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<p>Rankings are meaningless to a certain extent, and the average test scores in the engineering school are certainly higher than the average for Cornell as a whole. Not sure who said it was “very liberal,” but it’s not any more liberal than the next school. (For reference, I also lean slightly conservatively). I don’t think there’s a “state school” feel. It’s a midsize university, not “large” with 20k+ students. Class sizes get smaller as you go on, and really there’s no difference between a 40 person lecture or a 1000 person lecture - the only value in smaller classes is when they’re actually small, and you don’t really need that as much for the lower-level courses. The high stress/difficult work is a widely propagated myth; engineering is generally hard, but it won’t be significantly harder here than at Duke.</p>
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<p>There are a ton of study abroad opportunities at both schools. Also, the engineering/economics double major at Cornell can take 4 years if you accelerate it, which several people do.</p>
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<p>The first of those is spurious. As to the second, choose the school you want to go to, not what other people want (assuming your family is willing to pay for it).</p>