majors.</p>
<p>Not the OP on New England attitude but to me it includes:</p>
<p>shabby chic
old money doesn't boast about it
it's good to be frugal
practicality</p>
<p>Follow-up on epistrophy's and xjayz's comments: If you're young, talented, interested, social, and turned on by being able to sample the best of art, music, intellectual thought, political discourse, sidewalk cafe life, and general collegiate extracurricular brilliance, being at Harvard, in the middle of Cambridge, and 2 miles / $1.70 from downtown Boston is about as good as it gets.</p>
<p>Except...the weather sucks!!!</p>
<p>If Tsinghua has that much of money, it can easily exceed Harvard.</p>
<p>Harvard has the advantage over Tsinghua of being in a country with more diversity and freedom of speech. That makes a difference in a college environment.</p>
<p>Some of the profs who have been charged with expanding/opening new departments at Tsinghua have degrees from Harvard and other American universities.</p>
<p>Students in Tsinghua are very tough. Most Chinese student can earn perfect score on SAT Math IIC Physics and Chemistry tests.</p>
<p>What Chinese students often have a more difficult time doing, until they have been away from China for a while, is critiquing a governing party and its public policies. That's a skill that Harvard can find in most of its entering students from the United States. That's part of the skill set expected of college graduates (and even of people who never attended college) in a democratic republic.</p>