<p>Guys, I actually think there is a very good reason for the Pentagon to prefer MIT over Caltech today, and it has nothing to do with population bias or marketing or whatnot. Whatever you might think of the quality of the science at MIT vs. the sciences at Caltech, I think one thing is quite clear - MIT’s engineering programs, particularly its graduate-level engineering programs are, overall, better and more extensive than Caltech’s. That’s not to say that Caltech’s engineering program is bad - on the contrary, it’s one of the elite. However, I think even most Caltech people would concede that MIT’s engineering is probably better. And the DoD tends to be at least as interested in engineering than in science, if not more so. Let’s face it. MIT is more of an engineering school than a science school, whereas the opposite is true of Caltech. </p>
<p>However, it is an open question as to whether MIT became a strong engineering school because of the DoD, or whether MIT was already a strong engineering school, and that’s why the DoD preferred MIT. I suspect it’s a bit of both.</p>
<p>IMO, MIT’s engineering programs, including its graduate programs, are not better than Caltech, but they’re more extensive as you said. For a specific research in engineering, they both have similar strength, however, in MIT, the researches available in engineering are numerous, where in Caltech, they’re pretty limited only to a few. </p>
<p>When Caltech’s reputation was ahead MIT’s, did it include the reputation of its engineering program as well ?</p>
<p>I think back in the old days, engineering wasn’t really seen as an ‘important’ thing to study. Back in those days, all the prestige was in pure science, and engineers were basically seen as a bunch of glorified handymen. It took WW2 and the Cold War defense buildup to change people’s perspectives about how important engineering really is. </p>
<p>As far as my previous statement in which I said that MIT’s engineering, particularly at the graduate level, seems to be, on the aggregate, better than Caltech’s, I would appeal to the NRC study of 1995 as well as pop-rankings like the USNews graduate-school listing, Gourman Report. Especially the NRC Study. Forget about the engineering disciplines in which Caltech does not compete, let’s just talk about the ones that it does compete, and you will notice that while Caltech’s engineering departments always rank highly, MIT’s rank even more highly. In particular, of the ‘4 horsemen’ of well-established engineering disciplines - electrical, chemical, mechanical, and civil - MIT beats Caltech every time. Caltech does well in all 4, but MIT does better. </p>
<p>Now this is nothing for Caltech to be ashamed of. MIT is, after all, has chosen engineering as its major core competency, just like Caltech has chosen things like astrophysics and geology as its core competency. I don’t think anybody at MIT would seriously claim to have a better geology department than Caltech does. We just have to recognize that MIT is better at certain things, whereas Caltech is better at other things. I see nothing wrong with that. However, as a whole, it does seem to be true that MIT does have a better brand-name which cannot be explained away by simply saying that they are the older and better-established school.</p>
<p>Oh, don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean Caltech is ‘equal’ to MIT in engineering. What I mean is that when we compare both school in a particular dept, let’s say electrical engineering, MIT is always more extensive than Caltech. As you perhaps know, in electrical engineering dept. itself, there’re various researches with different specialities. My previous post stated that while for a specific research they share in common they have similar strength, MIT has much more research and specialization, even when we count only electrical engineering. To put it bluntly, in EE, Caltech has only about 11 professors while MIT has about, ehmm so many (more than 40). The NRC report in fact takes the average performance in each dept, e.g. electrical engineering, to make a ranking list in the corresponding dept. </p>
<p>On the other hand I agree with you that MIT is more engineering where Caltech is more science.</p>
<p>rtkysg, I was just joking. I dont even know what you look like! I was just generalizing because of what Caltech girls usually look like. I wore a UCLA sweatshirt at Caltech and all 3 girls in the shcool wouldnt stop following me around. I didnt even feel like a stud. I fealt like I was being chased by hippos in heat.</p>
<p>Actually, my tourguide at Caltech was nothing like you would expect a Caltech girl to look like. She looked more than decent. </p>
<p>I am just playing around. Sorry if I really insulted you.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, this girl sure was promotional material. Perhaps she was a phony. After all, she is the one who said that Caltech students are allowed to take classes at PCC for credit.</p>
<p>Harvey Mudd > Caltech any day =). It’s about the same size but you’re really part of the entire Claremont Colleges making it like 7000 students or so. Pshh far better environment. Hey Pasadena may be quiet, but Claremont is far sexier.</p>
<p>Remember that Caltech had more patents than MIT in 2004. The Daily Cal reported that UCs had over 400 patents (of course this is an unfair comparison of ALL UCs vs other single campuses… then again I bet like half of them came from Cal alone).</p>
<p>Well, actually, if we really want to talk about UC patents and where they come from then I think we have to acknowledge that while Cal is obviously an important contributor within the UC system, arguably the most important contributor is actually UCSF. </p>
<p>Consider the following quotes:</p>
<p>"UCSF holds more than 500 patents, including five of the University of California system’s top 11 revenue producers – hepatitis B vaccine, human growth hormone, a cochlear implant helping deaf people hear, a technique for delivering medicines into the body’s cells and a form of recombinant DNA used for the production of therapeutic agents. </p>
<p>UCSF’s patents generated $434 million in the past five years – 76 percent of the revenue from all patents in the UC system in the same period."</p>
<p>Hence, while I don’t know if it is true or not, it seems to me that it’s too strong to say that half of all patents in the UC system in one year came from Cal alone, because of the presence of UCSF in the UC system.</p>