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It would be more interesting and valid to compare schools on SAT scores according to discipline. That information isn't readily available.
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<p>A partial approach would be to compare the math SAT scores to the proportion of students majoring in math and the hard sciences. I would suspect that there will be a positive correlation within the broadly based universities. This relationship might be lower at places like MIT and Caltech, where everyone has to take the hard science core, even if they end up as English majors.</p>
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Other specialized colleges that come to mind are Nursing at Penn and JHU and Education at Vanderbilt. What are some others?
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<p>Not sure these are good examples. These students get evaluated on traditional academic qualifications. It is different than the musicians, dancers, and other artists, for whom their academic accomplishments are beside the point.</p>
<p>^I agree. They get evaluated the same way as those artsci/engineering students. It's just that most of the high-achieving kids in high school don't think of becoming nurses/middle school teachers. So the pool is usually less competitive. That said, the average SAT of education students at Northwestern went up 120 points in one year and was few points higher than the university average. The overall 25 percentile score changed from 1320 to 1350.</p>
<p>^my bet is their nursing students would have lower SAT. how many high-scoring kids that you know say they want to be nurses? those who want to be in medical/health profession would much more likely want to be doctors, who are generally respected more and paid significantly more. there's this stereotype that nurses don't need to be brainy and this turns the smartest kids off too.</p>
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how many smart kids that you know say they want to be nurses?
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<p>At Penn, quite a few. It is not a fall back for people who cannot make it as premeds. It is a different, and respected, career. Many Penn grads become nursing leaders. Quite a few get doctorates and end up on nursing faculties.</p>
<p>It is also more lucrative than most people assume. You will never get paid like a neurosurgeon, but experienced nurses can make the same as family practitioners.</p>