<p>the reason to choose brown over northwestern is because brown is a better school by certain uncontestable measures that matter most</p>
<p>brown has a stronger student body by virtue of having its pick of students that are also admitted to northwestern. brown admits less than half as many students by percentage of applicants, and (unlike northwestern) is able to get the majority of those student to come.</p>
<p>brown students win many, many more prestigious fellowships (rhodes, marshall, fulbright, etc.) than northwestern students despite being a smaller school</p>
<p>brown has better academic pedigree than northwestern, and as a result sends a higher fraction of graduates into highly sought after jobs and graduate schools</p>
<p>brown faculty are considerably more accomplished than northwestern faculty–there are more pulitzer prize winners, nobel laureates, former heads of state, macarthur genius prize winners, former rhodes scholars, etc.</p>