<p>Low tier ivyes like Cornell, Brown, Duke (not ivy, but w/e), Dartmouth, and Columbia…</p>
<p>I mean is the student body better at Stanford? The professors?</p>
<p>uh, everything?</p>
<p>The weather is better. Otherwise, I wouldn’t consider Stanford better. Except for Duke. But that’s because I happen to dislike Duke. Even then, they’re probably comparable.</p>
<p>It all depends on what you want from your college.</p>
<p>The faculty are outstanding, I love the course offerings, the atmosphere, I prefer the student body, the ECs, and the general vibe on campus. </p>
<p>For almost every aspect, there is no clear measurement that would allow someone to definitively call Stanford (or the other schools) “better”. To me, it is all about preference.</p>
<p>I chose Duke over Stanford, Princeton, and Harvard - it’s a different collegiate world than which existed in 1975.</p>
<p>Its reputation, its location, and its campus (followed closely by Duke) were the first things to come to mind.</p>
<p>“Better” is a ridiculously blunt term. It really doesn’t make any sense to argue about which one of those colleges is “better” than any of the others (and you could include HYPS or MIT in there, too). For the most part, in academic and educational structure, and in the students they admit, their similarities far, far outweigh any differences. The differences that are most pronounced are things like location and size – big things, but not really a question of quality so much as of preference. Lots of the differences are really issues of style, of getting to the same point by a slightly different path, and again it’s a matter of preference.</p>
<p>What Stanford has going for it is:</p>
<p>– Student popularity. It’s the first choice for a lot of really great, interesting students. As are all the others, but Stanford maybe a little more so. So on average the students may be a tick more amazing than the amazing students elsewhere. You won’t be any more amazing just for having gone there, though, and the amazingness of particular friendship/peer circles at other colleges can easily exceed the amazingness of particular circles at Stanford, since no one at either place will have precisely average friends and classmates. It will be true that at Stanford hardly anyone is going to have a chip on their shoulder because of some college they didn’t get into, whereas at some of the others that’s a common issue.</p>
<p>– Faculty/grad student strength. Stanford is better regarded across more departments than practically any other university, except maybe Harvard. This accounts for its success in overall ranking systems, and is practically meaningless to any particular undergraduate. At most, maybe by the time you are a senior you may know enough in one department to be able to understand the difference between the #1 program and the #10 or #20 program in that field, but it won’t really affect your education at all. And it really won’t affect your education at all in all those other departments where you never take a course or never go above the intermediate level. And of course academic reputation does not guarantee teaching quality for introductory and intermediate courses, which are going to take a lot of your time. So really, this is pretty meaningless for comparing strong universities.</p>
<p>– Reputation in the world. More people you don’t really care about will be impressed by Stanford than by some of the others. Big whoop. But it’s something. Your mom may strut a little more.</p>
<p>– Traditional undergraduate experience. Duke and Stanford uniquely (among private universities) combine top-shelf academics with top-shelf Division I college sports and social life. Some people really care about that, others not so much.</p>
<p>– Location, location, location. Stanford rules the West Coast in a way that no other American university, not even Harvard, rules such an important area. Its weather is amazing. Palo Alto isn’t a city, exactly, but it’s a very cool suburb, and San Francisco is arguably the nicest city on Earth. Northern California is indescribably wonderful. All of these are great reasons to go to Stanford. They’re also great reasons to go to Columbia, if what you really want is Manhattan.</p>
<p>– Attitude. The general mood at Stanford is appropriately described as “chill” – maybe not by comparison to UCSC, but by comparison to anyplace people are really comparing it to. For some people, that’s just what they want. For others, it lacks the general air of intensity and intellectual excitement that characterizes some of its competitors. Also, Stanford is a place where students are generally free to adopt the style they want. If someone wants to be intense and hyper-academic, that’s fine, and if he wants to do the minimum and to concentrate on having fun and making social contacts, that’s going to be fine, too.</p>
<p>^good post.</p>
<p>agreed, well said</p>
<p>Yes, very nicely put. And I might add that those same factors, among others, make Stanford a better choice for many students than the “upper tier” Ivies as well. That’s why Stanford wins many cross-admits from all of these excellent schools. : )</p>
<p>Yield is predicted to be about 72% this year, a record.</p>
<p>Stanford is miles ahead of all these universities in faculty strength. Stanford is a world class research power house. Columbia and Cornell may be called a research power house as well, but a tier below.</p>
<p>HYPSM are inarguable the best universities; most funding, they tend to accept a stronger pool of applicants, etc. Not to say Cornell or Penn is bad; they’re still highly respected and an education at a lower ivy is nothing to scoff about (I highly doubt that the Stanford Course Work can be any “harder” than Cornell’s or Columbia’s; still tough no matter where you go)</p>
<p>Umm…I would put things like Wharton, Caltech, and Georgetown SFS on equal footing with HYPS. </p>
<p>PS… Penn isnt a lower tier ivy all around…I believe its a middle tier (though…I am attending there so I may just be too biased to think straight about it)</p>
<p>haha doesnt USNWR rank UPenn exactly the same as Stanford? and MIT and Caltech as well?</p>
<p>Because Stanford is just amazing…</p>
<p>Stanford is 2/3 grad school, whence its fame derives, one of a handful of best in the world.</p>
<p>the kids I know who go to stanford are nice. they’re all nice people, but the whole “stanford has so much fun” myth is a myth.</p>
<p>if USNWR rankings were accurate and comprehensive, that might be used as support. but they are not.</p>
<p>The many students I know at Stanford are definitely having a great time, in addition to working hard and learning immense amounts. They describe it as “edutopia” and paradise (except during the week right before finals. ; ) ) They have been able to find that crucial balance between studying and pursuing extracurricular interests, though sometimes they have been overextended and have learned to scale back the activities a bit. There are so many tempting things to get involved with at Stanford.</p>