<p>Interesting that no one has addressed the OP’s third point so far. My D is down to her top 2 choices now, and U of C is one of them. However, she has serious concerns about the quality of undergraduate teaching in the hard sciences, particularly physics. Current students she talked to told stories of “weeder” classes and professors who gave very difficult exams that had nothing to do with the material that had actually been taught in lectures and assignments. The miniscule number of women profs & grad students in the department has also put her off (other school she is seriously considering is better in this respect).</p>