<p>I agree that Yale is probably not the best school around for engineering, but the biological sciences are good, there are plenty of pre-meds, and they get into very good med schools. (I’m a bit biased–my wife was an MB&B major who went to Duke Med). And you certainly change your major quite easily–lots of students do.</p>
<p>As for lifestyle issues, it’s really weather vs. the residential college system. Reasonable minds can differ on which is more important.</p>
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<p>Ivybear, according to Princeton administration, the admissions to medical and law school have not changed much since the new grading policy was implemented. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/odoc/faculty/grading/faq/[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/odoc/faculty/grading/faq/</a></p>
<p>Can you provided detailed evidence to support you comments above?</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>If you want to go by statistics, check out this thread.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/stanford-university/1118844-stanford-harvard-yale-princeton-mit-others.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/stanford-university/1118844-stanford-harvard-yale-princeton-mit-others.html</a></p>
<p>Stanford is tracking who they lost their admits to and cross admits with Harvard had more choosing Harvard, yale was 50:50, Princeton was 3:2 in favor of Stanford.</p>
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<p>gadad, wrong again. Most of the residential colleges are for 4 years</p>
<p>At Princeton, the main nexus of social life is the eating clubs; at Yale it’s the residential colleges. Even though Princeton now has some residential colleges, they are not equivalent to Yale’s system.</p>
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<p>ewho, care to show us the results of the Putnam Contest for Stanford, Yale and Princeton?</p>
<p>nevermind, here it is:</p>
<p>[William</a> Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lowell_Putnam_Mathematical_Competition]William”>William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>The following table lists Teams finishing in Top Five (as of 2009[update] competition):</p>
<p>Top Five Team (s)
55 Harvard<br>
40 MIT<br>
30 Caltech<br>
**28 Princeton **
18 Toronto<br>
17 Waterloo<br>
12 Duke<br>
11 Chicago, Washington U in StL, Yale<br>
9 UC Berkeley, Cornell<br>
**8 Stanford **
5 Brooklyn College, City College of NY, Michigan State<br>
4 Case Western Reserve (including former Case Tech), Columbia, Michigan, Rice<br>
3 Brooklyn Polytech, UC Davis, Carnegie Mellon (including former Carnegie Tech), Queen’s, UPenn<br>
2 British Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvey Mudd, Maryland, UCLA<br>
1 Cooper Union, Illinois Tech, Kansas, Kenyon, Manitoba, McGill, Miami University,
Mississippi Woman’s, NYU, Oberlin College, Swarthmore </p>
<p>The following table lists teams that finished in the top five since 1990 (as of 2009[update] competition):</p>
<p>Top Five Team (s)
19 Harvard<br>
14 MIT<br>
**13 Princeton **
12 Duke<br>
8 Waterloo<br>
7 Caltech<br>
**6 Stanford **
4 Toronto<br>
3 Cornell, Washington U in StL<br>
2 Chicago, UC Berkeley, Harvey Mudd, University of Michigan, Yale<br>
1 Miami University</p>
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<p>boomssha, the only complaints about the Princeton Eating Clubs, half of which are non-selective, are the people that never attending Princeton.</p>
<p>All three of these schools are excellent in everything. One or the other might be marginally more excellent in one discipline or another, and that might be a reason to pick one of them over the others. But it’s silly to try to run them down based on such things as the results of a math competition.</p>
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So the people who wanted to be in one of the selective clubs but were rejected never complain about them? That would be surprising. What turns some people off to this aspect of Princeton is that such a significant part of the campus social life is based on something selective–it’s essentially the same thing as a campus with a significant Greek presence–some people don’t want that kind of tiered system. Yale doesn’t really have that (despite the growth of Greeks there). I don’t know about Stanford.</p>
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<p>Hunt, what in the world are you talking about?</p>
<p>“some residential colleges”?</p>
<p>all princeton freshmen and sophomores belong to one of the six residential colleges and most continue for the 4 years there. Only about 1/3 of the total student body belong to the Princeton Eating Clubs, which are only for eating and socializing, but not for sleeping.</p>
<p>According to Princeton’s website, most juniors and seniors join eating clubs. I’d be curious to know how many of them continue to live in the residential college. At Yale, virtually all students remain in the residential college all four years and take most meals there.</p>
<p>I will admit that I didn’t know that Princeton now assigns all freshmen to residential colleges. I commend Princeton for becoming more Yale-like in that respect.</p>
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<p>Hunt, huh?</p>
