<p>Its one of the few colleges that does not use the common app.
That fact alone accounts for its yield and selectivity ratings.
You simply do not expend time on the very important and unusual essay unless you are seriously interested in attending.</p>
<p>honestly, poster x, you have no idea what you are talking about saying nearly everyone who gets accepted choses to go elsewhere. Please dont post your ignorant comments again.</p>
<p>it was my understanding that students who attend chicago could have attended 'higher ranked' colleges. they chose chicago because it has an academic environment that is very unique and cannot be replicated by other institutions. you really have to work for your chicago degree, but in the end its worth it. i think its really hard to fake enthuisasm for chicago, unlike some other schools, because of its uniqueness and its priority for a truly academic environment. </p>
<p>if you don't agree, please comment with your opinions. im open-minded.</p>
<p>Hello. I attend Chicago. The academics here speak for themselves. Just bring a very good winter jacket and understand that Korean food is hard to come by. </p>
<p>To give you a tiny taste of the people and the crazyness in Snell-Hitchcock last year, (the oldest and coolest houses on campus): </p>
<ul>
<li>we Googled and recited Hungarian tongue twisters at the dinner table, just for the hell of it. none of us knew Hungarian.</li>
<li>we made a bet over the correct pronunciation of the word "forte" in a non-musical context.</li>
<li>we tied for first place in the annual Scav hunt, the list of items for which event might give you an idea of what the Chicago brand of FUN entails: <a href="http://scavhunt1.uchicago.edu/list2005.pdf"></a><a href="http://scavhunt1.uchicago.edu/list2005.pdf">http://scavhunt1.uchicago.edu/list2005.pdf</a></li>
<li>we got lost in the colorful tunnels beneath the science buildings.</li>
<li>we outlined everything in our pockets on notebook paper in pencil, named each outline a metaphor for something seemingly unrelated but really related, taped it inside a large envelope along with a penny, and stuck it in the common room chandelier for someone to marvel over. Shortly after which... a dormmate stuffed a small teddy bear's head into a condom and hung his creation from the corner of the envelope. beneath that spectacle, we added a mountain of all the furniture in the room. modern art, we thought.</li>
<li>someone from Hitchcock built a functional igloo in the Snell-Hitchcock courtyard and had a tea ceremony inside it.</li>
<li>there is a resident who tends to randomly place sealed cans of dog food into your hand and run off. </li>
<li>there is a resident who regularly wears a kilt. </li>
<li>we also have a belly dancer who WILL break out into dance, inspiring others to follow, at 2 AM.</li>
<li>in our small dorm alone, we had people who could read, speak, and/or translate many obscure, dead, or recently resurrected languages: Latin, Greek, Egyptian, Hebrew, ASL, Esperanto... </li>
<li>people will admit to having read the entirety of the course catalog several times over.</li>
<li>dinner conversations can easily include someone's business model for a coffee bean shop, the superiority of the Smith translation of "I and Thou" and the Fagles translation of "the Illiad", the definition of the word "torture" and its impact on international human rights legislation, and more...</li>
</ul>
<p>half of the fun came from relief that people such as my Chicago peers can exist and half of it came from marveling that they decided to come to Chicago.</p>
<p>Chicagograd, what I said is simply a function of the yield rate - nothing more and nothing less.</p>
<p>posterx - You have made the assertion that "nearly everyone" admitted to UC goes elsewhere to college. That's flat wrong, especially if you define "nearly everyone" as 9 out of 10 or even 8 out of 10 admitted applicants. U of C's yield (admitted applicants to those actually accepting their offer of admission) is in the 33-34 percent range and has been in the 30's for a long time. The actual selectivity for UC admissions overall continues to rise especially as reflected in the declining percentage of those admitted who apply (now in the 38-40 percent to range). Since you have made the assertion, it is up to you to provide actual figures supporting your "nearly everyone" remarks and not just say "look it up".</p>
<p>Strictly considering the yield percentages (drawn from Princeton Review), here are some other universities that have nearly everyone go to other colleges/universities they applied to according to xposter's rationale - Washington University in St. Louis (yield of 33 percent), Tufts (yield of 32 percent), Carnegie-Mellon (23 percent). Others in the low 40 percentage yields are Rice, Northwestern, and Duke.</p>
<p>posterx appears to be an expert on all schools, judging from other posts.
