<p>Data for other T14 schools is available as well. But as a prestige whore, you shouldn’t be worrying about schools below HY anyways.</p>
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<p>Last I looked, Washington University is as hard to gain admission to as Northwestern, if not harder. Wesleyan and Northwestern’s stats for 2010 are VERY similar, particularly when one takes into account the fact that Northwestern is a university with more people applying “just because,” attributing to a slightly higher mean SAT. </p>
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<p>I’m confused. Is this because I actually know how to argue or because Wesleyan has a higher acceptance rate into Harvard than Northwestern?</p>
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<p>Pomona’s admission rate is 16% and its mean SAT score 1450. I don’t know Northwestern’s off the top of my head, but I know it’s not nearly that low.</p>
<p>On the contrary, a quick glance at this thread shows several Northwestern students with a reason for bashing Wesleyan. I can only imagine why Northwestern students seem to be the most represented when it comes to insulting other schools, most of which are of similar caliber or, in some cases, better.</p>
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<p>I really hope not for the sake of future students.</p>
<p>The list “undergrad institution represented” shows only number of students attended, nothing about admission rate. You should say higher porportion of Wesleyan grads are at HLS. It can be because of higher acceptance rate or more applicants (proportionally). You can’t be sure. But as you probably already know, LACs tend to have higher proportion of students applying to grad schools.</p>
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<p>Only elsijfdl was bashing Wesleyan in this thread. I actually said it’s inappropriate to call Wesleyan a second-tier school. </p>
<p>brand_182, you are usually pretty cool and level-headed. This is so not your usual self.</p>
<p>You are right. As we do not know the number of applicants from each school, we do not know the actual admission rate, only that a higher percentage of the total student body from Wesleyan is at HLS compared to Northwestern. </p>
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<p>It seemed as if there were more. If not, then I renounce my previous statement and apologize. There are enough Northwestern posters in this thread that I would expect criticism of els’ posts as he is a fellow student. When none occurs and he continues, I feel obligated to say something.</p>
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<p>Unfortunately reading the same dreck post after post can be irritating. I must control myself and not feed the ■■■■■.</p>
<p>Yea, there are quite a few here. But they were arguing for different things. If you reread them, some actually argue for WashU. I guess we like to argue. Hey, NU has won more national champ in debate than any others. ;)</p>
<p>I don’t know if the difference is considerable. I remember they are very close in wsj ranking. Do you have the HLS numbers? I thought NU got decent number like 20 or 22. But anyway, they are both, along with WashU, in the same tier.</p>
<p>I’ve tried to find them but it seems as if HLS has deleted the old page and simply lists the institutions represented, without the number from each. There’s an old thread in the law forum that links to quite a few of the T14 schools and representation by numbers/institution, if I can find it.</p>
<p>I agree that this debate is getting silly. Somehow it transformed from Dartmouth v. WashU to Wesleyan v. Northwestern. I shouldn’t have fallen into the trap as els was able to divert me entirely from the real argument. Misery loves company I guess. Bleh.</p>
<p>oh so you were or were not lying trying in the very act of establishing your schools “right to be elite” that you accused me of. haha.</p>
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<p>bc Northwestern students are too busy accepting six figure job offers to bother paying $80k a year just to hope for that in three years.</p>
<p>or joining top orchestras or walking on to the Washington Post… you do know we have specialty schools right? you know… for people with talents other than making up facts to support a “case.” Just look at Gonzalez. good luck getting disbarred… </p>
<p>that is if you even get you into law school. i recommend not lying on the application to make yourself look better like you just tried to do with wesleyan.</p>
<p>Reading this thread and following its deterioration, I am reluctantly extending it with this post.</p>
<p>Several of the comments made here demonstrate what is often so wrong with CC. Only someone terribly naive could believe there is a way to globally compare colleges in a simplistic US News-like numerical order. These my school is better than your school arguments are nothing less than infantile. In addition, to presume every student poster is a true representative of his/her school is equally naïve.</p>
<p>To address this second point first: elsijfdl is not representative of NU. I cant begin to imagine why any current Northwestern student (or any engaged college student, for that matter) would show more than occasional interest in these boards - certainly not nearly 1,800 posts in one year? Im an alum with strong ties to the school and I find many of his comments offensive.</p>
<p>This brings me back to my first point. As Weskid, unalove and others so well state, its fit that matters and youll have to run those numbers for yourself, and yourself alone median SATs, preference rankings, etc. just dont cut it. There are hoards of Pomona students who believe (some rightly) that they would shrivel and die if denied daily doses of California sunshine. There are hoards of Wesleyan students who see legally turning right at a red light to be the sole redeeming feature in their vision of SoCal as a cultural wasteland (forgive me, Woody, for paraphrasing). Most, at both institutions, couldnt be happier than where theyve found themselves and few would willingly trade places. To follow up another example, Johnwesley, a very knowledgeable and zealous Wesleyan alum, in taking offense at the attack on his alma mater, brings up Northwestern and Chicago. The schools sit at not only Chicago city geographic extremes, but offer campus experiences that are polar opposites. Most Northwestern students would view transferring to UC as favorably as forced exile in Antarctica. Most UC students would view a transfer to NU as akin to spending four years in Siberia.</p>
