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<p>excellent point</p>
<p>What a great story, T26! I don’t know which description sounded better, but I think I get the meaning behind those words simply by the vibe I get on CC.</p>
<p>Time for a break from studying. This whole number one or number two thing is the ONE thing I DONT like about Yale. I’ve been dreaming of going there for a long time but it really is weird how much they like to talk about how Harvard sucks and Princeton doesn’t matter. I thought it was funny at first but I think a lot of them really believe it. My mom isn’t a big fan of Yale. She went to Wellesley and spent a lot of time on the Harvard campus where she met a lot of her friends. She thinks Yale is a fine school and all for humanities except she says that Yale usually isn’t at the top of any ranking lists she sees. (Somebody give me some lists I can show her!!!) In her mind (she’s a scientist) the top schools are really places like Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and MIT. For me, Yale is PERRRRRFECT and I don’t care at all if its number 2 or number 20. Ill probably change my mind though if they reject me and Harvard or Princeton takes me LOL I just think the Yale kids should stop making such a big deal out of it.</p>
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<p>I agree with her to some extent but not necessarily in that order. Globally (grad and undergrad) in the sciences, it would be MIT>Stanford>Caltech>Harvard>Yale=Princeton.</p>
<p>Princeton>Yale in physical sciences and Yale>Princeton in biological sciences (especially considering that Princeton doesn’t even have a med school).</p>
<p>Very broadly if you are a humanities or social sciences undergrad, then the order probably should be something like Yale=Princeton>Harvard>Columbia>Stanford.</p>
<p>Mind you this is JMHO and really a very broad generalization. You really can’t go wrong with these schools. They are all good schools.</p>
<p>I agree with Hunt, the students at ALL these schools could use a little inferiority complex. These are all great schools but there are a lot of other great schools that provide very similar quality of education.</p>
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<p>vicariousparent, other than HYPSMC that you discuss above, can you please tell us which schools you are referring to “that provide very similar quality of education”?</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>My son felt the same way after the game…he too stayed in a Harvard dorm. Came back wondering why anyone would choose H over Yale…he didn’t like the vibe at H.</p>
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My list would have about fifty schools on it, maybe more. Jut because one school is better than another one doesn’t mean that it’s a lot better.</p>
<p>^ My list would also be pretty long. For instance, purely in terms of academic strength, two schools on my daughter’s list- Northwestern and UMichigan- are very similar.</p>
<p>Northwestern and UMichigan are similar to HYPSM in what kind of academic terms…? I know that USNews rankings primary based on undergraduate teaching (as they have subject rankings for grad studies), therefore in many cases they do not reflect academic achievements properly. But whilst USNews ranks HYPSM(C) in the top 10 (first half of top 10), the ARWU list, which based on academic excellence, also ranks these schools in the (world) Top 10, with CalTech, Berkeley, and UChicago. But ARWU ranks Northwestern 21 in the US and 29 worldwide, and UMichigan 18 and 22, respectively. If you say, that Caltech or UChicago could provide similar education in many fields, I would say yes I agree, but nor Northwestern or UMic ranked that high…in any rankings (QS, Times, Forbes, etc)</p>
<p>Both schools are great, especially Northwestern, I liked it very much when visited, (have to add, I never been in Ann Arbor, so cant say much about UMic), your daughter choose well 
But they are not in the same league with HYPSM and the like…</p>
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<p>vicariousparent, so you are saying that Northwestern and UMichigan are very similar to the following?:</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT
Caltech</p>
<p>In what way are they similar?</p>
<p>Yale’s psychosis regarding its elder rival has long been evident and much discussed. Why, look at today’s YDN, the authors are practically squealing with glee that Harvard is studying Yale’s own experiences in college renovation as Harvard begins planning for its own: [Harvard</a> is copying us | Yale Daily News](<a href=“http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2011/mar/03/havard-copying-us/]Harvard”>http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2011/mar/03/havard-copying-us/)</p>
<p>A Yale grad myself, I think it probably goes back to the very beginning, when Yale was founded by a bunch of ministers who left Harvard in a huff – it has been seeking affirmation ever since. Yale has many wonderful qualities, but this is probably its least attractive feature. I think Princeton has been able to develop a much more healthy “separate but equal” mentality regarding its larger rivals to the North.</p>
