<p>I’m just glad the VERD schools (Vandy, Emory, Rice and Duke) are FINALLY getting the overlooked attention they oh-so-deserve. ;)</p>
<p>Missouri was a slave state but did not secede.</p>
<p>^^Yes. Missouri was a typical Border State in the Civil War - A slave state that did not formally secede but had very divided loyalties. It sent large numbers of men to both the Union and Confederate armies, with the Conferates getting a little more than half of the Missouri men who enlisted.</p>
<p>Today it sorta has a similar postion - straddling both worlds. Culturally smilar to the Midwest in many ways and also similar to the South in many ways.</p>
<p>In answer to some prior posts:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The schools chosen for comparison with the non-HYP Ivies are all southern. That is why others like Wash U, Northwestern, Johns Hopkins, etc. were not included. The South frequently gets lower consideration (or worse such as in # 20) than other areas of the USA and one of my hopes is to inform on the highest quality colleges there, all of which merit the consideration of the nation’s top high school students. </p></li>
<li><p>I’m not presenting this as a ranking and the comparison is REVD and the non-HYP Ivies. The reality is that any of these schools would be an exceptional college choice and distinguishing them based on some ordinal rank would IMO be…stupid. Don’t focus on rankings. Focus on data that’s important to you and compare. You might learn something that could challenge or even change some preconceived notions.</p></li>
<li><p>Not all schools provide Common Data Sets or wholly transparent data (Duke, Columbia). If somebody wants to fill in, please do so and please try to make the comparisons apples and apples. </p></li>
<li><p>If anybody has any comparisons of these 9 schools that they would like to share, please post.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>As the financial aspects of these colleges have been mentioned several times, following is a comparison of the numbers and percentages of students who are receiving need-based financial aid. This might help answer some questions about the relative wealth and socio-economic status of students attending these colleges. Data is from collegeboard.com.</p>
<h1>of students offered need-based aid , FTFY Students , % on FA , College</h1>
<p>637 , 1493 , 43% , Brown
1647 , 3181 , 52% , Cornell
774 , 1419 , 55% , Columbia
535 , 1094 , 49% , Dartmouth
1031 , 2404 , 43% , U Penn</p>
<p>370 , 894 , 41% , Rice
na , 1308 , na , Emory
740 , 1599 , 46% , Vanderbilt
na , 1724 , na , Duke</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Nonsense. Of course you are presenting a comparison. It’s explicitly stated as such in the very title of the thread. And you go on to present all sorts of side-by-side comparison data.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>My point exactly. You can’t say that avg. indebtedness is an apples-to-apples comparison between schools. I mean there are a whole myriad of variables that you have to consider before a decent comparison can be made. Variables like the wealth of the student body, cost of living, outside scholarships, housing policies, students home proximity to campus, percentage of students doing study abroad, etc…</p>
<p>coureur,
Perhaps I didn’t write it clearly. I’m not seeking to rank these nine schools against one another or any other school. I don’t expect anyone to walk away from this thread saying that College A should be ranked ahead of College B. From what I have gleaned from the data, the differences are razor thin and any “ranking” could be legitimate. </p>
<p>However, you are right that I am posting data comparing these nine schools to one another. That’s the point–to compare and to learn, both about the REVD schools and the non-HYP Ivies.</p>
<p>^Hawkette, I went through all of your college comparisons threads which have a huge wealth of data (thanks for putting them together btw). As a point of reference Columbia happened to beat Emory (for example) on every single of 20 or so metrics apart from % of classes over 50 which was 7% vs. 8.4%. In some cases the difference was small but in some cases the difference was substantial. Now I don’t mean to pick on Emory or glorify Columbia, but I’m pointing out that Columbia fares much better on those metrics relative to HYP than Emory does relative to Columbia, so you can say Emory = Columbia as long as you also say that Columbia = HYP, which makes it silly that you’ve picked only the non-hyp ivies to compare REVD to. </p>
<p>I think the conclusion most people are going to reach from your data (or perhaps should reach) is that Duke is in most ways comparable to Penn, Columbia or other non-HYP ivies, but E and V are not. Rice as we know does well on small classes and financial aid. One would also reach the conclusion that Duke is better than E & V so clubbing them together makes little sense. I’m not saying this to reinforce some stereotype, I’m saying this after going through much of your data on the college comparison threads, I too am a big believer in having data guide conclusions.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>well in that case name me one metric which is an apples to apples to comparison between schools. From % of high schoolers in the top 10% of their class, to % of classes smaller than 20 to average SAT scores to acceptance rate, every single comparison can be painted as apples to oranges with a myriad of confounding variables. Unless you can explain some bias all we’ve got are these metrics, so either you make no conclusions, or you make conclusions which make sense but you cannot prove beyond all doubt. You have also yet to explain a bias with average indebtedness that favors certain schools.</p>
<p>^^Totally agree. A sneaky way for hawkette to make Duke look like it should be among the HYPSM elite instead of all the other ivy league schools of which is it better matched.</p>
<p>concoll,
Let the data come out first and then I’ll let the reader draw their conclusions. Btw, my read is different from yours.</p>
<p>rjk,
I have not mentioned HYPSM once in this thread nor posted any of their data. Not sure how you can draw the conclusion that you have. </p>
<p>Just read and compare and digest.</p>
<p>^^I agree with your agreement</p>
<p>"And what does Lawrence, KS have to do with St. Louis? "
My comment was about Missouri, not St. Louis specifically.