<p>only half of the Princeton Eating Clubs are selective and those admit about 50% of requests. So that a student that wants to be in a selective Eating Club can pretty much end up at one of them. In fact, the non-selective Eating Clubs are more popular by sheer number of members. Greeks discriminate on gender and the same cannot be said about kids that what to be members of a Frat or Sororities -they could potentially get shut out. Stanford has a strong Greek system, with about 15% of students belonging to these clubs.</p>
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<p>only about 2/3’rds of Juniors and Seniors belong to Eating Clubs, and about 1/2 of those are selective. The Eating Clubs are not for sleeping, only for eating and socializing. 100% of all students are members of Residential Colleges Freshman and Sophomore year and about 1/2 stay at those Residential Colleges for all 4 years.</p>
<p>Then there is the most important thing: for the 2/3rds of the juniors/seniors that were members of the Eating Clubs, most have an absolutely incredible time and develop life long friends and relationships and will tell you that their Eating Club experience was one of the most positively memorable parts of their Princeton experience.</p>
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Are you sure about this? As I understand it, only half of the residential colleges have housing for upperclassmen, and (at least according to Wikipedia), most upperclassmen live elsewhere.</p>
<p>Your defense of the eating clubs is sensible, and some people probably like that system. But it’s essentially the same as the defense of the Greek system at other schools. As you may know, the eating clubs are only coed because they were forced.</p>
<p>there are 3 four year Residential Colleges and 3 two year Residential Colleges, so I changed my “most” to “about 1/2” above.</p>
<p>But even at the four-year colleges, it appears that most of the upperclassmen move elsewhere (and don’t eat there, either).</p>
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I was comparing Stanford and Yale. Besides, can you count the top 50 finishers for each year. I never had the time and chance to do so. Princeton should have done better than Stanford, for sure on this.</p>
<p>OP – thank you for clarifying that you have an interest in Med School.</p>
<p>I stopped reading after 1.5 pages. Lots of BAD, outdated information by posters who I assume have never studied on any of the three campuses under discussion here.</p>
<p>1) Yale is not “a humanities school” that is bad in sciences. It is top 10 in the country in the sciences (not engineering), just not top 5 like S and P, and recent investments into its science infrastructure tells me it will be top 5 within the next 15 years (things change v e r y s l o w l y in academia).
2) Princeton’s grade deflation (3.3 ave. gpa vs. 3.55 at STanford, 3.5 at Yale) does NOT hinder med school applicants… though I cannot say about Law school. Someone posted here that 92% of Princeton’s med school applicants landed spots within a US Med school. The only person I know from our HS who went to Princton is now a first year at Hopkins Medical School. The rigor of Princeton’s undergraduate science and math departments prepares its student very well for the MCAT, as well as the interview portion of the med school admissions process.
3) Princeton and Yale are similar to each other, and dissimilar to Stanford, in size, and somewhat in weather and in the residential college experience. Stanford is as large as both P and Y put together. The DI sports culture is strong at Stanford. It’s simply a different cultural experience. </p>
<p>One last thing about Stanford that is hard to describe – its foundational position within Silicon Valley has a noticable effect on the attitude of the students toward their future lives… it is much more entrepreneurial than either P or Y, and more akin to the attitude at H. You can call it a pioneer spirit that is absorbed to a degree by the undergrads, as well as the students in the Law and Business schools at Stanford.</p>
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<p>for undergraduate, Princeton and Yale are now about the same size, 5,200 students, with Stanford only slightly larger, about 6,600 students.</p>
<p>for total students, Yale is significantly larger than Princeton and Stanford is about double Yale’s size and 3 times Princeton’s size:</p>
<p>Total Enrollment
7,592 – Princeton
11,593 - Yale
18,498 - Stanford</p>
<p>I’m totally biased here. Everyone is basically telling you to go to his/her college or his/her kid’s college. I’m every bit as biased, but I’m trying to be fair. </p>
<p>FWIW, I think some of the things people are saying here are irrelevant. Yes, Yale doesn’t do as well in the Putnam contest. What is the Putnam contest? It’s a math contest. If you’re planning to go pre-med and major in bio, how any of these schools do in the Putnam is totally irrelevant. Moreover, to a great extent, the colleges’ performance is dependent on the students they enroll. Yes, Yale enrolls fewer of the true geniuses in math than Princeton does. Unless you are a kid who scored at least a 7 on the AIME and you want to study math or possibly engineering, IMO, it would be beyond foolish to factor the Putnam into making your decision. </p>
