Tufts or Stanford?

Mastadon
Mon, 29 Apr 2013 21:20:09 +0000

Thanks vonlost, I was wondering if there was a bug in the CC software….

Famouslastwords, Here are some things to consider taken from your post:

Despite the fact that you loved Palo Alto and thought that the Stanford campus was beautiful, (which usually lends a strong positive bias to a visit) you still felt uncomfortable. This worries me. People who are uncomfortable rarely excel at what they are doing.

A campus full of “engineers and econ majors” is probably not going to lead to a lot of scholarly debate on IR or women’s studies topics irrespective of political leanings.

Tufts culture is very welcoming, has a respect for alternative viewpoints and a non-combative nature. This is not true of all cultures, especially as you attempt to climb the “prestige ladder”. Defending your views against aggressive attacks or even an implicit bias is not conducive to learning, high academic performance or other campus opportunities.

A reason why “Tufts has one of the best IR programs in the country” is because it matches the Tufts culture (as to which one came first is an interesting chicken and egg problem) and people who are interested in IR tend to be a good match for the overall Tufts culture, irrespective of major.

Because IR is a very broad interdisciplinary major, people are less likely to switch out of the major and more likely to just change their concentration within the major (or switch to another major with an international focus).

There are other opportunities that come along with that culture (overall global perspective, global citizenship and travel abroad are some examples) that are not as pervasive in other campus cultures. Therefore, one can miss out on opportunities to differentiate oneself and excel by choosing an incompatible culture.

For example, Tufts has one of the highest percentages of people that enter the Peace Corps, while Stanford did not even make the list of top schools. With the Tisch College, Tufts is more active on the citizenship scale. There are other areas as well.

At Tufts there is the opportunity to spend a year abroad on Tufts’ program with Oxford. That program is compatible with your interests, would be an amazing learning experience and trumps Stanford in the prestige arena.

The fact that Tufts has one of the” best IR programs in the country” and Stanford does not actually makes Tufts more prestigious (for this particular discipline) among people versed in IR.

A quick look at the course offerings in women’s studies suggests that Tufts is stronger in this area as well which is also another indicator of differences in the respective cultures and opportunities.

According to recent cross admit data, 20% (and rising) of the people who are admitted to both Tufts and Stanford choose Tufts, 24% of the people who are admitted to both Georgetown and Stanford choose Georgetown and 33% of the people admitted to both Wellesley and Stanford choose Wellesley. My guess is that a reasonable portion of these are the people interested in IR and women’s issues. You would not be the first to turn down Stanford on those grounds.

My advice is go where you feel you can excel, because that will be the best for your long term career goals.

Once you are out in the world, it is your achievements rather than the name on your diploma that define you and your career.