<p>Hey. Your son sounds a lot like me when I was hunting last year.
Let’s see, I wanted a core, I wanted a crazy quirky student body, I liked philosophy and science (+ engineering but that’s not a commonality), I was really into music, really into art, had felt really out of place throughout high school… really… and quite terrible at making small talk and kind of disillusioned by the general social context and atmosphere of young people… wanted a really tough curriculum (to be challenged for once), and really wanted as little hand-holding as possible (craving independence), but also didn’t want to go anywhere where grades were considered more important than knowledge and learning.</p>
<p>Sorry if this has already been answered, but how strictly are you defining “Ivy”? Do you mean top school or a member of the Ivy League?</p>
<p>I’ve heard that top schools are more similar than different and I have found that to be false. I’ve also heard, even in this thread, that each quality can be found in each school to a greater or lesser extent (afterall as many attitudes are there are students) but I would caution against taking this too approximately… the “lesser” vs “greater” makes a HUGE difference. There are always prevailing attitudes on campus and I have found some of them to be suffocating.</p>
<p>Chicago seems like a perfect pick for him. That was one of my top choices for school last year as well. As for “Ivy” I would probably recommend Columbia. I think he’s going to love the energy of the campus and the diversity of the student body. Kids are creative, crazy, fast-paced like the environment rubs off on them, generally love the core, have pretty diverse interests, it’s great for premed and other sciences (I was interested in their astrophysics program)… independence is kind of stressed there, like you make your own way in the hustle and bustle of the city and school sort of thing. Yet it was cooperative instead of competitive and I especially valued that.</p>
<p>If the core thing is negotiable I would bet Brown is worth a look as well. I loved the school in every way and its students come in all shapes and sizes. Very laid back, very quirky, it seemed like it’d be great fun going there. Brown, however, is one of those make-your-own-rigor kind of places, you can probably build yourself a very challenging curriculum but you can also breeze. Problem I saw here was that most students would probably lean toward the “breeze” route, and it may be some kind of social anomaly to take on more courses than is required. Brown eventually came off my list because of its comparative weakness in theoretical sciences.</p>
<p>Some colleges I would recommend against considering your son’s preferences: Princeton, Harvard, maybe Penn, maybe Dartmouth (I may not know enough about the last two to give you a solid picture though).</p>
<p>It’s the general personality of those schools. Non-conformity has very little reign in those schools so you end up with a fairly homogeneous student body. Dartmouth is more of a jock-dominated and greek-dominated school, Penn didn’t have as intellectual an atmosphere as I’d have liked (though the students are obviously brilliant). Social elitism is kind of the trademark of Princeton and it is also present at Harvard though to a slightly lesser extent. Princeton’s student body is self-selecting because of the air of pomp that is generally associated with the school so the stereotype self-perpetuates which is a shame. Socially, Harvard offers a very typical college experience. Surprisingly. I mean what do you do with your brilliant future-leaders-of-the-free-world classmates? You get wasted with them on the weekends and dance (grind) to bad rap music in crowded and poorly lit common rooms, of course. Hey, dont get me wrong, that’s a perfectly tolerable form of entertainment once in a (fairly long) while, but I find myself kissing the ground of my own campus after returning from a night out at Harvard. And Harvard has its own form of Princeton’s eating clubs, they’re called final’s clubs and from what I hear they’re kind of demoralizing to get into. Like wait outside in long lines in the Boston cold for some kinda “evaluation”. For some clubs you need a certain ‘look’, for others a certain dollar value… etc etc you get the picture. Harvard’s student body, though, is generally very impressive and has a lot to offer academically. Especially for premed, you can’t get much more choice than that considering its strong bio department and grade inflation. I just have qualms with its social atmosphere.</p>
<p>There’s probably more, but I have class now :)</p>
<p>EDIT: p.s. I go to MIT (as I see some have suggested the school).</p>