<p>need an honest comparison…</p>
<p>Biggest downsides of Michigan–too many grad students teaching, large classes, in-state students weaker.</p>
<p>Biggest upside of Michigan–a stronger faculty in many departments. People who use US News have no idea of what faculty think about the faculty at elite schools. The best ranking of the quality of faculty departments is done by the Faculty Research Council for graduate departments.</p>
<p>The tables can be downloaded here:</p>
<p><a href=“http://books.nap.edu/html/researchdoc/appendix_h.html[/url]”>http://books.nap.edu/html/researchdoc/appendix_h.html</a></p>
<p>Let me summarize the results for Michigan, Northwestern, and Wash U. for the Humanities & Social Sciences.</p>
<p>Michigan is better than both Wash U and Northwestern in:</p>
<p>Classics<br>
Comp Literature<br>
English<br>
French<br>
Linguistics<br>
Music<br>
Philosophy<br>
Spanish<br>
Anthropology<br>
History<br>
Political Science<br>
Psychology<br>
Sociology</p>
<p>Michigan better than Wash U, but not Northwestern:
Art History
Economics</p>
<p>Northwestern better than both Michigan & Wash U.:
Art History
Economics</p>
<p>Wash U better than Northwestern but not Michigan:
French
Spanish
Anthropology</p>
<p>Wash U better than both:
German </p>
<p>Northwestern better than Wash U:
Art History
Comp Literature<br>
English<br>
Music<br>
Philosophy<br>
Religion<br>
Economics<br>
History<br>
Political Science<br>
Psychology<br>
Sociology</p>
<p>Top 5 Departments
Michigan-- Classics, Anthropology, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology
Northwestern–None
Wash U–None</p>
<p>Top 10 Departments
MichiganClassics, French, Music, Philosophy, Anthropology, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology
NorthwesternArt History, Econ, Sociology
Wash UGerman</p>
<p>Top 20 Departments:
Michigan14
Northwestern5
Wash U2 (German, Anthropology)</p>
<p>Note the last set of numbers. In the social sciences and humanities, Michigan has 14 top 20 departments, while Northwestern has 5, and Wash U has 2. From US News you wouldn’t get the impression how much better the Berkeley and Michigan faculties are compared to “hot” schools such as Vanderbilt, Emory, Wash U., etc. </p>
<p>Yet as noted at the outset, a better faculty does not necessarily translate into a better education if you don’t have much contact with them.</p>
<p>thanks so much for doing all that research! its very interesting especially for me since i want to do econ…</p>
<p>Those departments are only great if you’re applying for GRADUATE school. I plan to attend UMichigan for graduate school, but I knew I didn’t want to attend there as an undergrad. Too impersonal and large. Northwestern is serving me just as well.</p>
<p>Tenighs, that’s a myth. Michigan is not impersonal, and most of Michigan’s departments are actually just as good at the undergraduate level than at the graduate level. Whether a school has 5,000 undergrads or 25,000 undergrads makes no difference. Once a school is larger than a typical LAC and its faculty rewarded for research achievements, individual attention will suffer. That is the case at all top universities save Rice, CalTech, Dartmouth, Brown and maybe Princeton.</p>
<p>One should visit both schools and decide on personal taste. In most respects, Michigan and Northwestern are equal…but they are significantly different in terms of culture and atmosphere.</p>
<p>cool… great post merryxmas…
i got into NW for econ… guess that makes my choice a lot easier</p>
<p>At almost every school, the graduate faculty in the Arts & Sciences is virtually the same as the undergraduate faculty. So a rating of the best graduate faculty is a rating of the best undergraduate faculty. The real difference is that the ratings are primarily as scholars, not teachers.</p>
<p>Yes, MerryXmas, and some professors are very lousy as teachers but great as researchers. (I know from experience in the classroom.)</p>
<p>Alexandre, I live in Michigan and I have visited UMichigan many times so I know what I’m talking about. Michigan has more GSIs to fill in large introductory courses than Northwestern. Northwestern has the same opportunities like UMichigan, just that the student population is smaller. At UMichigan, undergraduate opportunities are very competitive (reserved for the best potential). I have the opportunity to speak with my professors on a daily/weekly basis that I wouldn’t have at UMichigan. I also have the opportunity to work on research projects here at NU that I probably would have not done at UMichigan because many students would want the same thing. Professors at very large research universities have greater preference for their grad students than undergrad students. UMichigan, other than academics, just did not fit my personality (small classes, close interaction with the professors, caring professors, etc.)</p>
<p>Do you people think UMich fits my personality type? Small classes aren’t really my thing, it actually doesn’t matter, but I’d like to have some interaction with the professor. And if I try hard enough, will I get to know any professors and do a lot of stuff? I love michigan but sometimes I worry that I’ll just be walking around not knowing anyone or getting to do enough research/other opps.</p>
<p>Tenisghs, with all due respect, you do not know what you are talking about. You chose based on perception and hearsay, not on facts and experience. Not that it matters because Northwestern is wonderful and every bit as good as Michigan. But I have never heard of a student who could not find meaningful research opportunities at Michigan…and that was BEFORE UROP. At this point in time, Michigan has more research opportunities for undergrads than any university in the nation. And I never had a hard time getting to meet professors. I even got to know a few of them well. </p>
<p>And I am not sure who told you Michigan has more GSIs teaching course than Northwestern. Only 3% of Michigan classes are actually taught by GSIs, and most of those are intro to Calculus and Intro to English. 73% of all undergraduate classes are taught purely by full time professors and 24% of undergraduate classes are taught by full time professors and then broken up into discission groups that are led by GSIs. So 97% of undergraduate classes are actually taught by professors. </p>
