<p>As in, the students study all the time with little free time for anything else.</p>
<p>Caltech immediately came to mind. So did Johns Hopkins, UPenn, and Chicago.</p>
<p>You are using “cut-throat” in a very weird way… “cut-throat” literally means that your competitors would cut your throat… it denotes an environment where everyone is hyper-competitive and only looking out for themselves.</p>
<p>“Cut-throat” is NOT the same as challenging.</p>
<p>I have heard Caltech being described as incredibly challenging with an near overwhelming work-load… but I’ve never heard anyone call it “cut-throat.” On the contrary, places like Caltech, MIT, etc are so challenging that students tend to be quite supportive of each other. </p>
<p>Chicago is challenging and intellectual… but again, never have I heard it described as “cut-throat.”</p>
<p>Reed is incredibly challenging but not cut throat. They don’t even issue grades. You have to ask for them.</p>
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<p>Interesting. I’ve heard of Chicago as cutthroat by at least a few different people in academia.</p>
<p>Bephy… I was talking about undergrad. Yes, at the graduate level and at the assistant professor level, Chicago is pretty cut throat… they chew up their assistant professors and then spit them out after 6 years by denying them tenure.</p>
<p>“As in, the students study all the time with little free time for anything else.”</p>
<p>This has nothing to do with a school being cutthroat.</p>
<p>Do you want to avoid schools that grade on a curve where students hurt each other, or avoid schools where you have to work very hard to satisfy professors’ requirements?</p>
<p>I would say Harvard comes to mind. But your use of cut-throad is off, I would say what you describe is a college where fun is going to die is more like it.</p>
<p>As for “studying on the time with little free time,” they call Wake Forest University “Work Forest” because of challenging academics and heavy course loads.</p>
<p>For cutthroat in the traditional sense, I’ve heard a lot about grade deflation at Princeton making it such an environment.</p>