<p>"We are still more selective than schools like Duke, Chicago, Northwestern, JHU"</p>
<p>I'm only saying Cornell should make attempts to advance, not consolidate its position. If we constantly compare the school with Northwestern or Johns Hopkins, how are we ever going to compete with schools like Harvard?</p>
<p>I bet half the complainers in this thread wouldn't have gotten in Cornell in the first place if Cornell had a "desired" 10% acceptance rate.</p>
<p>^haha I was about to point out the same thing. </p>
<p>I certainly wouldn't have gotten in.</p>
<p>^Yup. 10chars.</p>
<p>Well..I despise college rankings too, they force colleges to do things that could possibly NOT benefit their students, all in effort to be ranked in a certain order.</p>
<p>However, the sad truth is that high school students use them like the college version of the Bible. And we live in a world where sometimes, if you want to get ahead, you have to play the game like they want you to play it.</p>
<p>Also, Brown Man, are you at Cornell for graduate work? Cause, you obviously went to Brown, lol.</p>
<p>
[quote]
a school is really only as good as the quality of its students
[/quote]
That's a commonly held sentiment. It's even used as a major part of the US news ranking.</p>
<p>However selectivity says nothing about the school's educational experience.</p>
<p>Let's say that School A greatly expands its ED program to raise its yield and inherently lower its admit rate. This does nothing to education available at School A.
Despite this .... the US News methodology would give school A a better score because of its grater selectivity.</p>
<p>If school A simply did a better job promoting itself and was able to enroll an entering class with a higher average SAT score, the professors/research opportunities/facilities wouldn't change because of the high SAT scores.
However, according to Bescraze's logic, this would make School A "better".</p>
<p>Perhaps Bezcraze could explain his way of thinking?</p>
<p>It is a general sentiment that for the most part holds true. At most colleges you can get a very comparable education, because in the end the material being taught to you in classes (whether the professor is a Nobel laureate or not) is identical. Thus the quality of the students you interact with comes to be a very very important part of your college experience for both you social, intellectual, and emotional growth. Furthermore the quality of the student body at a school will heavily affect its prestige and thus its grad placement and job recruitment. As a result you will have better opportunities as a graduate than you would coming from another school. Stanford law school may take 1 kid from Umaryland, but they could easily take 10 from Columbia (if not more). Thus the quality of the student body has an intrinsic effect on the quality of the institution as a whole, in a way your specific examples of number games fail to account for.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Let's face it, there are a lot of negative connotations about Cornell. It would really benefit by providing more information out to prospective applicants.
[/quote]
I'd say the college that is working hard to improve its image recently is UChicago. By <em>changing</em> how it reports its data, it jumped to the top 10 in USNWR. While that means nothing in terms of academics, but it's a great way to attract applicants who might not have considered the college before. UChicago is also doing a lot to dispell rumors that it is a crime ridden murder hole and that the students do little more than study. In the last few years applications to UChicago have gone up by a lot. While that doesn't necessarily mean the student body is stronger, it does help with PR and Chicago probably has many matriculating students who would have never even applied 5 years ago.</p>
<p>If Cornell were to try similar efforts to change its image from a cut throat place with a ton of suicides to a more accurate one, it would attract more applicants and more kids who would not have wished to apply in the past. I'm not as well versed with Cornell's goals as other posters, but I doubt the university wouldn't want to attract as many prospective students as possible.</p>
<p>
[quote]
a school is really only as good as the quality of its students
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Partially true. Good students make for a good academic environment. However, I think CCers tend to magnify the differences in selectivity b/w different schools. Cornell's avg. SAT score is around 1390. The avg. SAT score at so-called more selective schools (like Northwestern or Duke or WashU) is around 1400-145. If I let you hang out with a 1390-scorer and a 1450-scorer for a year and go to class with them (w/o telling you their scores), can you conclusively tell me at the end of the year which one scored 1390 and which one scored 1450?</p>
