<p>I am very interested in Yale University and I know Harvard + Yale are both great schools but I’d like to hear the differences between Yale/Harvard environments.</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>Use the Search function on this forum for ‘Harvard’ and you will find a plethora of Y v H threads.</p>
<p>Okay, thank you.</p>
<p>^^You should first get the confirmation of acceptance at either school before even thinking about this dilemma. It seems you are being rather presumptuous to even ask this rhetorical question. Very few get accepted to Harvard and even fewer at both Harvard and Yale because students who “generally” get accepted to Harvard rarely apply to other schools whereas students who get accepted to Yale, Stanford, Princeton, Chicago, MIT in the early rounds usually throw in an application to each other including Harvard. Even though they seem similar they look for somewhat different types of students. Good luck in your college quest.</p>
<p>With Harvard/Yale, they are the top echelon of schools in the world, even. I can only imagine that cross admits would choose one school over the other because of:</p>
<p>-Possible Legacy at One School
-Location (Connecticut vs. Massachusetts)
-Financial dispute (maybe $10,000 more in scholarships from one school is enough to make you pick that school.)
-How they felt about each school on the visit
-Specific departments</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Just to clarify, ‘scholarships’ implies merit aid, both of these schools only give need-based FA.</p>
<p>gravitas2, don’t try to group your alma mater (Chicago) with Harvard and Yale. People can see right through it.</p>
<p>Hey, I’m biased, but I’ll give this a shot…</p>
<p>H vs. Y
Boston/Cambridge area vs. “pit of despair” (New Haven, CT)</p>
<h1>1 choice of many top students vs. #2 choice of many top students</h1>
<p>Dream school vs. Safety school
(OK, just kidding about that last one.)</p>
<p>Both schools are great. Although certain departments may be “stronger” at one institution relative to the other, this probably won’t be a deciding factor for the vast majority of applicants.
What Harvard really has going for it (relative to Yale) is its location. The Boston area has a charm all its own–“small” walk-able city, great public transportation system, the North End, the Freedom Trail, Boston Commons, the Red Sox, proximity to Walden Pond. There are also a bunch of really good schools in the Boston area. As a Harvard undergrad, I ended up partying/hanging out with friends at M.I.T., B.U., B.C., and Wellesley.
Although I agree with much of what gravitas wrote in the preceding post, I can’t say that I agree 100% with the quote above. From what I’ve seen, top-tier schools, such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, M.I.T, and CalTech, are competing for the same pool of bright, motivated applicants.</p>
<p>@Bartleby007: These days, the area surrounding Yale’s campus has become more like Harvard Yard, with an Apple Store, Shake Shack, Urban Outfitters, American Apparel, J. Crew, Barnes & Noble etc. See: [UP</a> CLOSE | Building the ?new? New Haven | Yale Daily News](<a href=“http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2012/04/17/up-close-building-the-new-new-haven/]UP”>UP CLOSE | Building the ‘new’ New Haven - Yale Daily News)</p>
<p>@rfav32: See: [Harvard/Yale</a> cross-admits explain their decisions | Yale Daily News](<a href=“http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2010/09/21/harvardyale-cross-admits-explain-their-decisions/]Harvard/Yale”>Harvard/Yale cross-admits explain their decisions - Yale Daily News)</p>
<p>
@gibby: Thanks for posting the link to that article. Despite recent changes to the commercial landscape in the New Haven area, I still think that the Boston area has so much more to offer. I do appreciate the gentrification efforts by the university in the New Haven area, though. It certainly appears to be a work-in-progress. I hope that the university doesn’t squeeze out all of the mom-and-pop stores in favor of large, national chains. After all, that’s what often gives a college area so much “character.”</p>
<p>On a side note, it’s a shame that Yale let the New Haven area fall into disrepair in the 80’s and 90’s. It was downright depressing to visit the campus during those dark years.</p>
<p>@Bartleby007: I agree that Boston has much more to offer than New Haven. However, the vast majority of Harvard students, including my daughter, are too busy with their studies or extracurricular activities to go into Boston to go shopping, walk the Freedom Trail, visit the Museum of Fine Arts, attend a Red Sox game etc. My daughter was only able to do those things last summer when she was working in Boston and NOT attending school.</p>
<p>There’s one – and really only one – basic reason why people choose Yale over Harvard. People tend to be happier at Yale. People tend to be less competitive with one another, and less anxious about whether they are measuring up. It works better as a social environment. (And by “social” I don’t mean parties, or just parties; I mean the full range of social interactions.)</p>
<p>Of course, Cambridge/Boston is a lot nicer than New Haven, even if New Haven is plenty nice and nowhere near as dreadful as people in Cambridge think. And of course more people who don’t really matter recognize the Harvard name than the Yale name. Harvard is probably the greatest university the world has ever known (which means very little at the individual student level, since no student can experience more than about 1% of the university). </p>
<p>There are certainly more students at Yale who would have gone to Harvard if they had been accepted than there are students at Harvard who would have gone to Yale. But I would bet there are more students at Harvard who would pick Yale if they got to choose over again than vice versa.</p>
<p>@Everyone: Thanks for all the insightful replies/links I appreciate all of them! </p>
