theSATmaster

How would you rank the ivy league in order of difficulty?
My question deals with undergrad, and doesn't have to do with admissions for students, but for current students (in terms of how hard it is to get a good GPA,course rigor, etc.)

goldhamster

personally know someone who went to both penn and harvard. he said penn classes are tougher... you would need more ivy-to-ivy transfer students' input to make an accurate list...

Rister_Chutophs

it always depends on the major i'd say.

cornell is known as the hardest ivy to graduate.
also princeton is pretty tough in terms of grading because professors have to use a curve (i've heard?).

rumor has it that 90% of all harvard kids graduate with honors and i don't think that brown is very hard either (compared to the other ivies)

dufay

Brown has an open curriculum, and classes can be taken pass/fail. This is in contrast to Penn, in which there are many distribution requirements, and the classes MUST be taken for a grade. Having done interviews for med school (as the interviewer), this stands out.

dcircle

having also done interviews for med school (as the interviewer), brown students are among the most highly regarded because they design their own curriculum and tend to be memorably unique and original.

it's certainly not the case that an A in organic chemistry from brown is weighted differently from an A in the equivalent class at princeton.

it is the case though that a B in organic chemistry at a school like MIT is cut more slack.

wolfmanjack

the open curric and pass/fail options may make Brown less stressful but I wouldn't say the classes are easier because of it.

innervisions

Brown isn't easier in general, it just can be easier to graduate from.

padfoot

I know my anecdotes are data, but hey this whole thread is anecdotal:

In reference to two that I have the most friends at, I hear that Harvard is not too difficult and Princeton is VERY difficult.

legendofmax

Princeton is difficult, Penn is difficult, Harvard seems overrated, dunno bout the others much