Has Harvard losses its appeal to Stanford?

College Search & Lists
21

Stanford isn’t any less liberal arts focused than Harvard - they’re both liberal arts universities. Stanford has top 10 programs in history, psychology, anthropology, French language and literature, Spanish language and literature, English literature, religious studies, classics, sociology, linguistics, economics, political science and philosophy. And they have a heavy emphasis on combining tech and sscience with the humanities and social science - they have several CS+ joint majors; you can do a joint major in CS and Slavic languages and literatures, Italian, linguistics, music, philosophy, French, English, German, history, and classics. It’s just a well-rounded, excellent world-class university all around (just like Harvard).

In one of my fields (psychology), Harvard and Stanford are about neck-and-neck - but I perceive Stanford as better for my subfield and specific research interests. Stanford doesn’t have public health and Harvard is a top 5 program in that field, so it’s better for that by default.

As an undergrad in 2004, I probably would’ve chosen Harvard just by dint of familiarity. But if I had to choose knowing what I know now, I’d choose Stanford - because of my interests in statistics and data science, their major in science, technology, and society, the major in comparative studies in race and ethnicity, Greek life (not recognized at Harvard), and the warmer weather at Stanford - but they also have a Japanese major and a creative writing major, both of which appeal to the 17-year-old me.

College Board data suggests that yield at Harvard is about 85%, and yield at Stanford is about 78%.

22

ewho says: “I don’t know where you got those data. None of them are true except Harvard’s yield is about 81%.”

You can look up yield data… Harvard is usually over 80% and Stanford is usually in the mid-70’s. As for cross-admit data, ask your son about his company’s search tool and google it ;). In cross-admit battles, students accepted to both Harvard and Stanford choose Harvard nearly 2-1. Those accepted to both Yale and Stanford split 50-50. Stanford beats Princeton 7-3, and Stanford beats MIT 2-1. There was an economics research paper on the subject (called “revealed preference ranking”) by Caroline Hoxby (curiously enough, formerly a professor at Harvard, but now at Stanford). There is a website (rhymes with smarchment) that has more up-to-date data. Honestly though, none of this should be taken so seriously…

Does that mean Harvard is better than Stanford? Absolutely not! For engineering, a student should definitely choose Stanford over Harvard. In all other areas, Stanford and Harvard are equals. I have known students who have turned down Harvard to go to Stanford and vice versa. Quality and prestige wise, they are equals. In some fields, Stanford is superior… in other, Harvard is.

In the grand scheme of things, the quality of the UNDERGRAD education is pretty similar at any school in the top 50 or even 100. For many students, smaller LACs would provide a better fit for their learning styles and helping them reach their potential.

23

I believe that never in history has Harvard had a yield of 85%. For last year, Harvard had an 82.4% and Stanford had a 78.6%, though the official numbers could be off a little bit but not by much.

24

Harvard’s largest yield in modern times was just over 83% for the class of 1973. It has fluctuated within a fairly narrow range from the high 70’s to the low 80’s.

25

If you google it, 99% of data/reports shown are either from Stanford reports or from me, and I am truly not aware of anything you mentioned.

26

It kind of just points out how silly the idea of ranking an entire university is. Or at least, of putting a lot of stock into whether this school is #1 vs. #5 vs. #10.

27

Have your son teach you how to use Google then :wink: Search for “A Revealed Preference Ranking of U.S. Colleges & Universities” by Avery, Glickman, Hoxby & Metrick. They lay out the methodology. The data is about 10 years old… but there is another website (rhymes with smarchment) that has more up-to-date cross-admit data. They have a tool for which you can compare any two colleges (college matchup) and they will tell you how students admitted to both choose.

But seriously, it seems like you are getting mad and taking this waaaaaaaay too seriously… almost like you are getting offended. Geta grip. Harvard and Stanford are equals… feel better?

28

Glancing over the the Common Data Sets, some differences:

Biology – Harvard produces 3 times as many majors (15% vs. ~5%)
Social sciences excluding psychology – Harvard produces twice as many majors (33% vs. 14.5%)

Engineering – Stanford produces 5 times as many majors (~20% vs. 4%)
Computer science – Stanford produces 4 times as many majors (12% vs 3%)

The two are roughly on par in the production of humanities majors (12% at Harvard, 10% at Stanford) and arts majors (3% at Harvard, 2% at Stanford). Harvard produces slightly more math and physical sciences majors (13% at Harvard, 9% at Stanford). The percentages of psych majors 6% at Harvard, 3% at Stanford) are too small to say anything.

29

No, I am not mad. I have seen this a lot. I just want to see how statements are reflected in one’s education.

30

https://stanford.app.box.com/s/y4abufqg66nte7uax6eq

This seems more trustworthy than Parchment.

Yale-Stanford was about 50:50 for a few years before the 2013 cycle though.

31

Exodius, very interesting data! I note a big change from 2012 to 2013… I wonder what Stanford did to increase their yield… as I said above, Harvard was beating Stanford 2-1 and Yale vs. Stanford was 50-50, and Stanford vs. Princeton was 7-3… but then something changed in 2013… Harvard still beats Stanford, but closer 6-4, Yale vs. Stanford is now 6-4 in Stanford’s favor, and Stanford is crushing Princeton 3-1.

What is interesting is The Ivy League yields are ALSO increasing… so I think this must mean the pool of overlap admits is drastically diminishing… which makes sense… with acceptance rates so low, very few students are being admitted to more than just a few of the elite schools.

