<p>I can try to answer some of your questions as a first year student.</p>
<p>1) Duke students are generally pretty happy but everyone can seem really perfect in comparison to you so sometimes that can get depressing (as I would imagine at other schools). The balance of the school however, seems to have people up in high spirits (athletics, academics, social scene). Duke and Dartmouth are probably equal in this regard while Cornell is known to be more depressing.</p>
<p>2) Duke probably beats out both in prestige and definitely in most placement areas. Duke was ranked #6 I believe in the feeder rankings to top law, medical, and business schools, above the other 2. Of course some areas are better at one like engineering at Cornell (except for BME since BME at Duke is #2 in the country), or similar like wall street placement (similar at duke and dartmouth).</p>
<p>3) Duke has a pretty nice balance in that sports are dominant, but so is Greek life. What separates Duke may be that the social scene does not revolve around Greek life (there are SLGs which act like “houses” which many people opt for) and then of course there is shooters the local “club” that everyone goes to on wednesday and saturday night.
Dartmouth greek life is the end all be all from what ive heard while cornell greek life is similar to duke’s.</p>
<p>4) The vibe I have gotten at duke is that everyone is really excited to be here. Everyone is always wearing duke apparel unlike at some schools. Duke so far has also been extremely collaborative. I have never noticed people not wanting to study together or help someone else out because the class is curved. Cornell is known to be more cutthroat while I am unsure of Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Duke is definitely very community oriented and you feel it. The big difference I have noticed between Duke and other schools is the balance. The only other school that really has it all (Academics, social scene, and athletics) is Stanford. </p>
<p>It might also help knowing what field you want to go into/major in to give you a more accurate description of the school for you.</p>