calmom

I want to add to my last comment that I also agree with you that it does not reflect well on Barnard for a student to claim to go to Columbia, though I see nothing wrong with telling people accurately that the student goes to Barnard College at Columbia, or having a resume reflect that-- there honestly are many people who don't have a clue where or what Barnard is. But Barnard is tough enough to get into these days without anyone having to exaggerate the accomplishment.

I did just check the letterhead of my daughter's admission letter, and it does say:As a parent, I'm delighted to spread the news of my daughter's admission to Barnard, and I am not tempted in the least to call it "Columbia" -- that only will come up if someone asks me where Barnard is, and so far I haven't run into that problem. As noted, my daughter would not have wanted Columbia - for one thing, she was looking for a college where she could pursue her academic studies while at the same time continuing her focus on dance as a nonmajor .... and Columbia doesn't have dance classes, Barnard does.

But it is also true that part of the attraction to Barnard is its association with Columbia, with the shared resources and cross-registration. My daughter wants to pursue studies of slavic languages, and most small LAC's are not able to sustain very strong language departments. The combined resources of Columbia and Barnard are impressive; the presense of the Harriman Institute is one additonal bonus. So it would be equally disingenuous to deny that Columbia matters -- when she looked at the strength of any department, she was looking at the colleges together as a whole. So yes -- she does want both -- not as a "back door" or for prestige value, but simply because she is looking to have the best of both worlds. Barnard seems perfect for her precisely because it does let her have it all.

oldman79

Bravo. I wish I were as articulate as you. As a parent of teenagers and an alum of Columbia College, this discussion was driving me crazy and I couldn't resist responding to Columbia2002. Bravo!

yellowhair

Is Barnard College like a Extension school at Harvard ? Harvard University has two undergrad school, Harvard College & Harvard Extension. They both award bachelor's degree. Many Harvard extension school students say Harvard Extension is same as Harvard College and they proudly say that they are undergraduate student at Harvard ( conveniently eliminating the word "Extension").

I guess Harvard College-Extension relationship is like Columbia-Barnard relationship... It looks like Barnard people are trying everything they can to find an excuse to claim that they are part of Columbia and skip the word "Barnard"

Barnard students are ashamed of being Barnard student ?. It that why they are trying to hide the word 'Barnard" from their record as much as possible ?

calmom

No, Barnard college is not like Harvard extension. Harvard extension offers a degree completion program for working adults; admission is open to anyone who applies; and while there are some courses in common and many extension courses are taught by regular Harvard faculty, I do not believe that extension enrollment entitles students to take the full range of Harvard courses.

Barnard is an extremely selective women's college -- in fact it is the hardest women's college to get into in the U.S., tougher even than Wellesley. This year they accepted 22% of their RD applicants. It is one of the seven sisters, which is what the very top women's colleges were called back in the days when most of the Ivies were male only. If it is "like" anything then it is probably something like the relationship that Bryn Mawr has with Haverford, or that Smith & Mt. Holyoke have with Amherst, except that it is an even closer relationship. It is very much "like" the relationship that Radcliffe had with Harvard back when Harvard was male-only, or that Tulane had with Sophie Newcomb before the flood. But when Harvard went co-ed it merged with Radcliffe.

Columbia was the very last Ivy to go co-ed, and it wanted to merge with Barnard. Far from thinking that Barnard was second-rate, the Columbia administration was worried that its own prestige was sinking fast when they were male only, because they had become the least selective of all the Ivies simply because their applicant pool did not include women. Barnard & Columbia entered into negotiations to merge, but they couldn't agree on terms, because Barnard wanted to keep its differing approach to curriculum and also wanted to keep control over the tenure of its faculty. So when it was clear that the two schools couldn't agree, Columbia decided to start admitting women on its own in 1983. This left two separate undergraduate colleges on essentially the same campus, sharing resources but offering distinctly different academic programs -- kind of "like" the relationship that Scripps has to the other 4 Claremont colleges.