<p>@gravitas2: How did I come off as presumptuous? I just wanted insight on this stuff in no way do I even think I am a shoe-in or anything, I would be super lucky to get into one I know, the topic just interested me. That’s all I didn’t mean to come off as inappropriate or conceited.</p>
<p>@gibby: We all make time for the things that are important to us. When I attended Harvard, I heard the same ridiculous rumor that “Harvard students are so busy that they never got a chance to go into Boston.” That’s B.S. The vast majority of my friends would go into Boston at least once a week. Some of us worked at the Longwood Medical campus. Others wanted to go out to eat, visit a museum (MFA, Museum of Science), go shopping, or just hang out in the Commons. When the weather was nice, we’d make a trip to Walden Pond. If your daughter enjoys exploring Boston, she should make time for it during the school year.</p>
<p>Even during my busiest semester at Harvard, when I was crazy enough to take 6 classes, I had enough time to travel into Boston to do fun things. That being said, there’s plenty to do on campus at Harvard even on the weekends. Student-run musicals, orchestral performances, plays, and a cappella performances were lots of fun.</p>
<p>Just passed this thread and had to add…despite its age that I know someone who eventually chose Yale because she felt like she “clicked” with the place. She imagined herself there. When academics are that strong we are talking the minutest of differences. Both names are brand names - you do not need to worry about that at all. Plus I heard the funniest phrase in passing yesterday - the only thing cooler than getting in…is rejecting the offer…I thought it was quite funny! In the end, its fit, a name doesnt make 4 years of academics fun.</p>
<p>I think the location of Harvard in Boston makes the campus a bit more “outward-looking” than Yale is. At Yale, there is less drawing students off campus, so it is more “inward-looking,” which is also enhanced by the residential college system. I think this contributes to the more collegial, or even family-like atmosphere at Yale. I think Princeton has this as well, to some extent–and Columbia is probably the most extreme counter-example in the Ivy League. All these schools have personalities which will appeal more to some students than others–although the schools are really much more alike than they are different.</p>
<p>Kenyanpride: your gratuitously insulting jibe at gravitas2 only reveals your own lack of class and security, rather than confirms --as you expected it would – any globally-shared opinion about UChicago. But, hey, if you’ve got the time to waste on such silly and nasty posts, who am I to judge.</p>
<p>JHS: you are usually sensible and sober in your judgments rather than over-the-top injudicious, but your Harvard is “the greatest university the world has ever known” is, even for College Confidential, a bit much to take. Really?? Really?? Should the rest of the educational universe simply just.give.up? I don’t know if it fits the contemporary, formal, definition of a university, but I’d take an acceptance from Plato’s Academy over Harvard any day of the week, if such were an HISTORICAL possibility.</p>
<p>Bartleby007: “Top-tier schools such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, M.I.T., and CalTech, are competing for the same pool of bright, motivated students.” I have never understood the inclusion of M.I.T. and CalTech as members of this specific elite school group, not because they are not elite, but because in fact they do not seek the same “pool of bright, motivated students.” M.I.T. and CalTech, by virtue of their more specific missions, seek a mere sub-set of this pool of bright, motivated students. Classics scholars and budding historians and sociologists less frequently apply to all of these schools as a class, because the latter two in your group are not full-service universities with the full panoply of offerings in all fields outside of their scientific missions. Yes, I know that M.I.T. has some strong offerings outside of its scientific core strengths, but your budding humanists tend not to apply there, and certainly do not even have CalTech on their radars. Therefore, I am always mystified by the HYPSMC acronym, because most non-science or non-math students do not apply to the latter schools. Though prestigious in academic circles, let’s be honest, few John and Jane Q. Publics are aware of M.I.T. and virtually none of them know CalTech. I remain confused by the conflation of these two schools with the liberal arts powerhouses that are the other universities represented by the acronym. And am always amazed when anyone who, meekly, asserts that the “C” in the acronym might more appropriately apply to Chicago or Columbia – because as full-service universities they are more appropriately grouped with these schools than are M.I.T or CalTech - is humiliated by other responders, as though he or she had just shown up naked at a Princeton eating club, or committed some other faux pas for which mere death is too good, but for which persistent social shaming seems appropriate.</p>
<p>NYC is easily accessible for a day, weekend, or even evening. I do it all the time. Some hardy souls commute daily.</p>
<p>NYC>Boston.</p>
<p>When I went on the Yale tour with my son, someone asked, “Why Yale over Harvard?”</p>
<p>Tour guide: “People at Harvard are very proud of it, but we love Yale.”</p>
<p>@swingtime. There are some non-hard sciences at MIT that are at the top of all the charts. Linguistics comes immediately to mind. But you can also major in history, writing, anthropology, economics, and philosophy–among others. Philosphy for some has tremendous overlap with mathematics. I think there is a group of students who might want to go to graduate school in a social science but with a strong quantitative/science background. After all, the social sciences–even history–have serious quants among them.</p>
<p>For what it’s worth, megabus can make going to Boston cheaper than going to NYC…</p>
<p>MetroNorth to Grand Central is about $5 less than MegaBus to Boston. And MegaBus offers service to NYC on weekends for $5–if you want to catch a 6am bus.</p>