Lonestardad and I will agree that Chicago isn't for everyone- congrats to the kids who figure out they would be happier elsewhere. However, for the right kid it is an incredible place with absolutely stellar academics in a fun city.</p>
<p>What is more important than yield rates is the schools that students are choosing it over</p>
<p>of the three kids who that got into Chicago, they chose NU, Penn State Schreyers Honors College, and Cornell over it. I guess they wanted a more traditional college experience.</p>
<p>Chicago is self-selecting on two levels (plus one). One is in initial application. Many students know its reputation for academic rigor and say "I can get the prestige without all the work elsewhere," and not apply. Others are intrigued by the rigor, but once accepted, and begin looking more closely they begin to have doubts about how well they would actually do in that environment. My S had two friends who went through that. One ended up a NW because she felt as a humanities person she shouldn't have to do the science/math core, the other headed somewhere further east for similar reasons. The other main reason is $$. Many schools, particularly for families with incomes below $60,000, give full rides. Chicago at most only gives full tuition, and then the rest in loans. I know of students who preferred Chicago over Ivy's, but went to the Ivy because they gave more $$. Accordingly, analyzing yield is a tricky business. </p>
<p>Six out of ten go elsewhere, but for a variety of reasons. To change in order to substantially affect yield would likely change what makes Chicago the great school it is. (I remember the student protests when the Core was changed for 21 to 15 courses. The protests did change the proposals somewhat.)</p>
<p>I remember a story told by former U of C president Hugo Sonnenschein about going to pick up a pizza his first week on the job exemplifies what makes UChicago special:</p>
<p>"In my first week, Beth and I ordered a pizza from the Medici. I gave my name as Sunshine, which is a thing that my father did--easier to spell. When I went to pick it up, the young woman who gave it to me said, "Sunshine. Oh, you're Mr. Sonnenschein. You're the new president!"</p>
<p>She told me that she was a second-year in the College, and I asked, "What's your concentration?" She said, "Art history," and I asked, "How do you find it?"</p>
<p>Then she looked at me very keenly, put her face almost in mine, and said, 'Brutal!' I jumped back, and as I did, she smiled and said, 'Exactly as it should be.'</p>
<p>It was wonderful. That interchange was pure University of Chicago."</p>
<p>What sets Chicago apart from the others, however, isn't so much the difference in the abilities of the incoming students, but what motivates them and what happens to them after they get there. The intellectual "value added" is perhaps greatest for Chicago than anywhere else.</p>
<p>pardon... thethoughtprocess</p>
<p>what exactly do you believe constitutes a traditional college experience? what makes you think that an Ivy or an honors program would fall under a traditional college experience? these are both rigorous experiences, arguably just as challenging as a Chicago education, with the only true difference being in the proportion of career preparation. ought the "normal" modern college experience then necessarily gear itself toward vocational training? </p>
<p>i chose Chicago because to me it defined and embodied the ideal of a traditional liberal arts university. of course, nothing is perfect. the point is that chicago seems to care more than the majority of universities what an ideal school is. as in, its professors and administration, based on their debates and writings, seemed to be most keen on preserving and also further developing the intellectual life... the life of the mind. </p>
<p><a href="http://iotu.uchicago.edu/presentations.html%5B/url%5D">http://iotu.uchicago.edu/presentations.html</a></p>
<p>there are schools like st. john's college, which seek only to preserve the traditional liberal arts of Western Civilization by giving their students almost no choice in what they study. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.sjca.edu/asp/main.aspx?page=1003%5B/url%5D">http://www.sjca.edu/asp/main.aspx?page=1003</a></p>
<p>chicago does both. it gives us a firm grounding in the tradition, but simultaneously encourages the exploration of other cultures. it is certainly not the only college able to accomplish this. otherwise the future of mankind would look pretty grim. but chicago is one of the most vocal regarding its dedication to the modernized but still traditional life of the mind. it would be very disappointing if chicago, after all of its promises, failed in this noble endeavor. after a year in its halls, however, i would say that its chances of failing are quite slim.</p>
