<p>I totally second norcalguy's statement about Cornell's location. All of the other schools I applied to were in or near cities, so I had some reservations about being in the middle of nowhere. However, I've come to love it. I grew up in the overcrowded DC suburbs, so being in a place with no traffic or pollution has been an amazing break. I was never an "outdoorsy" person before, but now I'm usually the first one to suggest to my friends that we walk to the commons, bring the books outside, or go play frisbee when it's warm. My asthma is about a thousand times better, and I love that I can walk everywhere. It's absolutely true that the lack of alternative activities brings Cornellians very close together. </p>
<p>The way I see it, while I might be missing out on sightseeing and stores that are open past ten, I have the rest of my life to live in city, so I might as well experience the reasonable pace of rural life when I can afford to (i.e. don't need to find a job!)</p>
<p>I've been out of Cornell a few years, and I'll just throw this perspective in having lived in DC and Boston since graduating.</p>
<p>My fondest memories of Cornell are of going to see funky arthouse flicks at theatres on campus or in downtown Ithaca, going to see interesting speakers or performances (both visiting and student), going to a weekend long party at a professor's organic farm outside of Ithaca, throwing a beer back with professors and friends, going on wilderness survival expeditions, going on tours to wineries ranging from completely pretentious to completely hippie. </p>
<p>When my friends new to Cornell were sitting around with their curtains closed complaining about how boring Ithaca was, I threw them into the back of my truck and took them to Ithaca Falls. Their eyes were as wide as saucers. They had no idea it was even there. We spent all afternoon swimming in the gorge and diving off rocks under the massive waterfall (which, I believe, is technically illegal but you would never know by the dozens of people there on a warm day). </p>
<p>My point is simply that I don't ever remember feeling bored or waiting to get back to civilization while I was there. If you're from the Northeast, you're going to hear over and over how it's in the middle of nowhere and how awful it must be. That's just a bigotry bred into Northeasterners. I recently stopped to get a transcript and spent several hours just wandering the slope, the old brick roads, the suspension bridge, the art museum, the White Library in Uris, the classrooms where professors who really cared taught... </p>
<p>For me, the place just has a magical power like it's this whole fantastical world separate from reality. The novel "Fool on the Hill" by Cornell's Matt Ruff kind of captures the magical feeling. For some, that is a negative because they feel they're missing out on something important happening somewhere else. For me, it created this island of incredible memories and experiences completely unique to that time in my life and that place in the world.</p>
<p>I've heard many great things about the actual school that is UPenn from alumni, but never such an emotional, almost teary-eyed connection to the locale that I've heard over and over from Cornell alumni who have since lived their lives immersed in major cities.</p>
<p>intl echo, totally agree with absolutely everything that you said, especially about dc. ive been going running with my friend everyday, and we have been going through beebe lake and out of campus. yesterday we went all the way out to the plantations and teh arboretum. cornell's campus is absolutely absolutely gorgeous. ive never been an outdoorsy person, but exploring the outskirts of campus make me so happy that im in such an amazing location.</p>
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But never such an emotional, almost teary-eyed connection to the locale that I've heard over and over from Cornell alumni who have since lived their lives immersed in major cities.
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<p>So true. Attend a Glee Club concert at Homecoming or Reunions and you will see more grown men crying than you ever wished to see in you life. My own commencement was fraught with so many instances of teary eyes my parents couldn't figure out why I was so bent out of shape. The truth was that I was just having so many wonderful emotions and memories flooding back to me every time I saw a heard a different thing on campus -- the chiming of the bells, the rushing of the water over fall creek, the view from Libe Slope, or my friend's smiling face.</p>
<p>Cornell breeds a fierce affinity for the school precisely because it is such a unique experience. In my experiences at the Ivy Society events in Boston, where recent grads from all eight schools get together for happy hours, Cornellians are typically the most energetic and enthusiastic about their undergraduate experiences.</p>
<p>Are there problems with Cornell? Of course. If you are Elgguj, you will want a Starbucks closer to your dorm and more of a big city experience. But hopefully you should know what you are getting into in that department before you arrive in Ithaca. The other main problem with Cornell is that a small subset of the student body does not want to be there -- probably less than 10% -- and they will complain a fair amount in your freshman dorm rooms about how they were rejected from somewhere else and how they hate Ithaca. They should have done us all a favor and gone somewhere else.</p>
<p>some of them are doing you a favor and going somewhere else ;) </p>
<p>in all fairness though...sometimes you don't realize these things until you actually go to college and learn more about yourself. i will say that people who complain about cornell/ithaca should either do something about it or shut up about it. also, believe it or not i complain about ithaca on the board to prevent more people like me from going to cornell and not being happy. so im helping the cause!</p>
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Explain this: more people choose Penn over Cornell when accepted by both.