<p><a href=“U-M Weblogin - Stale Request”>U-M Weblogin - Stale Request;
<p>In my four years and 45 classes at Michigan, I never once had a GSI lead a lecture. Most of my professors knew me by name and I never had to wait to meet a professor. Admitedly, some professors were more into their research than teaching, but the vast majority were genuinely interested in their students.</p>
<p>I am not sure how Northwestern fares, but most top research universities have anywhere from 1%-10% GSI leading classes, so Michigan is not exactly lagging in that regard, and even if Northwestern has fewer GSI led classes, how much better than 3% can it get? </p>
<p>I hope you aren’t spending an additional $25,000/year to attend Northwestern simply because you thought Northwestern would offer you more individual attention or a better education. If you chose Northwestern because you felt it was a better fit, that’s great. But if you picked Northwestern because you felt you would get a better education or more individual attention, that’s too bad.</p>
<p>cool off … lets not make this personal… logic would indicate that NU is more or less as rich as Umich but much smaller so it would seems that they would be able to afford more real professors vs graduate students… then again you never know</p>
<p>Not really Go. Schools only spend limited amount of money on instruction and undergrads. Michigan’s endowment of $4.5+ Billion is more than enough to grant each student attention to the extreme, especially when you consider that Michigan receives over $300 million from the state annually. To claim that one research university pays more attention to its undergrads than another is almost always a case of misplaced loyalty. All research universities save Rice, Brown, Dartmouth and maybe Princeton (not in the sciences) have faculties that are far more interested in research than in teaching. Only LACs truly pay very close attention to their undergrads. </p>
<p>Classes at Michigan are indeed larger than at Northwestern. Recources availlable to undergrads at Michigan are probably not as abundant as they are to undergrads at Northwestern, though in some ways, Michigan has more resources availlable to its undergraduates. But the differences in resources and quality are insignificant. Both are top universities with incredible offerings. One should pick between the two according to fit, not accoridng to insignificant differences. </p>
<p>And by the way, I was not getting personal. I just feel that a person who has spent 4 years studying in a university (taking a total of 45 classes) would know much more about that university than someone who just knows it from a limited number of visits as a visitor. I spent 2 years as a graduate student at Cornell. I took several classes (both graduate and undergraduate) in various departments. I was even a GSI for a couple of classes. And despite all this exposure to Cornell, I am not that knowledgeable about Cornell. It takes a lot of exposure to a university as complex as Michigan to really know it well. </p>
<p>But from experience I can tell you that all research universities, from Harvard to Cal and everthing in between, pay little attention to undergrads. It is the burden of the undergrad to seek out opportunities at all those universities. But they all have unlimited opportunities, so there is no reason to fear.</p>
<p>In short Go, you should chose a university that matches your personality and that has an atmosphere and culture that appeals to you. The rest is just a statistical exercise.</p>
<p>**And by the way, I was not getting personal. I just feel that a person who has spent 4 years studying in a university (taking a total of 45 classes) would know much more about that university than someone who just knows it from a limited number of visits as a visitor. **</p>
<p>Not to mention I had cousins who went to Michigan and Michigan State and I have done many summer programs at the UMichigan!! You cannot say that, as a resident of the state of Michigan, and with Ann Arbor only minutes away from my home, I don’t know anything about Michigan, Alexandre! Plus, Go, he is right about one thing: Choose a university that matches your personality and career interests. NU was a better fit for me for my undergrad studies than the UMichigan.</p>
<p>Tenisghs, I did not say that you do not know anything about Michigan. But the notion that Michigan pays less attention to undergrads than other top universities is inaccurate and unfair to the University. Michigan is as committed to undergraduate education as any top university.</p>
<p>Personally, I would trust Alexandre because he has actually been through the whole University experience. There is so many things you don’t take part in unless you are an actual student. If you were thinking about buying a new car, and you needed some opinions on it, would you trust the person who has seen the car while driving past the dealership or the person who has actually driven it? Seems like an easy choice to me.</p>
<p>Its so funny to me that students are commonly pointing to these 2 schools as their top choices because they are so different to me. Besides the amazing intruction offered at both institutions, when I visited both schools a month ago, the social atmosphere/size/towns/every other aspect were so vastly different. It depends on what you want in a school, you’re going to get a phenomenal education either way.</p>
<p>“the social atmosphere/size/towns/every other aspect were so vastly different.” please explain in detail</p>
<p>the data may be 12-15 year old…just be careful</p>
<p>well one reason ppl choose colleges is reputation
im not condoning it but its true
what potential employers think is very important
now who would be extremely surprised
if someone who received a flatout rejection from michigan got into nu?</p>