<p>If excellent undergrad science-research opportunity is the goal, your son should give Brandeis very serious consideration. As mentioned, if his stats are excellent, he might receive substantial merit aid as well. The Brandeis sciences faculty is excellent and committed to undergraduate education as well as cutting edge research and graduate education. It is the nurturing quality of that faculty and their mentoring that attracted and benefitted Rod MacKinnon, an undergraduate and a classmate of mine at Brandeis in the late 70’s. He returned after medical school to pursue post-doc studies there. In 2003 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Clearly, a nurturing, undergraduate-oriented atmosphere can may make the difference in a student’s future. </p>
<p>On a related note, Edward Witten, the Fields Medal winning Physicist (sometimes called “Einstein’s successor”) was an undergrad at Brandeis as well and went on to take his graduate training at Princeton. Perhaps another example of how a small, nuturing undergraduate program can lead to great success in science.</p>
<p>If you haven’t seen it, you should watch the interview on the Brandeis website with Greg Petsko, Professor of Biochem, who left MIT to come to Brandeis. He discusses his reasons as to why he found Brandeis to be, in his words, “a better place” to teach and for his students to learn. Here’s a link to the “video tour” page which you may need to paste into your browser: [url=<a href=“http://www.brandeis.edu/admissions/videotour/]Tour[/url”>http://www.brandeis.edu/admissions/videotour/]Tour[/url</a>]. Then, you may need to click through to the faculty interviews to find Petsko.</p>