<p>I am currently torn between Penn, Northwestern and Cornell. Penn is my dream school. It has everything I could ask for: atmosphere, location, prestige, a minor in nanotechnology, everything! However, Northwestern has offered me a position as a Murphy Scholar; this designation includes a $4000 research grant to lead my own research project and would give me greater connections with professors. I was also offered a position in the Hunter R. Rawlings III Cornell Presidential Research Scholars program at Cornell, which includes $8000 to be used toward my own design project. </p>
<p>I am planning on majoring in chemical engineering, with hopes of going to grad school and then pursuing a career in pharmaceutical development. Any advice? (Also, which of the three typically awards the most need-based aid?)</p>
<p>Have you not received your FA awards yet? I’d imagine Penn has the best awards of the three, just because it has the biggest endowment. But who knows.</p>
<p>Penn has [Center</a> for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships](<a href=“Penn CURF”>Penn CURF) and from what I’ve heard, it’s not hard to do research. I’m not sure about your personal project versus signing on with a professor, but I’m sure the website I just pointed you to has info about that (I personally am not a research person).</p>
<p>I actually chose Penn over Northwestern (I don’t remember it being a hard choice, though in hindsight, I think I only chose based on the fact that Penn is an ivy and I got into Wharton…I love Penn but I probably should have thought about it more than that).
If Penn is your dream school, I would say go for it…look into the research thing, but I don’t see why you wouldn’t be able to find equivalents to the awards Cornell and NU have awarded you. You can also sub-matriculate in CBE (what we call your major shorthand at Penn) to do a masters.</p>
<p>I don’t know where you’re from or how much time you’ve spent in Chicago/Philly, but I lived in Chicago for a bit and LOVED it. I also got to avoid most of the cold, bitter weather, though (and NU is a 40 minute L ride from downtown, though it seems Evanston’s great). NU also has quarters, which is quite a different system then semesters so you need to look at that as well.</p>
<p>I really don’t think you can go wrong with your choices, so maybe try and make pros and cons lists for the schools and see if that helps at all…I’m sure the schools have different atmospheres. I honestly don’t think it will make much of a difference for your plans after college. And if this post somehow felt a little skewed towards NU, that’s just me missing Chicago right now (I don’t live there anymore and haven’t been back in awhile).</p>
<p>You should definitely see if Penn will somehow match the money you’ve been offered by Cornell and Northwestern; especially if, as you say, Penn is your dream school.</p>