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<p>That's pretty easy to explain. Between the allure of Wharton and the fickle students who succumb to the idiocy of the U.S. News Rankings, Penn edges out in common admits. </p>
<p>But I'm not certain how the opinions and decisions of students who haven't spent one year in college (yet alone spent multiple years on different college campuses) should inform the decision that current students have to make.</p>
<p>Plus if more students pick School A over School B because of reason x, that doesn't mean a different student shouldn't pick B over A because of reason y.</p>
<p>As I mentioned in my first post on this thread, for the liberal arts it is really a toss up between the schools, and for the hard sciences, engineering, and many niche majors, Cornell trumps Penn academically. And socially, Cornell offers a broader array of student types to experience -- Penn seems almost blindingly pre-professional these days. I have met at least three people from Penn who upon visiting Cornell felt that they would have been better off at Cornell due to the more laid back atmosphere.</p>
<p>I'll note that Penn has done an extremely good job of packaging itself over the last decade. They have aggressively used early decision to really bring down the acceptance rate, and they have adopted tag lines like the "One University" policy which seems to reverberate with people. (But Cornell has the functional equivalent of that policy as well, so I'm really not certain what the value-added is.) Cornell has really only started to catch up in the PR game. </p>
<p>So that leaves Penn with Wharton. But we'll let Penn keep Wharton -- between the Enron and WorldCom fiascoes earlier this decade and the current subprime meltdown that is going to leave the country -- if not the world -- in tatters well into the next decade, I'm not certain it makes all that much sense to boast about your financial acumen.</p>
<p>I agree w/ Cayuga. Wharton is a better program than AEM. CAS is a toss-up: but know that Cornell, at least from my visit, seems to be laid-back, and Cornell CAS is smaller: 3rd smallest in the ivy league.</p>
<p>Correct me if I am wrong, but about 20 to 30 years ago or so, wasn't Cornell ranked higher than UPenn?</p>
<p>I remember reading something back in like 1997/1998, where it stated that only recently has Penn moved up in the ranks with its tremendous number of applicants but that before it used to be very low/unprestigious.</p>
<p>So is there any truth to this or did I misread/misinterpret?</p>
<p>(And yes, I know some of you here will say, "Ranking doesn't matter, blah, blah, blah" but I am not here to argue about that matter now. Currently as it stands Upenn is ranked higher than Cornell...what were the rankings back in like 1985-1990?)</p>
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And Philadelphia, and the northeast corridor, and more money.
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<p>The first two would be matters of opinion as to whether or not that is a good thing. But the third item is incorrect. Cornell has more money after you consider all of the subsidies that it receives from the State of New York.</p>
<p>Check out page 78 of the following document. After imputing the monies received from the state, Cornell has around $100k more in resources per student.</p>
<p>I don't understand what we're discussing here anymore. Everybody agrees that if you want a pre-professional, urban campus you should go to Penn. And if you want a more laid-back college town campus you should go to Cornell. Business? Penn. Architecture, hotel management, engineering, and environmental majors? Cornell. The rest is a toss-up, with Cornell edging out in the physical sciences, Penn edging out in the social sciences, and the humanities being pretty much split.</p>
<p>Penn is stronger in theory, micro, metrics, and finance. Cornell is stronger in public, consumer, labor, and development. Overall, Penn is probably considered a top 10 program. Cornell a top 15.</p>
<p>Other social sciences:</p>
<p>Sociology: Cornell
Government: Penn
Psychology: Penn
Anthropology: Penn</p>
<p>Cornell has strengths in a lot of applied fields: Human development, organizational behavior, development sociology, collective bargaining and conflict resolution. </p>
<p>But at the undergraduate level, most of it doesn't really matter.</p>
<p>it's incredible how sooo many people omit the "people" part of rankings. Do you think an employer really gives a hoot over the fact that Penn is 7/3500 while Cornell is 12/3500?? (i dont know their exact rankings, i'm just guessing). The answer is no, to those still pondering. It's all on the student and how they performed at their university, how they socialized, what clubs they did, what research they did, how they got involved, how they helped, and most importantly how they interviewed.</p>