@austrie Why do you have to decide now? You have not been admitted to either school yet.
The only thing that you can decide on now ED or RD to Penn. USC does not have ED.
I’m applying through QuestBridge, and I have to rank them. If I get accepted to them, the one I rank higher, I will be obligated to go.
USC is much better as a 21st Century college.
Many of the East Coast schools are either living off their past reputation or trying to catch up (oh, look, we now are taking computer science seriously!)
This thread is funny.
I have spent time on both campuses. Both are adjacent to undesirable neighborhoods. As a student, I would feel perfectly safe on either campus.
That said, the “feel” of these campuses is very different. You would need to visit to know what I’m talking about. As a QuestBridge applicant, I’m assuming you lack the funding to make visits, unfortunately.
I side with the group saying that the Penn degree will mean more, to a wider group of people, as far as prestige and having “legs.” That said, if you could go to either university, you would be one of the luckier people on this planet.
The problem with Penn is that it’s stuck in the hierarchy of the ivy league, whereas USC is a wild card like the other privates, and likey will break into the top 20 in a decade or so. IMHO, USC is definitely more prestigious on the West Coast and so too are Cal and other Pac 12 schools. On the East Coast, Penn is prestigious, so consider where you want to live.
I tend to agree with prospect1 plus added the fact the Penn is Ivy League which makes it prestigious in the eyes of many in the West Coast. Outside of UCB, UCLA, Stanford, USC, maybe UW, the other Pac 12 schools do not carry the same prestige academically. If you are referring to football, then Oregon, the Arizona schools are prestigious for sports.
@keasbey Nights Information is correct, and @prospect1 has summed the thread up perfectly in my mind. If you have ability and people like you, both schools will open a lot of door.
I think you will find that the vast majority of cross admits to these two schools will choose Penn, in spite of the worse weather (but best weather of the Ivies), and that they are doing that because it provides a better opportunity for most of them.
The suggestion that the Ivies are stuck in a hierarchy is partially true, but not really a negative for Penn. You will find that it isn’t really an Ivy hierarchy, it is a rankings hierarchy. Versus USC it is a significant positive. Certainly, Penn has difficulty drawing students who are also admitted to Harvard or Stanford, but that is not really just a challenge for Penn, and I would bet that they pull a lot more of them than USC does. They also lose more cross admits than they win with Princeton and Yale, but they win a decent number of them because Penn has such a different approach and culture.
Honestly, Penn M and T is great opportunity, but a CS major can compete for the same jobs and win them. Also, you can reapply to M & T, or apply for an uncoordinated dual degree. Other alternatives would be to minor in entrepreneurship or just take classes of interest in Wharton. That is available and encouraged at Penn.
Penn students know that successful startups usually begin with a small group of 2 to 4 people and not one person. At Penn you will often see business students interested in tech entrepreneurship working with tech students interested in tech entrepreneurship on a project together outside of class. These two roads tend to converge. They need each other to be successful.
On the West Coast, pretty much all ivies fall in the shadows of the behemoth schools and their legions of alumni, especially at social settings. On any Saturday, especially during football season, go into any restaurant and you’ll be surrounded by alumni from USC, Cal, UCLA, UW and Oregon up here or other Pac 12 schools. I’m sure the reverse happens on the East Coast but less so. The vast majority of alumni of USC and other large schools reside on the West Coast, so prestige is relative.
That’s a bit of a joke, Cal and UCLA people don’t watch football games, nor hang out with each other - UC environments don’t facilitate that kind of post-graduation loyalty… Many of UCLA’s present fans are people who jumped on the bandwagon in the past 5 years, and Cal’s fans are… non existent. Drive on the I-10 or 110 at any time of day in Los Angeles and you’ll see 20 USC license plates to 1 UCLA plate. I actually see more Berkeley plates than UCLA plates in Los Angeles - if this could be used as any statistically significant indication of alumni strength, which it is not. It’s only an interesting observation that I wonder about the causation behind when I make my commute.
I have to admit that in Seattle, the UCLA alumni don’t appear as close, and the Stanford alumni are also not as close as USC Trojans. The Cal alumni are okay and we’ve had some joint game day events that were cool. That’s what I love about USC, we actually enjoy interacting with each other…