<p>I need to make a decision in choosing which school to attend, U Chicago or Dartmouth. I’ve searched the forums and on the internet, but found it a difficult decision to make. I plan to study in the fields of econ, law and finance.</p>
<p>What do you want to know specifically? They are peer institutions. For all of the listed fields they will for the most part get you to the same place. Culture is somewhat different; discussions with professors are probably going to be different; city-environments are very different—but again, what do you want to know?</p>
<p>Are they really similar in terms of academic quality for undergraduates? I’d like to know the differences in culture, access to research and internships, campus life quality (safety, niceness, facilities) (I’m not into party/drinking stuff). How do they compare in academia and business worlds?</p>
<p>Okay first disclosure: I have never spent a substantial amount of time at Dartmouth, so I can’t help you with the relative measures. I can give you my experience here—take it for what you will.</p>
<p>1) Academic Quality: I’ve found that everyone, and I mean everyone: Nobel Laureates, professors, post-docs, lecturers, TAs care for your learning here. Even post-docs who look like they don’t care will spend time in Office Hours to ensure that you know the material. The Core is a spectacular part of the College here—even if you end up going to into business or medicine, what you learn in Core will impact the way you approach learning. In terms of economics and finance, you will find that the UofC Economics curriculum is very, very quantitative and thorough. You will find that so many of the basic things you learn in Econ are applicable to a wide set of simulations via well-designed economics models. In terms of finance, the Booth name matters. Many of the finance professors have been in banking for many years: corp. fin and investments are taught by ex-bankers, etc.</p>
<p>2) Access to Research and Internships: Yes. There’s too many. If you’re going into econ/finance there’s new opportunities for research every week. The Decision Research Lab, Booth, the Economics department, the law school, etc. all look for economics/finance people.</p>
<p>3) Campus Life Quality: It’s an urban environment. Don’t walk around with your laptop in your hands. That being said, it’s an urban environment. There’s so many enjoyable and interesting aspects of the city of Chicago. The neighborhoods are worth knowing, the food is spectacular—this makes for some very enjoyable excursions. </p>
<p>4) Academia and Business: I’ve already posted about the banking thing in several threads—Chicago is well-represented in banking. This is also the UofC; academia is a huge part of the air here.</p>
<p>They are both absolutely fine in terms of the opportunities they present in those fields – good enough so that the only thing that can hold you back is you and your ability, not what’s available at your college or its reputation in the world. Chicago has a stronger academic reputation, Dartmouth a better network, but the differences are so minor that at the individual level they are meaningless.</p>
<p>The style and cultures of the two institutions are about as far apart as two institutions that have fundamentally similar values and draw their faculty and students from identical pools could be. Dartmouth is basically a big rural LAC. It offers the “traditional college experience” in spades – lots of bonding, lots of going crazy, lots of school spirit, lots of togetherness. Alumni are fiercely loyal, people have loved it for generations. Very outdoorsy – lots of camping, skiing, sports. Lots of drinking on weekends as a communal activity. It’s hard to get a term-time internship in finance in Hanover NH, but the “D-Plan” assures that you have one fall or spring during college to work on Wall St., and lots of help in finding a slot there.</p>
<p>Chicago is urban, intellectual. People care a lot about what they are studying, talk about it. There’s drinking and partying, but generally on a much less frenzied level than Dartmouth. People do stuff, including work, in one of the most exciting, diverse cities in the country. There’s a general shortage of rah-rah. Until recently, alumni tended to feel ambivalent about it. That’s changing, but it’s still well short of the cross-generational clubbiness of Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Most people know instinctively which college they favor, but sometimes it’s not the obvious choice. And sometime people don’t have a choice. So I think there are plenty of Chicago types at Dartmouth, and vice versa, and they wind up liking where they are fine. You really can’t go wrong either way.</p>
<p>JHS nailed it, as usual. Let me add just a bit, though, from the perspective of a current UChicago parent who has also spent a lot of time at Dartmouth (in loco parentis for a nephew there, and with our family second home near Hanover). </p>
<p>Dartmouth’s setting around the green, with Baker Library anchoring the north end, is gorgeous, even archetypical – Dartmouth and Hanover are what a college and a college town should be. Then again, Chicago’s central quad is also spectacular, and for those partial to Oxfordian Gothic, archetypical, too. However, while Hanover is a charming college town, it is a small town, and for most students it wears thin fairly quickly; Chicago the city (though a bus or metro away, not a walk) is a cornucopia one’s not likely to exhaust in four years. </p>
<p>For those who worry about Chicago winters, try Hanover for a taste of the real thing (and it starts sooner and hangs on longer). Of course, if you’re a skier and/or a hiker, climber, cyclist, kayaker, etc., Dartmouth can’t be beat, and the Dartmouth Outing Club may be the best in the country at what they do. So, which do you value more on a sustained basis – urban pleasures or rural?</p>
<p>Both schools are on a quarter system (vs. semester), but 4 courses tends to be the norm at Chicago vs. 3 per quarter at Dartmouth. At Dartmouth (which has minimal graduate programs) you may never be taught by anyone not a regular faculty member, whereas at Chicago graduate assistants and teaching fellows are the norm for discussion sections of larger classes, and the more senior of them occasionally teach their own courses. That said, the commitment to teaching and to faculty engagement with undergraduates is surprisingly strong at Chicago. You’d expect that, and certainly find it, at Dartmouth, but you might be pleasantly surprised by the faculty-student dynamic at UC.</p>
<p>Finally, the Greek scene does loom large at Dartmouth, whereas at Chicago it’s a sidebar. At the former, it’s the culture of the school, and you can’t help but be affected by that, even if you choose not to participate. At the latter, it’s something you seek out if you value it; otherwise, it’s peripheral and a non-issue. Concomitantly, and perhaps, too, because of the relative isolation, the limitations of a small, albeit delightful, town, and the long hard winters, a lot of Dartmouth students drink, and drink a lot, certainly compared to those at UChicago (who, themselves, are far from being teetotalers). Given that the students at both schools are equally smart and accomplished coming in, all this results in, I think, a greater heterogeneity across the student body at Chicago than Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Returning to the dilemma of your decision, fromaparent, the fact that the two schools are so clearly different in vibe and the nature of the undergraduate experience should make the choice easy, unless you are one of those who truly likes both these very different worlds equally. Some do. In that case you really do have a dilemma, but (to restate JHS’s on target assessment) take comfort in the likelihood that either decision will be the right one for you.</p>