<p>CAlove: I agree with you about Washington. It has several nationally ranked programs, yet unfortunately always manages to slip under the Cal/UCLA/Stanford shadow.</p>
<p>atomic: Using class-size to downplay an institution is simply foolish. In fact, Berkeley and UCLA are great because of their class size, in many instances. Do you honestly expect a school with 30,000+ students to have classes capped at 20 kids a piece? That would make for 1,500 faculty members at least, per UC school. That's a lot of professors, buddy! Class size is only one aspect of an institution, and I know many people who turned down the Claremont Colleges in favor of larger universities because it fit their personality better. Not everyone needs to be able to ask questions during the lectures, they are fine seeking out a professor during office hours. If we were to take another aspect of a university, its selectivity, and rank them based on that, both UCLA and Berkeley would be ahead of HMC, as they accepted 23.8% and 23.4% of their applicants, respectively, while HMC accepted 28%. True, HMC students are self-selecting, but so are Berkeley's, most would argue.</p>
<p>Lastly, what makes the UCs so great is their research capabilities. True, they may be slightly more focused on graduate work (though a large majority of students would say that the undergrad opportunities are excellent as well), but each and every year they are producing research to benefit society. UCSD and UCLA boast two of the best medical centers in the world, forerunners in cancer research. A Berkeley physics professor won the Nobel Prize last year for his work in developing the Big Bang theory. Out of all those accomplishments, you are saying they are worse institutions than, say, CMC because of CLASS SIZE?</p>
<p>It's largely the same old LAC vs. big U debate:</p>
<p>Small classes vs. large classes
Personal attention vs. not so much
All profs vs. some TAs
All undergrad research vs. mostly grad research
Profs hired primarily for teaching ability vs. research/book ability
Small prestige vs. big prestige
High cost vs. moderate cost (at state schools)
Few available seats vs. many available seats </p>
<p>The beauty is that we have different schools to choose from to fit all personalities.</p>
<p>ok, different strokes for different folks i guess lol. i think cal and ucla are MUCH more well rounded. i mean, how many kids go to hmc for an english degree? cal and ucla are nationally ranked/renowned in several different disciplines, not just engineering. though, i agree that hmc is a very good science school.</p>
<p>It really depends on what the definition of western ivies is. If its the best schools out west, then Cal, ucla and all the others belong. If it's the schools that are the equals of the real ivies, then I can only think of Stanford.</p>
<p>what about cal tech and berkeley? Sure, Berkeley doesn't have the BIGGEST name in the US, but internationally, it and Michigan are well known than some of the best ivies. For example, my parents knew how good Berk and Mich were, but had no idea what Columbia was.</p>
<p>Stanford=HYP, but otherwise there aren't really any Western schools similar to the Ivies. On the other hand, the East doesn't have any pure science schools as good as Caltech or pure engineering as good as Harvey Mudd or publics as good as Berkeley. In terms of LACs, Pomona and CMC = AWS.</p>
<p>And Berkeley has a big name because of its grad schools, for which it's certainly top 5 and probably top 3.</p>
<p>^^ I don't get how people can say that Stanford=HYP. I'm not saying that it's subpar in any way, but simply because they're ranked similarly doesn't mean they're the same. Stanford=Harvard -- both are large, very much focus on grad, etc. Princeton is very much like an LAC. And Yale is very much like an LAC, too, though it's something like a cross between Princeton and Harvard.</p>
<p>Not to hate on the West Coast, but honestly, there is only one school out West that is similar to the Ivies, and that is obviously Stanford.</p>
<p>There aren't that many top schools on the West Coast to begin with, and all of them besides Stanford can be eliminated in one way or another. Caltech is a technology school and thus not similar to an Ivy. It is also WAY too small. Liberal arts college are not at all like Ivy League schools, and public universities are a completely different category.</p>
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Liberal arts college are not at all like Ivy League schools
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<p>I beg to differ. Princeton and Dartmouth are both very LAC-like, and Columbia has a large liberal arts core.</p>
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public universities are a completely different category
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<p>I think the two are more alike than people seem to think. A few of the Ivy Leagues are rather large -- Harvard, Penn, and Cornell all have about or close to 20,000 students each, and many have cited them for being "large and impersonal" (Harvard is very often criticized for not focusing much on its undergrads). And in fact, Cornell is part public, part private. So no, I don't think "Ivy" and "public" are mutually exclusive terms.</p>