hannahmontana

As I've embarked on my quest to choose a college for next year out of all my options, I find a lot of current students at the schools I'm considering who had to make similar decisions. So what kinds of cross-admit pairs have you encountered? and which school generally comes out the victor of the cross-admit battle? Why?

Here are the ones I know of:

Yale vs. Duke: I've met Duke kids who got into Yale but chose Duke, but I'm sure there are a lot more Yale kids who got into Duke and chose Yale (though I haven't met any yet:[ ). The Duke kids I met were all biology/BME/engineering focused and thought Yale emphasized the humanities too much.

Yale vs. Williams: apparently this is pretty common as one Yale alumni told me. Kids usually end up picking Yale. I'm not sure why.

HYP vs. Penn Wharton: I see a lot of kids choosing Wharton over HYP, probably because it suits their academic interests best.

The ones I'm wondering about:
Harvard vs. Yale?
Princeton vs. Yale?
Stanford vs. Yale?

Haha I guess most all of these involve Yale, but I'm definitely curious about other schools too

hannahmontana

boo, 73 views and no replies??

Sausalito

Williams and Dartmouth - I'd guess Dartmouth wins most of the time! There is a table showing the percentages of choices among many of these cross-admits in:

The New York Times > Week in Review > Image > Collegiate Matchups: Predicting Student Choices

The New York Times > Week in Review > Image > Collegiate Matchups: Predicting Student Choices

It's from 2006, but still interesting.

jarsilver

I wish they had a similar chart for liberal arts colleges.

B Man 22

USC vs. UCLA is pretty common I think. I don't know who usually wins but I would choose USC.

Here_to_Help

Apparently for W&M the top overlap schools are the University of Virginia, Duke
University, Georgetown, Cornell, and Vanderbilt.
http://web.wm.edu/news/pdf/College%2...df.pdf?svr=www

I'd bet most of the competition is between UVA and W&M, of which, from experience, it seems to be about even - although there is some self selectivity, I believe, with regards to some students not applying to W&M as they want a larger party(er) school. If anyone has any stats on that it would be interesting to see.

mini

Until you know the financial aid situation, you know very little.

(Full disclosure: my older d. chose Smith over Williams, not for financial reasons, but for better academic program in her areas of interest.)

eatsalot

that new york times article is EXTREMELY old and been perpetuated throughout this site.. i feel like they need to make a new one. especially after all these changes in ED/EA, the recession, etcetcc.

i've met a lot of yale vs duke, and although a lot did opt for duke since it's more focused on science/math/etc, one kid i know choose yale for a) parents b) name recognition. so yeah they exist. and i would probably assume there are a lot more yale-winners than duke-winners. not to bash my school, as i love it and its great, but yale's name recognition wins. haha. and of course, yale is amazing in many other regards. especially if you are humanities-oriented.

Cuse0507

In the state of North Carolina, UNC almost always beats out Duke when it comes down to decision time for most people. UNC is much less expensive, more prestigious (in state), and much less hated than Duke is. For OOS students who apply and are admitted to both, the decision becomes more difficult.

tk21769

Yale is pretty strong in the sciences. Here's a comparison of some NRC-95 department rankings:

Astronomy: ... Yale 15, Duke unranked
Chemistry: .... Yale 12, Duke 44
CompSci: ...... Yale 14, Duke 28
Mathematics .. Yale 7, Duke 34
Physics ......... Yale 13, Duke 42
BioChem ........Yale 6, Duke 15
CellBio ...........Yale 10, Duke 13
Eco/Evo ..........Yale 17, Duke 3
Genetics .........Yale 8, Duke 15
NeuroSci ........Yale 2, Duke 16
Pharmacology ..Yale 1, Duke 5
Physiology .......Yale 1, Duke 27

Yale also ranked higher in the social sciences. These numbers are based on somewhat outdated departmental peer assessments. Over time, professors die and money moves around. Duke may have invested heavily in these departments since 1995, though Yale probably has managed to keep up, too.

IBclass06

Cuse, I wouldn't go that far; I'm not sure that's the case. What I would say, however, is that UNC is increasingly winning those cross-admit battles.

Note that this is a big increase over just four years ago.

RonPaul_2012

Wisconsin Madison and Minnesota is common due to the reciprocity agreement between the two states.

Sligh_Anarchist

No one from my NC high school has ever picked UNC over Duke if admitted to both. UNC is a great school, but the statistical differences between a Duke admit and an UNC admit are very large (at my high school). For example, here are the rough stats from my high school:

{All rejected from Duke}

UNC admit #1: SAT = 2010
UNC admit #2: SAT = 1750
UNC admit #3: SAT = 1840
UNC admit #4: SAT = 1850

__________________________

Duke admit #1: SAT = 2300

eatsalot

tk21769, those are graduate rankings, i assume. i was referring to undergraduate.

and after talking to NC duke kids, i believe that unc vs duke is somewhat like berkeley vs stanford for CA kids.

tk21769

>>tk21769, those are graduate rankings, i assume. i was referring to undergraduate.

Understood, but I would think there's some carry-over to undergraduate programs, especially in small to mid-sized private universities. I suppose perception counts for a lot with respect to the topic question but I wonder where the factual basis would be for it.