[Lawrence</a> Massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Massacre]Lawrence”>Lawrence Massacre - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>The vestigial collective memory lingers on, thankfully in the benign form of the MU-KU rivalry. </p>
<p>For more opinions:</p>
<p>[Is</a> Missouri a Southern State? Dixie Dining](<a href=“Private Site”>Private Site)
[Missouri…Southern</a> or Midwestern? (Kansas City, St. Louis: house, school, median income) - (MO) - City-Data Forum](<a href=“http://www.city-data.com/forum/missouri/88300-missouri-southern-midwestern.html]Missouri...Southern”>Missouri...Southern or Midwestern? (Kansas City, St. Louis: house, school, median income) - (MO) - City-Data Forum)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yes, it’s been so very hard to compare top 25 schools before this thread. Apparently the point of this thread was to introduce the acronym VERD. Heck, if it makes sense that VERD have a life of its own so be it. VERD is the word.</p>
<p>confidentialcoll: So basically you’re acknowledging that I’m correct in concluding that avg. indebtedness is not an apples-to-apples comparison, right?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yeah, which is kind of why it’s pointless to bicker for countless pages over which school is “better.”</p>
<p>It’s not pointless when it’s an accepted fact by almost everyone that Duke + non HYP ivies are better then Rice, Emory, and Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>But the differences between all of these schools are still differences that are very much on-the-margin and razor-thin, and are outweighed by personal fit and preference (and financial considerations, if relevant). Really, anyone who is deciding between any of these schools who points to the rankings as justification is goofy. None of these schools have magical powers to anoint someone Successful For Life; only the individual can do that. I would advise anyone choosing between ANY of these schools to do so based on personal fit and preference (assuming there were no financial considerations), and I wouldn’t want to be one of those tools who crows about “but this one is #8 and that one is #18” because that’s irrelevant when you’re talking about schools that are all the cream of the crop.</p>
<p>Buddy,
Re your statement,</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>you’re my target audience. </p>
<p>Read the data. Compare the data. Digest the data. Think about the differences. Then draw your conclusion. It may be what you’ve stated above….but maybe it’s not.</p>
<p>Btw, one’s school’s greater ability to place into investment banking does not mean it’s a better school or that the student body is better qualified. I know that lots of northeastern types classify schools in such a manner. Un-uh…there is a big world out there and there are lots of smart folks in it.</p>
<p>Let’s look at some Retention & Graduation Data. Here’s how the REVD schools and non-HYP Ivies compare:</p>
<pre><code> Freshmen Retention , College
97% , Brown
96% , Cornell
99% , Columbia
98% , Dartmouth
98% , U Penn
97% , Rice
96% , Emory
96% , Vanderbilt
97% , Duke
</code></pre>
<p>4-year Grad Rate , 6-Year , College</p>
<p>84% , 93% , Brown
87% , 91% , Cornell
87% , 93% , Columbia
86% , 93% , Dartmouth
88% , 94% , U Penn</p>
<p>82% , 92% , Rice
82% , 95% , Emory
84% , 90% , Vanderbilt
88% , 94% , Duke</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>well people make these judgments (and sometimes need to) all the time. I contend it’s better to make the judgment based on raw data rather than feeling or stereotype. A judgment like which college is likely to provide better FA is an incredibly important one to make for a low income/middle class high school applicant. Thus for any metric you can come up with one can find confounding variables. But I can’t find a better metric than average indebtedness to judge a school’s FA program.</p>
<p>btw you have still yet to:</p>
<p>a) find a relevant metric which is perfectly apples to apples (it’s fine if you consider this a futile search)</p>
<p>b) explain a bias prevalent in average indebtedness</p>