<p>Yes, there are idiots at Cornell. There are also idiots at Duke, Brown, and every other college out there. A sizable percentage of students at these schools scored less than 1300 on the SAT.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Furthermore the quality of the student body at a school will heavily affect its prestige
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Actually, quality of grad depts. heavily influence a school's prestige. Cornell is more prestigous in academic circles and around the world than other peer institutions (Northwestern, Dartmouth, Brown, etc.). Med/law school admissions are a function of the individual. The undergrad name carries little weight. Therefore, it is not surprising that the most selective schools do the best in professional school admissions.</p>
<p>Venkat89-agree 100%. Good example.</p>
<p>"The avg. SAT score at so-called more selective schools (like Northwestern or Duke or WashU"</p>
<p>Cornell is more selective than both Northwestern and Duke, actually, lol.</p>
<p>Oh, since Bescraze is here, I'll copy my disclaimer from the other thread:</p>
<p>Disclaimer: To anyone considering Cornell, please ignore all posts by Bescraze. We have yet to figure out what happened to cause it, but he seems to detest Cornell. He'll randomly pop in anytime he gets a chance to bash us...because for some reason he like creepily stalks the Cornell forums even though he hates the school.</p>
<p>I agree with Venkat89... admissions policies might not need to be changed too much, but I think Cornell would do well to consider a marketing brand revitalization initiative, to better package and market the existing product. I'd say UChicago and USC are prime examples.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Oh, since Bescraze is here, I'll copy my disclaimer from the other thread:</p>
<p>Disclaimer: To anyone considering Cornell, please ignore all posts by Bescraze. We have yet to figure out what happened to cause it, but he seems to detest Cornell. He'll randomly pop in anytime he gets a chance to bash us...because for some reason he like creepily stalks the Cornell forums even though he hates the school.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Soccerguy, can you bold, underline, and italicize your disclaimer so that it's more prominent?</p>
<p>
[quote]
If I let you hang out with a 1390-scorer and a 1450-scorer for a year and go to class with them (w/o telling you their scores), can you conclusively tell me at the end of the year which one scored 1390 and which one scored 1450?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
Thus the quality of the students you interact with comes to be a very very important part of your college experience for both you social, intellectual, and emotional growth.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think norcalguy is right about selectivity differences being magnified..... IMO Interacting with a 1450 scorer won't give me better "social, intellectual and emotional growth" than interacting with a 1390 scorer</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think norcalguy is right about selectivity differences being magnified..... IMO Interacting with a 1450 scorer won't give me better "social, intellectual and emotional growth" than interacting with a 1390 scorer
[/quote]
the difference isn't even that big... Cornell's average score is about a 1400 whereas Duke/Nortwestern's is a 1420/1430 this means that a completely average cornell student would have gotten one more question wrong on the SAT than a completely average Duke/NU student. </p>
<p>Some better "social, intellectual and emotional growth" that provides, interacting with students who on average got one more question right than you on the SAT.</p>
<p>^It's pretty silly if you think about it. I got two wrong on the Math section and ended up with a 760. Without those two wrong, I would've had a 800. That's what the 40 points mean...that you got two more right on a flawed standardized test. At the top of the scale, each question is worth 10-20 points. And yet somehow Penn is supposed to have a better social, intellectual, and emotional environment because their students, on average, got 2 more questions right.</p>
<p>how many of those 631 full riders are HEOP/EOP students?</p>
<p>
[quote]
if I take the same classes as a guy who doesn't know how to compute the square of square root of 2, what interesting ideas can he share with me? How he can chug 5 beers in 30 seconds?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I for one would like to know how to chug 5 beers in 30 seconds.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I for one would like to know how to chug 5 beers in 30 seconds.
[/quote]
Come on people !!!! We need to set our ambitions high if we're to remain competitive. I mean ... some Dartmouth kid has already figured out how to chug 6 beers in 10 seconds....
YouTube</a> - Dartmouth student drinks 6 cups of beer in under 10 seconds
Can't we at least try to top that???</p>
<p>Hahaha...that's so funny, I didn't know what the beer chugging record was lol.</p>