@AnnieBot : My guess is that engineering still seems rougher despite you having to work in classes outside of it (many STEM majors are good writers, but for others, it does take more effort). It’s really all about the departmental norms and the norms outside of say STEM and econ. are pretty uniform across all schools;a very restricted range distribution of grades. The only difference is that at selective schools, achieving the same range as the “easier” schools requires instructors to at least give more work, but it is generally still restricted range at the upper end of the scale whereas STEM courses, where they give hard or reasonable exams vs. the student body come out to a nice spread of grades. Part of this is due to structure differences in courses as many humanities Social Science classes have much more than just exams. However, even the exam based ones are often more “straight-forward” so to speak. From my experience, they don’t seem to go out of their way to write particularly challenging or thought-provoking test items.
Regardless, the thread went off topic. The OP should take away that Vanderbilt is not a special case among the ones they named when it comes to challenge and grading. Outside of STEM, it would likely feel like the other elite schools unless there is some signature non-STEM program or track known for higher workload or standards than a normal major at the school. It isn’t as if they’ll be screwing themselves (basically portions of their overall GPA) over by attending Vanderbilt. STEM is what they need to worry about regardless of which school they choose. It will generally be tough in the lower division and intermediate courses if you lack experience or don’t develop good strategies quickly.