<p>You can get a good education and get into med school from any of these 3 colleges. Frankly, I think the rankings of schools for various specialities are pretty much irrelevant to all but the academic <em>superstars</em> who want to go on to get Ph.D.s in their fields. It really doesn’t matter to most UGs who major in bio or chem and then go on to med school whether the UG they attended is ranked #4 or #17 . The rankings are based on graduate programs in the first place, and at some schools the faculty in those programs don’t teach any UG courses. </p>
<p>So, you need to look at their other attributes.</p>
<p>Personally, I feel that having access to a university hospital while you are an undergrad is crucial for pre-meds. Stanford and Yale both have affiliated hospitals and med schools. Princeton doesn’t. I’d mark it off the list because it doesn’t.</p>
<p>I’m NOT saying you can’t get into med school from Princeton. Of course you can! I am saying that having an affiliated hospital allows UGs to do things that I think are valuable to do. </p>
<p>If you haven’t researched this, do it ASAP. Can UGs shadow doctors in different specialities, can you get a work-study job in the hospital, can you volunteer at the hospital? To some extent, these experiences will give you a boost in med admissions. More importantly, they will help you figure out if you really want to be a doctor and help you decide which kind. You may change your mind later, but which kind of physician you want to be is relevant to some extent in choosing which med schools you want to apply to. Find out the extent to which these options are available at both schools. </p>
<p>And if at all possible, check the “grids.” Call Career Services at both schools and ask for this information. Your’e alreay in–no reason not to ask. Does everyone get into med school who applies? Where do the people in the middle or the bottom of the class go? Because, like it or not, right now, there’s just no way you know where you’re going to end up in the class. I doubt there’s much difference, but find out. </p>
<p>How much hand holding do you get going through the med school application process? Which med schools come to campus? How many? </p>
<p>Then there’s the social life, including dorm life. </p>
<p>At Yale, everyone is assigned to a residential college, though legacies are given the option of choosing to live in the same one as their Yale alum parent did. Very, very few people switch out of their colleges. At Stanford, there are ethnic dorms. Officially, people of any race or ethnicity can live in them, but there are still dorms which are populated by people who want to live primarily with people who belong to the same minority group. </p>
<p>Do you want to participate in intramural sports? At Yale, they are based on your residential college. At Stanford, they aren’t. That means, from what I’ve been told, though I may be out of date, that teams tend to break down along racial lines. A group of students who want to form an all African-American basketball team can do just that. </p>
<p>There are frats and sororities at Yale, but you can’t lvie in them until at least your junior year, and most people don’t. Even if you do, you remain affiliated with a residential college which give you the right to participate in the social and cultural events of that college. At Stanford, you move into a frat or sorority your sophomore year. Your social life then revolves around the frat or sorority. It is important to remember though that Greek life isn’t that big a deal at either school.</p>
<p>The flipside of this is that there are Yalies who complain because it simply isn’t possible for all the sophomore women’s crew members to live together as sophomores, for example. It’s no accident that many of the folks who moved off campus are members of varsity sports teams who then live with their teammates. </p>
<p>Yale is a small, compact campus. Stanford isn’t. It really helps to have a bike to get around. Science majors at Yale frequently complain about the trek to Science Hill. Anyone at Stanford would laugh at that because the campus is just more spread out. </p>
<p>If you like cheering for sports teams, well, Stanford is most definitely the better choice. There’s a LOT to be said for the energy and excitement that having top teams brings to a college. It’s a real bonding experience.</p>
<p>If you’d rather spend a weekend night watching a play, then Yale is a better option. Stanford’s music and drama offerings are inferior to Yale’s. I’m not trying to say that doing either is “better.” I’m just saying that Yale has a much artsier vibe and Stanford has a jockier vibe. Even if you are not "into’ either sports of the performing arts, it will color the experience you will have in college. </p>
<p>Of course, Stanford has much better weather and there’s a lot to be said for that. No doubt about it. But, Yale is such a small campus that if somone cuts class because it’s snowing, that’s someone who just wanted an excuse to cut class.</p>
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I would argue that Yale’s teams need the cheering more.</p>
<p>I agree with everything jonri says.</p>