O, and I completely agree this is more trustworthy than smarchment… but most schools do not reveal this data publicly, and smarchment is the only place to get it all in one place, albeit not as necessarily representative.

32

@warblersrule - The number of majors (or proportion) at a particular university doesn’t necessarily reflect the university’s priorities or strengths; it just reflects the preferences and interests of the undergraduate student body. My comment was in response to someone who implied that Harvard was more liberal arts focused (which, on CC, could either mean more focused on a well-rounded liberal arts and sciences education or could mean more focused on the humanities and social sciences) while Stanford was more focused on technology/CS, engineering, and entrepreneurship.

But Stanford, as a whole university, has serious strengths in the humanities, social sciences, and life sciences in addition to their strengths in engineering and computer science (and business). The important part is the whole university - because there are actually more graduate students at Stanford than there are undergraduates, and the research and scholarship of the professors also helps determine the university’s strong areas. Case in point - the rankings I was referring to are the National Research Council’s rankings of the doctoral programs in those fields. A particular university might have a small department, but that doesn’t mean that it’s weaker or even that the university doesn’t have a strength in that area. It just means that computer science and engineering are more popular than the social sciences at Stanford, but not necessarily that the university is focused that way.

33

@Exodius:

Each school has a list of admitted and a list of enrolled. So, theoretically to get the exact cross-admit numbers instead of abusing stats like what Parchment does to figure out, all the schools have to do is to exchange those two lists in October, or prior to that when they know for sure. I remembered seeing Stanford’s report on Stanford’s admission Dean calling MIT’'s on this issue, though I am not exactly sure how Stanford does this.

Those numbers are highly guarded and only Stanford sometimes releases them. The cross-admit yield rates seriously affect their decisions on many things, especially the yields among HYPSM, since most cross-admits they lost in the past were among those five schools.

The yield of each school does reflect something regarding the winning/losing cross-admits, and the yield/admit ratio might be a better indicator for which school is “more popular”, since it reduces some of the manipulation effect . Last year, it was the first time Stanford had a higher yield/admit ratio than Harvard did.

So is what the title trying to say, nothing more than this.

34

“The yield/admit ratio might be a better indicator… since it reduces some of the manipulation effect.”

Says who? Oh Ewho.

There is absolutely zero evidence for that assertion. The yield/admit ratio is just as easily gamed and manipulated as any other silly statistic. In fact, at the low end of the admit rate range, insignificant changes in admit rate have large changes in the ratio… in the language of calculus, r=ratio, y=yield, a=admit rate, delta r is approx (dr/da) times delta a, which means delta r can can very large for small changes in delta a when dr/da is very steep, which it is at the low admit rate end of the range (because r(a) is a hyperbola).

Let’s all agree that HYPSM are all super popular, super awesome institutions.

[And a super high quality education can also be found at another 100 or so institutions.]

35

“The yield/admit ratio might be a better indicator… since it reduces some of the manipulation effect.”

Says who? Oh Ewho.

There is absolutely zero evidence for that assertion. The yield/admit ratio is just as easily gamed and manipulated as any other silly statistic. In fact, at the low end of the admit rate range, insignificant changes in admit rate have large changes in the ratio… in the language of calculus, r=ratio, y=yield, a=admit rate, delta r is approx (dr/da) times delta a, which means delta r can can very large for small changes in delta a when dr/da is very steep, which it is at the low admit rate end of the range.

Let’s all agree that HYPSM are all super popular, super awesome institutions.

[And a super high quality education can also be found at another 100 or so institutions.]

36

No, that wasn’t my point at all. I wasn’t referring to Stanford’s strength in any area; it’s incontestable that all of its programs are strong, as I’ve acknowledged in the past. Stanford’s only weaknesses (and by that I mean top 20ish instead of top 10) a decade ago were in the humanities and a few social sciences - art history, classics, religion, linguistics, etc. - and it has stepped up its game in those areas since.

Rather, I wrote that post to reflect how the distribution of academic interests can impact the atmosphere of a college. For example, JHU is pretty strong across the board (great programs in art history, creative writing, history, IR, etc.), but 2/3 of its students are majoring in STEM fields, resulting in a comparatively STEM-heavy feel. If you then turn to another academically strong university like Northwestern, where only about 30% of the students are majoring in a STEM field, you get a different buzz on campus. Of course, that Hopkins has a far higher percentage of pre-meds plays a role in that. For a prospective engineer or CS major, Stanford - with a greater population of such students - may feel more attractive than Harvard. For a prospective political science major, Harvard may feel more like home.

Of course, some people prefer the less populated departments because you get the strong academics without the crowds of competition – arguably the best of both worlds.

37

Re: crowds of majors

Both schools have recently been experiencing swelling enrollment in intro CS courses. As in 700+.

38

All else (FA packages, program strength, etc.) being equal? Probably Stanford. That would fall on fit however. I’d simply prefer Palo Alto weather to Cambridge. They’re both excellent universities.

FWIW, I think it’s kind of trivial to debate whether one university is a 10 and the other is a 9.97 but whatever.

39

Has Harvard somewhat diminished its attractiveness to elite students – or – Stanford has just improved a lot that it now is stealing plenty of Harvard admits/target students?

40

It really depends on what you want to do after graduating. If your goal is to work in Silicon Valley, then Stanford is the top choice hands down. If you goal is to work on Wall Street or Capitol Hill, then Harvard is a no brainer. For medicine, it’s probably a toss up. Also location is probably a factor. Most people west of the Rockies will probably prefer Stanford, while those East of the Mississippi will prefer Harvard.