<p>So I want to first acknowledge that there are probably some very sociable people at MIT who are well-versed in the art of conversation and who would entirely overshadow many Yalies at a party or a networking session. I haven’t attended MIT and only know a handful of students from there, and my experience with its social atmosphere is anecdotal at best.</p>
<p>I think that MIT students, in general, lack a certain social grace. Personally I don’t care at all for arbitrary social conventions or gratuitous tactfulness, but I got the impression that the general atmosphere at MIT does not encourage you to mature in your social interactions but rather indulges a sense of self-congratulatory hermitage. You have of course heard stories from MIT/Caltech graduates who say that they had been very introverted in HS and became more outgoing in college, but I suspect that this might have been a more efficient process at Yale, where they would have been, if not close friends with, at least surrounded by political science majors, aspiring consultants, and pre-laws who emphasize and nurture the deliberate development of camaraderie. I was once suspicious because it felt as though Yalies sacrifice deep friendships for superficial connections and leadership experiences, but honestly it seems that Yalies are actually just really enthusiatic (almost naively so) about everything they do, and their acknowledgement of the value of networking and social contacts does not detract from their sincerity.</p>
<p>So you might ask, why does this matter to me if I’m a science major? It doesn’t really, if you plan on working at the very frontier of astrophysics, where the field is heavily dominated by MIT/Caltech-types anyway. If you think you might be interested in something a bit more mundanely applicable, though, like biochemistry, biotechnology, bio/chemical engineering, etc., sooner or later you’ll have to learn the insidious truth that the top PIs all know each other, that their PIs all knew each other too, and that whether your paper gets published in Nature or, I dunno, some random pharmacology journal in Asia, is maybe 60% actual work and 40% wheel-greasing and introduction-BSing-about-clinical-relevance. All else held equal, the sociable, better-liked, well-connected scientist will find it much easier to get published in better journals early on, to get tenure in academia (or even a tenure track position, the way things are going nowadays), or to climb over the nerdy Scientist IV’s in industry to get that Chief Scientist position. Or, if you really want to make a difference, get investors to fund you for that brilliant engineering idea of yours.</p>
<p>I did say “all else held equal”, though. You yourself will have to do more research about just how much of an extra edge MIT might give you on your grad testing scores and weigh that against the more subtle yet just as important (and way more fun) skills that a Yale education will impart.</p>
<p>Lastly I realize that this isn’t actually a discussion about ultimately choosing between the two schools but rather about early applications. So just fyi, if your background is science-heavy, you will probably have an easier time impressing the Yale adcoms and interviewers.</p>
<p>PS: It also just really disconcerted me that my MIT interviewer kept on trying to reassure me that there are normal people at MIT, even though I never brought up the subject…</p>