<p>So regarding campus, though I am a student at UChicago and have not visited Columbia, I would vote for UChicago’s campus, personally. From what I know of Columbia, its campus is much like that of UChicago’s. The campuses are both not very big, both urban, both are open to the public etc., but the architecture is what, for me, puts UChicago over. I love Neo-Gothic and so Collegiate Gothic architecture and UChicago does it so well. We have beautiful quads, an incredible reading library that feels like Hogwarts, and nearly all undergrad academic buildings are in this style. Our “student center” called Reynolds Club was built to resemble a tower from a college in Oxford. </p>
<p>In terms of intellectualness, I think UChicago is more abrasively forward about it. People here sometimes fetishize intellect and knowing the most philosophers etc., but mainly the academics are what create the feeling of intellectual might. You get firsthand experience with Nietzsche, Locke, Plato, Aristotle, Dante, Marx, Roussea and a whole slew of others.As others have stated there is a differnce in the Cores of the two schools. </p>
<p>I think the main difference in the “cultures” of the two schools comes from the regional differences, the Ivy League tag that Columbia has, and the types of students each school attracts. I think that Columbia and the top Ivies tend to select and attract the most polished students who know that they are the best. UChicago goes for a more strange sense of success, and this I have felt being here. The school feels like a selective and powerful private college, but I have not seen much of an elitist vibe at all. The students are not begrudging the school’s status as below HYP, but know why UChicago is great without regard to other schools. We will routinely display our affections for this school because of its unique aspects, and ask anyone here if they’d rather be at Harvard, and nearly all students would reply no. Students here are special, but they don’t feel they are above others.</p>