<p>As at many colleges/universities which have unique charactrisitics, the Chicago experience is not easily summarized into a few words, but I think "life of the mind" comes closest. And "life of the mind" is anything but boorish and bookish. It is challenging, invigorating, liberating. Snell_love's post about lunchtime conversations and other activities that cover the gamut of intellectual happenings is one good example. idad's posts are another. For students that want stellar academics and all it entails in every facet of a university's life, come to Chicago. (Oxford and Cambridge Universities would be two English cousins of similar bent.)</p>
<p>Help, I need some "characteristics" of good spelling quickly!</p>
<p>Wow- thanks for all the info guys.. never thought my post could end up having so much intellectual debates. Well.. the fact that U of C has less school spirit kind of discouraged me, since I find social life in college very important and alumni relationship crucial for later in all society. I'm not sure if I could chose University of Chicago over Ivy colleges. As idad pointed out, if Ivy offers me more financial aid, I think I would attend to that school. So, would that make me the second case in self-selecting? There were lots of fact that I liked about U of C. Personally, I think academical workload won't be a problem because I expect to do lots of study in college and all schools in U.S do have bigger expectation from students than students do. Anyway, I would really love to go to chicago, getting all the great comments from Chicago grads and current students. hum.. traditional college experience? .. interesting.. University of Chicago does seems like a unique place..but that's what I like about it.</p>
<p>Somebody said earlier that chicago falls short in the natural sciences...that is absolutely untrue. In fact, Chicago has arguably the strongest program in the country in ecology, evolution and organismal biology.</p>
<p>Check out their department and look at the broad range of interests of the faculty.</p>
<p>cheers.
cugrad</p>
<p>From a different thread: Chicago is ranked 9th in the nation for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 17th for Cell Biology, and #1 for Evolutionary Biology.</p>
<p>yeah.. as anyone who's followed this thread can see, chicago students don't necessarily boast the rah-rah brand of school spirit. i mean, unless north face made a u of c parka or something, it would be pretty hard to see whether people are wearing school colors for like 6 months out of the year anyway. </p>
<p>as for the apathy to athletics, we're a school that built our main library (the notorious Reg) on what used to be the football field. enough said, right? but Ratner, the sleek new gym, is down the street for anyone who wants to work out.</p>
<p>at the University, as we call it, school pride and loyalty are a given where it matters - at heart. *****ing about the workload is very common, but when you ask those same people whether they are enjoying it, the answer is an invariable YES, WHY ELSE WOULD WE BE HERE? DO WE LOOK THAT STUPID? ours is a more conservative sort of love, borne of the conviction that chicago doesn't and shouldn't ever need selling to those who belong here.</p>
<p>i chose Cornell over chicago, but now i wonder if i made the right choice. Let me tell u something, if ur looking for like a strictly academic place, don't come to cornell. Sometimes, i wish i went to chicago.</p>
<p>Maybe that's because relative to its other programs, Chicago is not as strong in the natural sciences as it is in all other disciplines. Let us face it, Chicago is arguably #1 in the Social Sciences, Humanities and Physical Sciences. The the natural sciences, although top 10, it is not quite top 3 or top 4. </p>
<p>I know at Michigan, people always complain about the quality of the Chemistry and Biology departments. Those two departments are ranked #21 and #14 in the nation repsectively. That's not bad when you look at it absolutely. But relative to other programs at Michigan, they are are lowest ranked! I would say at Chicago, Biology and Chemistry (along with Computer Scoence and Psychology) are among the lower ranked programs.</p>
<p>One thing I would like to know is how good the networking opportunities are in U of Chicago. I know they're not likely to be as good as they would be in Ivy schools, but if there's at least a decent chance to get to know some influential people in U of Chicago, it looks more and more likely to rise in my list. As a bookish intellectual type, I'm not sure I'd fit in at colleges with very active social scenes.</p>