<p>Though Yale and Harvard are probably comparably selective these days, there was a time after WWII when Yale was in relative decline (New Haven fell apart, the University had BIG financial troubles, crime plagued the campus) and Yale really was full of folks who would have gone to Harvard in a heartbeat had they gotten in. There was sort of a “close but no cigar” attitude among a not unnoticeable segment of the student body.</p>
<p>Even the President of Yale can evince a bit of this mindset. Yale’s president Richard Levin spoke at the installation of Larry Summers as Harvard’s some years back and drew great chuckles from his Cambridge audience when has said something like " and I congratulate you on assuming this position, which may be considered the most powerful and influential position in higher education on the planet, because no University on the planet commands the breadth and depth of academic resources that Harvard does … and as you might imagine, that was a very difficult sentence for the president of Yale to utter."</p>
<p>GeraldM and onecircuit: Yes, hard as it may seem to believe, if you stripped the prestige, the selectivity, the undergrad experience, and looked purely at academic productivity of these institutions, you’d find that those ranked in the top 5 are not all that different from those ranked in the top 25-30. I don’t care for US News rankings, but just now I randomly browsed some of the graduate rankings and came across several examples where UMich or Northwestern ranked higher than Yale. </p>
<p>For example, in Chemistry, Northwestern ranks #7 (score 4.5), Yale ranks #13 (score 4.2), and Princeton is at #16 (score 4.1). Even in History, where Yale and Princeton have a great reputation and are ranked at #1 (score 4.8), UMich is not too shabby at #7 (score 4.6). </p>
<p>Most undergrads only take advantage of a tiny sliver of the vast opportunities available at these great research universities, so for all practical purposes these differences in academic strengths don’t make a huge difference.</p>
<p>Sure, Yale is great and a much better place for my daughter to go to college than Northwestern or UMich, but the educational opportunities at Yale are not all that superior.</p>
<p>Granted I’ve only been here one semester, but outside of Game weekend, I’ve never heard a current student reference Harvard, negatively or otherwise.</p>
<p>vicariousparent: You’re right that there are many subject in what Northwestern and UMic beats Yale or Harvard, as there is no university on Earth that is first in everything. The USNews not always reflect the academic quality, when for example Emory tops Berkeley, despite the latter is still a research powerhouse. (And also a public university, what a tragedy…) Again, the ARWU ranking is nearly purely based on academic excellence and research, and I already cited the rankings for Northwestern and UMich…both are among the Worlds top unis (while, for instance, Georgetown is nowhere, around the best 100-200) but not top 10. </p>
<p>The Big Three is not extremely prestigious for nothing, obviously. A good (or bad) university choice could heavily affect ones life… I have about 22 years at least, until my future children have to choose college, but if they will be smart enough (and money will not be an issue) I hope they will go to HYPS. (Or Oxbridge.)</p>
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<p>vicariousparent, well thanks for showing us that you have proven that Northwestern and Michigan have very similar quality of education as HYPSMC by posting ONE department in which Northwestern is ranked higher than Princeton and Yale out of more than 40 departmants and somehow forget to include Harvard, MIT and Caltech in your analysis for this ONE department.</p>
<p>Yep, by your analysis you have fully proven your point</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>I just want to say right now, that I would accept a rejection letter from Harvard in turn for an acceptance letter from Yale in a heartbeat. Take that as you wish.</p>
<p>Fully agree with vicariousparent that universities ranked in the top 5 are not all that different from others ranked among the top 50, and that “for all practical purposes any difference in academic strengths don’t make a huge difference”. Your ultimate career success and happiness in life depend a lot more on what you do at the college of your choice, how you take advantage of the resources available to you, and what you do post-graduation than the college you end up attending. In fact, I would even venture to argue that people who are accepted to a top college but choose to attend a lower ranked one will be as successful in life career-wise as someone who does actually attend the top college.</p>
<p>onecircuit you are entitled to your opinion. You think HYPSMC are a class apart. Good for you. You are not alone in that belief.</p>
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<p>ha!</p>
<p>xrCalico, funny you would say this…</p>
<p>there is a study that has been completed that concluded EXACTLY what you just posted above!</p>
<p>it’s funny–in many other threads I have argued against the claim that it makes no difference where you go to college–but in this thread, I’m arguing that it doesn’t make a big difference within a pretty large range. I think those are consistent opinions, though.</p>