Barnard students can enroll in any course at Columbia, except that Columbia students have first priority for any core courses, since only the Columbia students need those course to graduate. Columbia students can enroll in any course at Barnard, except for Barnard's first year seminar & writing courses, which are an integral part of the Barnard freshman year program. The registration system is combined -- that is, there are no special forms or papers to fill out, the student just signs up for all the courses at once and some may happen to be Barnard courses, some may happen to be Columbia.

The course sequence and numbering scheme is co-ordinated, so it really isn't easy to tell which course is where when looking at a list -- I don't know whether the college transcript would reflect that, either, or merely lists the course title and numerical sequence. That is, Columbia lists a course called Anthropology 1002. The Interpretation of Culture, with Paige West as one of its instructors. Barnard has the same course: Anthropology 1002. The Interpretation of Culture. Paige West is listed as being on the faculty of Columbia's anthropology department, and is also listed on the faculty at Barnard. If a student at either collge wanted to major in anthropology and wanted to take that course and there were two sections offered, the student would probably pick whichever section was offered at the more convenient time for their schedule - or perhaps if one class was full, choose the one that wasn't.

Now the funny thing is that I decided to also give you a list of some famous Barnard alumni, but when I Googled that phrase I found lists of famous Columbia alumni, and appears that Columbia grads are trying to claim Anna Quindlen and Zora Neale Hurston as one of their own; see:
http://www.drownout.com/columbia-alumni/
So I guess Barnard grads aren't the only ones who are sometimes content to let the distinction be blurred somewhat.

oldman79

Continuing this thread. There are 4 undergraduate divisions at Columbia University - Columbia College, Columbia School of Enginnerring and Applied Science (SEAS), Barnard College and Columbia School of General Studies (GS). GS is more like the extension division although they also have an impressive alumni list. All of the courses offered by the 4 divisions are open to all. For example, GS classes (which generally have the same professors) are generally in the evenings. When I was an undergrad there, I didn't like morning classes and preferred evening classes, so I took mostly the same courses, only at night (technically GS classes). One of the reasons, I feel that the campus is not that cohesive, is the mix where GS students where in some of my day classes and "young" undergrads in GS classes at night.
Also, as I mentioned earlier in this thread, and to correct CalMom, some Columbia College majors are wholly contained at Barnard. Columbia College does have a Dance major and a Theater Arts major, but these majors are completely housed at Barnard. I was a music major at Columbia and there was only one department, at Columbia, and so my requirements were the same for both Barnard and Columbia (and GS) and we all had the same classes. In this case, other than the core, the courses that I took were identical to what a Barnard student would take.
The problem with what is being stated on this thread is the word Columbia without specifically referring to the College, SEAS, Barnard or GS. Each school has different strengths and weaknesses. Each appeals to a different constituency.
In my current professional life, I know many Harvard and Columbia alums who are first rate and successfull. And I know many how are not. The same goes with graduates of less prestigious state schools. In another thread, there was a discussion about the tightness of alumni networks at various schools and the lack of such networks at Columbia. At least from my view, its what you have achieved that is important, and where you went to school is not important at all. I think this value is more important at columbia than some of the more prestigious schools.

lewisloftus

Hehe, that's quite funny. I guess both schools like to claim affiliation with the other when it suits their purposes...

By the way, Barnard's RD acceptance rate is similar to Columbia SEAS's.

crazyapp2010

Hey, anyone seen Columbia2002? LOL.

calmom

So does that make SEAS a "back door" into Columbia?


The bottom line is that they are all great colleges and any student should be proud to attend any one. Each college strengthens the others because of the constituency it attracts.

