<p>To begin, @Barbiegil127975, all three universities are outstanding and – for essentially all undergraduates – they will provide superb academic and non-academic opportunities that will likely enhance your life greatly, truly forever. I could elaborate in this vein forever, but you surely understand. While one could look at U S New’s latest assessment (or many others . . . and I place little confidence in any single evaluation and in any single year), which places Duke ahead of both Dartmouth and Cornell, the differences are minute and will be inapplicable to virtually all undergraduates.</p>
<p>What is not insignificant, however, is YOUR potential “cultural fit” with these three excellent institutions. To illustrate:
- Duke is located in a small, increasingly wonderful city, but both Dartmouth and Cornell are far “in the woods.”
- Cornell is comparatively huge, Duke is a smaller university (~6500 undergraduates), while Dartmouth (despite some excellent graduate and professional schools) really is an “Ivy LAC.”
- The social scenes at all three universities have some similarities and some possibly important differences, as does the “spirit” evident on the three campuses.</p>
<p>The foregoing list is obviously abbreviated; my goal is simply to highlight that major “cultural fit” difference exist between these three first-tier universities. Clearly, that drives a vital question: where would YOUR individual “fit” be best? Only you can answer this key question, and I respectfully suggest that may well be a more-critical decision parameter than endlessly attempting to distinguish these schools based strictly on academics, prestige, etc.</p>