<p>Yeah, but if a train leaves Chicago going 70 mph…</p>
<p>If proximity to other good colleges = prestige, then I guess any college in Boston > everyone else.</p>
<p>I guess I like Notre Dame ever since I watched that movie “Rudy” or something. It was about this really small white kid who was poor and his brother went to college on a football scholarship and he was supposed to work in the mines or something but he fought a hard uphill battle to get into/onto the Notre Dame football team.</p>
<p>“I was at mass lighting a candle for the soul of Frank Sinatra and didn’t have time to read all 26 pages of this thread.”</p>
<p>That’s pretty funny.</p>
<p>GentlemanandScholar: Are you a moniker of the op? You both seem to defend Wisconsin a lot and show up in the same threads over and over; usually backing each other up.</p>
<p>Wait, Alexandre, you got to Michigan, right? You’ve got to be biased against ND!</p>
<p>bill_smear, although I certainly have no love for Notre Dame, I am fully capable of fairly evaluating the university. Like I said, I have a great deal of respect for Notre Dame. I just don’t think it is better than Michigan or UVA.</p>
<p>“GentlemanandScholar: Are you a moniker of the op? You both seem to defend Wisconsin a lot and show up in the same threads over and over; usually backing each other up.”</p>
<p>Yes, we are one in the same. The jig is up. Actaully no, we’re not, and I don’t really think I’ve lobbied too hard for Wisconsin either. I really know nothing about the school, but what I do know is that I don’t like arrogant people bashing schools because they’re public, so when I see that happen I pounce…like a tiger…a hungry, hungry tiger.</p>
<p>No one is pouncing on a school because its a public. They are pouncing on these schools because they are less selective, have weaker networks, use TAs, are less focused on undergrads, are too big, are not as well known as “elite”, and use their graduate resources to believe that they should be higher ranked when they no full well that for a majority of students these resources are useless. I have no problem with Michigan or Berkeley as the 18th-20th school, I have a problem when people at these schools think they should be ranked with the likes of Brown and Penn.</p>
<p>“no full well” hmmmmmmmmm. Very elite</p>
<p>With some luck the UW might save you from the bird flu. </p>
<p><a href=“captimes.com | The Capital Times: Madison WI News”>captimes.com | The Capital Times: Madison WI News;
<p>Wasn’t brown ranked 15th? And if you have no problem with Berkeley being ranked 18th, isn’t that pretty close to being the same? Or do those 16th and 17th ranked schools make that much of a difference?</p>
<p>Brown in my opinion might be the most underranked school in USNEWS. The only thing elite about Wisconsin is their basketball team.</p>
<p>i’d say Boston College is the most underranked school by a long shot. and i don’t think academic prestige and elite basketball are mutually exclusive, given that BC is ranked #1 in the country for Fulbright scholars and will be #1 in basketball when they win the final four! :)</p>
<p>First, the comparsion wasn’t brown and wisconsin, it was brown and either berkeley or michigan (whichever school you meant to be ranked 18th), so we can agree that wisconsin is not as elite as brown. As for brown being underanked, I can’t really say because I don’t know much about it.</p>
<p>The football and hockey teams are pretty good too. Actually bball is a little down this year.
