<p>As the critical day approaches, I thought I’d post a list of the discomforts I’m having ‘outside’ of the whole acceptance/rejection thing. These colleges all seem have to have fearful downsides. Some are just stereotypes. Others are actually positive things that can be taken a bad way. Granted, I don’t know what my options are yet – if any – so I shouldn’t be complaining just yet, but still…</p>
<p>from what i’ve “gathered”…</p>
<p>UPenn:
cut throat competition, bordering on amoral
dirty downtown, less than inspiring atmosphere
not the most extraordinary job opportunities outside of wharton and important CAS majors</p>
<p>Princeton:
high schoolish atmosphere
sentimental and aloof from the rest of the world (I’m not saying preppy)
grade deflation and rigor beyond belief
buys too much into the “ivy” thing</p>
<p>Cornell
jockish and heavier on booze
frats/sorority membership a basic requirement for any real social life
less guarantee of a job</p>
<p>Harvard
density of hard-driven, not-laid-back types
teachers expect you have conquered procrastination
Awkwardness of feeling unworthy all the time
prestige drop-off moving out of college unless you go to bigname business/law/medical school</p>
<p>Feel free to contradict, enlighten, or ask for clarification. As Nixon would say, “I am not a ■■■■■.”</p>
<p>I can’t speak to Wharton competition, but competition in general is not cutthroat. I highly doubt it’s any worse than other top schools. Is it difficult to consistently do very well? Definitely. But people aren’t trying to sabotage you left and right. I’m sure there’s cheating going on, but I don’t get any outward sense of over-competitiveness. </p>
<p>Visit Philly for yourself. It’s definitely not my favorite city. Penn is in its own bubble though, and not part of Center City either. Again, visit for yourself to judge the atmosphere. It’s pretty difficult when walking down Locust in the spring to tell you’re in the middle of a city.</p>
<p>I don’t know what gives you the impression there aren’t good job opportunities. That aside, it doesn’t matter where you go. The school doesn’t get you the job, you get the job for yourself. Sure, going to Wharton will give you an advantage in on-campus recruiting if you plan on entering the business world (and non-Whartonites can probably take advantage of companies’ presence), but aside from that…pretty baseless.</p>
<p>Your description of Cornell is way off base, or accurate only for a subset of the community. There are over 13,000 undergraduates there. attending 7 different colleges. Due to the variety of progams and colleges , the student body there is quite diverse, making stereotyping particularly misleading.</p>
<p>There are jocks, and there are people who have nothing to do with athletics at all. The university community is large enough that you can find your own group of compatible individuals.</p>
<p>Fraternities provide great social experiences, hopefully, for the people who are into that scene. But that constitutes a minority of the student body there, not a majority. My daughter is not in a sorority and is having a great experience there socially,.</p>
<ol>
<li>No one is perfect.</li>
<li>Complain after you’ve been accepted to all the places.</li>
<li>If you are so afraid of the downsides of various places, you are better off living in your own room 24/7.</li>
</ol>
<p>Silly, narcissistic exercise. The colleges mentioned have no “fearful downsides” and absolutely nothing to “loathe” or “fear”. </p>
<p>If the OP is offered admission at ANY of those colleges, he should be pleased and excited. If he has the opportunity to choose between two (or more) of them and the handful of other peer colleges, he can consider potential dislikes, which will be minor in the grand scheme of things but are a valid way to choose among otherwise equivalent choices. But most of the downsides mentioned in the post are just misinformed high school sour-grapes folklore. Only two of them seem, from my experience, to have any glimmer of reflection in reality: Cornell (and Penn) has a more active greek community than most of the others, and some Harvard students make themselves feel anxious comparing themselves to classmates and Harvard alums. BFD.</p>
<p>Its only natural my points are gonna look abrasive in an opening post like that. It’s not “pros and cons”…just cons. And what can I say, I typed it in a highly sentimental moment at 2:00AM as a diversion from an English paper. But yeah, I’m realistic about the sort of responses and help I’m actually gonna receive on the internet. And yes, I’ll be thrilled if I can even get into one.</p>
<p>More to the point though, everything I’ve mentioned in my post came from some sort of tangible experience…or at the very least first hand sources. Yeah, yeah, I know the mantra “you get what you put in”. But for some places, I hardly see why putting in a strong effort there will be much better than putting in a strong effort at a “lesser” college. </p>
<p>Nothing that original or insightful, I know, but I was sentimental and angsty enough last night to write it in a post.</p>
<p>but beyond all “those” concerns…</p>
<p>I’m mostly just asking about “pace” I suppose. It seems you must jump in cold and become a superhuman academic and partier. Failure to maintain this sense of drive or failure to take yourself seriously will lead to disillusionment. </p>
<p>“dirty downtown, less than inspiring atmosphere”</p>
<p>Well yes, Philadelphia is no where near being the epitome of a clean city, but I can’t really agree on the second part of that statement. There is so much culture, history, city life and things to do in and around Center City plus other areas in Philadelphia. Most highly urbanized cities are not that clean. And the University City area itself has a different feel compared to downtown/Center City. University City is more of its own area/community, with less hustle and bustle, and city life going on because it’s more college campus-like.</p>
<p>But obviously if huge city life isn’t your thing, then HYP, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Brown are for you.</p>
<p>I think people stereotype too much. Every major city/university has its ups and downs. People also have their own personal preferences. I would have definitely chosen to go to school in Philly or New York City over places like Hanover and Ithaca, but that’s just me. I don’t really think that making a blanket statement about a particular school or location is ever the most effective description.</p>
<p>Harvard is full of hard-driven types? I have a few friends there and frankly… it goes both ways. There are a few students who are insanely motivated but most students aren’t nearly at that level, especially all of the saudi oil princes, etc.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that your college experience depends largely on which group of friends you choose to stick with.</p>
<p>PS - I haven’t found Penn to be cut-throat competitive. Competitive, yes, very, but not cutthroat. Usually, people are competing against themselves or the market, there are some people at any school who would sabotage others but mostly people fret more about their own issues than how other people are doing.</p>
<p>But as for how many, it’s hard to say, since, from the first linked article:
"These schools, as well as Stanford University and the University of Pennsylvania, were unable to provide any data regarding suicide trends over the past three decades. "</p>
<p>Suicides often go unreported, lest they spur clusters. In Cornell’s case, jumping into a public gorge from a bridge is a public and highly visible event, people see the act and or the body. Consequently hushing it up is not an option there.</p>
cut throat competition, bordering on amoral
Not true at all.
dirty downtown, less than inspiring atmosphere
Philly in general, maybe. But the Penn campus itself can be pretty inspiring.
not the most extraordinary job opportunities outside of wharton and important CAS majors
Uhm, did you forget engineering? Wharton + Important CAS majors + Engineering are a pretty big percentage, and those have some pretty awesome job opportunities. And probably the rest do too.</p>