I was aware that Columbia does offer dance & theater majors that are contained within Barnard, just didn't want to make my other post any longer than it already was. However, I don't think it would make much sense for a woman who wanted to major in dance to apply to Columbia - simply because if that is the primary focus, Barnard would be more convenient, especially for a first year student. (Why live far from all your classes when you can live close by?) Obviously a man who wants to major in dance would need to do it via Columbia -- though the guys with a serious interest in pursuing dance as a career might be more prone to audition for the awesome dance programs at Julliard, Fordham and/or Tisch and feel rather let down by a Columbia admissions. [In the dance world, "prestige" is defined on a different scale -- and I've known some 18 year old ballet dancers who were delighted at the opportunity to apprentice with ABT and skip college entirely.]

On the other hand, the Barnard dance program via Columbia is a great option for both male & female students who, like my daughter, don't want to major in dance but do want the opportunity to continue with some dance courses along the way.

blah1111

as playful as that comment was, let's try not to start another antagonistic thread of posts about SEAS.

Shraf

alright let me try to correct some misconceptions here:

absolutely wrong....all barnard classes start with BC, columbia college classes start with C and engineering classes start with E while GS classes start with F....(ex: BC1002, C1002, E1001, F2005)....and transcripts absolutely reflect that (thats y, for example it is usually not advisable for a columbia premed to take barnard biology...which is much easier)

not ALL courses r open to barnard girls

wrong, the registration systems are completely separate though you could register for classes at the other school, but the SYSTEM is completely separate.

wrong...there are three divisions....college, SEAS and GS. Barnard is another college, just like colgate, upenn, stony brook, bob jones or any of the 3000 other colleges in the US. Some colleges just have agreements of taking classes on each other's campuses or allowing students to participate in study abroad (like columbia's agreement with NYU)....that doesnt make NYU a division of columbia.

wrong. but it is especially wrong when it comes to engineering courses who are usually only open to engineers and sometimes college students and are NEVER open to barnard girls.

yes the percentage might be close but SEAS avg SATs and avg GPA is much much higher.

absolutely not....i hope you r joking....SEAS is harder than CC...i dare u to argue

have u heard of the new barnard dorm on 110th and cathedral....thats farther from barnard than any columbia dorm....so thats quite an invalid point and a bad reason to chose to go to a worst college

yellowhair

It looks like Barnard is not really part of Columbia...

Is it like University of California,Berkeley vs University of California, Irvine ?
They are both University of California system but two different school...

It is like I graduated from University of California... without mentioning which campus

Shraf

no, thats not the same thing at all.....

University of California = State University of New York (SUNY)

those are similar systems....columbia is one private university and barnard is another...they just happen to have an agreement because they are close....just like (another example) barnard has an agreement with the manhattan school of music so they can house barnard girls there...doesnt make them the same school.

garland

OLdman--I have nothing but respect for Barnard, and some of the best classes my S has taken have been there. But just for accuracy, the front page of CU's website says they have three UG colleges--CC, SEAS, and SGS. Barnard is listed with several other "affiliated" schools in another place. I am pretty sure both schools want it that way--my take is that BArnard prides itself for its independence as a separate entity. Two great schools--lucky to have each others' resources!

collegeisfun

So shraf...How about a Barnard girl that takes all her premed courses at Columbia?....How do the med schools look at her?....Now lets compare her to a Columbia girl that takes all her premed classes at Barnard? Give me a break!!! This conversation is getting so old...The fact that Columbia takes credit for notable BARNARD grads is proof enough for me that this entire conversation is a waste of time and energy and this conflict is just in the minds of some people that have nothing to do but post ridiculous posts on this forum. Do I sense some Columbia Grads that are feeling threatened here!!!!

And btw some departments....are joint between the two schools....What does that tell you? Yes, they are seperate schools that BOTH benefit a great deal from this arrangement...

crazyapp2010

Shraf: have u heard of the new barnard dorm on 110th and cathedral....thats farther from barnard than any columbia dorm....so thats quite an invalid point and a bad reason to chose to go to a worst college

Why don't you learn when to use "worse" and "worst" and stop insulting Barnard you TURD.