<p>You really can’t go wrong with any of these schools. Not for academics anyway. They are all prestigious schools with robust CS departments. However, the OP says he needs to finalize his QB list by tomorrow (Oct 14). So let’s take his question at face value and help him narrow down the list. He can (and should) re-visit his safety school strategy another time. One way to narrow down is to go by the US News department rankings (which are driven by peer assessment surveys sent to academics in the field). For CS, US News ranks the 6 schools below his “definitely will apply” cut line like so:</p>
<p>Columbia
Penn
Brown
Yale
Northwestern
Chicago</p>
<p>One could make a case that Chicago offers at least as good an overall undergraduate education as any of the others (which to me is more important than marginal differences in the CS department quality) … but the OP asked specifically about CS. So drop Chicago. Department quality aside, one issue that may not work in its favor is internship opportunities. Hyde Park is not ideally located for that (although, hey, location needn’t be a barrier to computing). Just because it’s so darn selective, without a compelling reason to pick it, I’d also drop Yale.</p>
<p>For the 4 remainders, it gets harder to say with a straight face that you should make the decision based on the US News department ranking. Do you like the Open Curriculum concept? If so, apply to Brown. If you prefer the Core Curriculum approach, go with Columbia. Penn and Northwestern are pretty similar schools in some respects, so if you feel a need to pick only one of these (and have no principled basis to choose), flip a coin.</p>