<p>Finally, for those who have forgotten, bigreddawgie in his/her great wisdom, never expected a simplistic best college response. The original post simply asked What school would you pick and why? The wisdom that is Clifford the Dog.</p>
<p>Is that a published average that you’d like to cite?</p>
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<p>I’m not sure why you feel I am trying to establish my school’s “right to be elite” - whatever that truly means. I’ve never indicated such, but I have realized that to continue to indulge you is to acknowledge that my school actually needs defending. Far be it from me to actually use data to support my case rather than typing “your school sucks and mine is better.” Opinion is the law I guess.</p>
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<p>With grammar like that, you shouldn’t be worried either.</p>
<p>Bala, your post is very wise. Els, you can finish this discussion on your own. I’m bored. You aren’t half the man nspeds was.</p>
<p>Bala: Amen. Great post. I esp. like this statement: “fit that matters and you’ll have to run those numbers for yourself, and yourself alone,” because, it’s, well, universally true. I mean, some people think an important factor in fit is prestige/job placement. Others couldn’t care less, and think location is key. Many think campus culture is the important factor, and I would think most use some combination of those factors (and others) when deciding what the best fit is. But the fact is, people shouldn’t be criticized for choosing a school based on their own factors and perception of “fit,” even if it means they chose the less “prestigious” school (or the school in the middle of nowhere, which I’m sure some would find just as odd an choice )</p>
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And that leaves us Wes film majors in quite a bind! <em>is, in fact, a Wes film major who hopes she can avoid moving to LA, though the smog is a bigger issue than the cultural wasteland-ness</em> </p>
<p>And, back on topic, I still think I’d probably spring for WashU over Dartmouth, but once again, that’s mainly based on location and a perhaps outdated vision of Dartmouth as rather too preppy for my taste.</p>
<p>I know this is out of the loop but here goes. (Hey, I’m in CA; we’re 3 hours behind here.) </p>
<p>K&S:</p>
<pre><code>First, I appreciate that you can state your opinion without vitriol. Now, not that it comes as a big surprise, but I don’t agree with you in post #152. I’m not expecting to win hearts and minds here no matter what I say so I’ll keep it short.
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<p>First, I agree with you that there’s nothing inherently wrong with merit aid. But I disagree that the “fruits” of the policy are tainted. Universities that are not HYPSM,etc. and want to attract top students have tough competition (and understandable preferences) to overcome and hard decisions to make. So merit aid awards, large and small are offered and accepted and the students come to campus. They are there. For the purposes of the USNWR metric they can be counted and I don’t need to “justify” their existence at WU or their impact on the metric. Your disapproval of the policy that got them there does not negate the score. I almost want to highlight that. You assume it’s a given that everyone agrees that merit aid shouldn’t be used to attract top students and therefore something is “artificial” about the student scores used in the metric. I think that’s an opinion, not a fact. I understand that you and others see it differently but in truth, your viewpoint does not cancel out my viewpoint (and those of others not expressed here) in real life. So I will continue to cite that “metric” whenever I think it’s appropriate.</p>
<pre><code> You state that WU’s admission rate is “artificially” lowered and therefore should not be cited as a positive contribution to the ranking scores. Okay by me. The admission rate within the student selectivity rate accounts for 1.5 percent of the overall total of a university’s score on the USNWR ranking. It’s negligible. In fact, that’s why it was demoted in the methodology. The harping on it exhibits an impression of its importance that is outdated and exaggerated.
No matter what “manipulation” or “tricks” — you choose the word — you think is affecting the admission rate, it is not possible for WU to score as well as it does in the overall ranking without being excellent in all the other categories.
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<p>Although anectdotal, some information can be gleaned from the fact that at least one student is transferring from Northwestern to Pomona this year. (Don’t know about the other way around). Pomona is also taking transfers this year from Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Rice, Davidson, Wesleyan, and Vanderbilt, to name a few. Apparently, the “fit” is better at Pomona for some people…</p>
<p>Pomona really is an amazing school with its own feel. To claim, without any evidence, that Northwestern is easily “more desirable” than Pomona shows a flaw in logic. Mere acceptance rate, applications per spot, and the competitiveness of the applicant pool - not to mention how geographically diverse it is - show Pomona to be a very desirable school and perhaps the most desirable liberal arts college at the moment. Who wouldn’t want to study in California with incredibly intelligent students and great career/grad prospects?</p>
<p>True, NU is a better-known school. Big 10 sports can get you far, not to mention a spot near the top of the national universities list - most people don’t even bother to flip the page out to see the top LACs. The same could be said for NU and Amherst/Williams though. Universities will always have a leg up on LACs when it comes to popularity. It all depends on how you define desirability, and then desirability depends on the school. What could be desirable to you may not be desirable to another.</p>
<p>oh, my. I just can’t beleive that this thread has gone on this long. Dartmouth and WashU do NOT belong on the same college list. One is a large LAC, and one is a medium Uni. They are both GREAT schools, but different.</p>
<p>Hey man, when I had narrowed my choices down to a few schools, I had Berkeley and Swarthmore on my list. Other than the liberal slant, that’s about as different as you can get. Trade-offs are terribly hard to stomach, and for me, it was very very hard to say no to all those resources, despite all the talk of beaurocratic red tape.</p>
Hey, NU has won more national champ in debate than any others. ;)</p>
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<em>is, in fact, a Wes film major who hopes she can avoid moving to LA, though the smog is a bigger issue than the cultural wasteland-ness</em> </p>