Emory vs. Northwestern

bernie12
Sat, 09 Apr 2011 02:27:35 +0000

Your mom is probably just going w/prestige and rank which is fair. However, the two are actually very different and you probably have reason to prefer Emory because you recognize this. Perhaps our interdisciplinary approach/depts. were more relevant to you.
Most of those examples that Sam cites are in science and engineering which we don’t even have (as in engineering), so it isn’t fair to compare there. We also don’t have a “top” music school/program (though it is really good for its kind). And a lot of my pre-med/pre-engineering (they are doing the 3/2 program with Tech) are music majors and love it. And even then, one should probably look into places like Georgia Tech for that stuff if they really want it. Both are actually excellent with the interdisciplinary areas based upon what Sam describes (and other things I’ve seen). Our strengths (as in cross-disciplinary) just manifest themselves in different areas throughout the science. We have the huge neuroscience, psyche, biology, anthropology, environmental, global health, etc. intermixing. And then Emory seems to be trying to add more integration of the liberal arts type teaching and issues into the sciences, which why we have the center for ethics and similar outlets. Basically doing science at Emory will not alienate you from non-science folks. They are trying hard to develop a legit intellectual community and curriculum the results in intermingling of two communities that would generally be so separate at most schools. In this sense, not having engineering is beneficial I guess. It seems as if having one would lead to nearly irreparable polarization of the natural/hard sciences and the social sciences. The number of people double majoring here is also crazy (but often it is two completely different majors).

Basically Emory has developed an interesting approach to interdisciplinary studies/depts that indicates its desire to maintain its liberal arts core.

As for Silo at NU, not sure about that. Normally places like Harvard are known (or cited) for high polarization between depts/schools, but I don’t know how much of it is hyberbole.