The faculty–elite, the research-- elite, the tradition-- elite, the facilities-- elite. The students range from good to elite. The social life is certainly elite.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Wait, this sounds like a lot of privates. Hmmm. TAs, less focused on undergrad, “too big,” graduate/professional schools make them look better. But whatever you so believe.</p>
<p>barrons’s optimism should be appreciated.</p>
<p>TAs – elite as well?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Wholly agree (surprise). Brown gets the total shaft by USNWR. WashU, JHU, Northwestern (heck even Cornell?) above Brown? Student preference and selectivity say otherwise.</p>
<p>USNWR’s Most Selective Top 10 is IMO the best indicator of the top undergrad programs:</p>
<p>1) Yale
2) Harvard
3) Columbia
4) Princeton
5) Stanford
6) MIT
7) Brown
8) Dartmouth
9) Caltech
10) UPenn</p>
<p>Now you can argue about positioning here and there, but those are THE top 10 elite undergrad programs in the US: The Ivies (minus Cornell - the weakest Ivy IMO) + Stanford, MIT and Caltech.</p>
<p>The Atlantic Monthly’s Most Selective Ranking is a near match:</p>
<p>1) MIT
2) Princeton
3) Caltech
4) Yale
5) Harvard
6) Stanford
7) Columbia
8) UPenn
9) Brown
10) Swarthmore</p>
<p>(only difference? Swap Swathmore with Dartmouth)</p>
<p>EDIT: Most Selective instead of Lowest Acceptance Rates</p>
<p>Slow down Slipper. I don’t think you need to exaggerate. Let us examine the reasons why you think it is ok to pounce on Michigan and UVA and Cal.</p>
<p>1) less selective. I cannot argue there. Cal, Michigan and UVA are less selective than much smaller private universities. And yet, their student bodies aren’t much weaker than most of those much smaller and more selective universities. All three have mean SAT scores in the 1370 range and mid 50% SAT ranges in the 1270-1450 range. Michigan and UVA have similar graduate school (tier one level) placement rates to Chicago, Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern and Penn. Either their students are about the same in terms of quality or they just do a better job of making more with less! hehe</p>
<p>2) “have weaker networks.” Yes, Michigan and UVA have weaker networks than Harvard and Yale and Princeton. But that’s where it ends. It is well known that Michigan and UVA have top alumni networks.</p>
<p>3) “use TAs.” Yes sir. So do Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Penn, Columbia, Cornell, Chicago… In fact, those privates use as TAs as much as Michigan and UVA.</p>
<p>4) “are less focused on undergrads.” Yes, and how does that make them any different than the majority of top research universities? Are you telling me that Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, MIT, Northwestern, Penn and Stanford are more focused on undergrads than Michigan and UVA?</p>
<p>5) “are too big.” What’s too big? I admit, Michigan could limit its size, but Michigan and UVA are managing just fine. </p>
<p>6) are not as well known as “elite”. According to whom? I’d say Cal is considered to be one of the most elite universities according to academe. Only 5 universities have a higher peer assessment score and whether you like it, that is the gauge for how “well known as elite” a university really is. Michigan has a corporate reputation tha places it well in the top 10 and is considered on of the top 15 undergraduate universities according to academe. Are you telling me that according to the uneducated masses with absolutley no decision-making power, Cal, Michigan and UVA aren’t as “well known” as elite? Much of the uneducated masses wouldn’t know the difference between Penn and UVA or between Cal and Brown. And those that do probably read about it on the USNWR and have little more information to go on. </p>
<p>7) “use their graduate resources to believe that they should be higher ranked when they no full well that for a majority of students these resources are useless.” Really? Is that why 80% of Freshmen and Sophomores at Michigan who wish to take part in research are given a two year research opportunity to work one on one or two one one with a professor on cutting edge research? Are you telling me that Michigan and UVA’s endowments of $150,000/student make them far weaker than Brown, Cornell and Penn, all of which have endowments of roughly $200,000/student? Are you saying that Michigan and UVA, where 65% of the students are undergrads, use more of their resources on their graduate schools than Penn, Columbia and Harvard, where over 50% of the students are graduate students?</p>
<p>So this is the list of best schools in the country, in order?
Personally, I do think college of the ozarks is a much finer school than princeton.
<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/webex/lowacc_brief.php[/url]”>http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/webex/lowacc_brief.php</a></p>
<p>GentlemanandScholar,</p>
<p>Please check my edit - The Top 10 Most Selective (National Universities) instead of the hodgepodge listing you posted - was what I meant. (somehow I think you know that).</p>