<p>Maybe.</p>
<p>About the sinking his body into Lake Michigan… don’t doubt it! Hugo Sonnenschein a bunch of years back “watered down” the core by making it more doable, and he had to resign as president. People are still angry at him, even though he did end up making the school more marketable and more desirable overall.</p>
<p>One of the most popular t-shirts around campus is the “I am Uncommon” shirt, protesting the Common App (and yes, declaring ourselves better than everybody else). For a school that’s perceived to have a major chip on its shoulder for not being an Ivy and not being Northwestern, you’d be surprised how spirited the students are in keeping things the way they are.</p>
<p>And Chicago does have great professional programs, but to an undergrad’s point of view, they might as well be operating in Siberia. I believe they just started an econ-major pre-businessy program (realizing that a top econ undergrad program blends with a top graduate business program! wow!) and you can cross-register with grad classes, but other than that there is a major wall between pre-professionals and undergrads that happen to be going to the same school.</p>