Yale vs Stanford

prezbucky
Sun, 24 Apr 2016 21:55:32 +0000

Based on reading testimonials on this site for the past several years, when I consider Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford overall, I feel like – relative to each other – Princeton and Yale emphasize the undergraduate experience a bit more while Harvard and Stanford emphasize graduate studies a bit more.

Think about it: H and S have more grad students and more great grad programs. P and Y have relatively fewer grad students and not as many top grad programs. P and Y have plenty of money to spend on expanding their grad offerings, but they seem content to concentrate ever-so-slightly more on undergrads.

So if I were a student lucky enough to be considering HYPS for my undergraduate years, and if I felt other areas of fit were even, I would give a slight edge to Princeton and Yale.

On the flip-side, if I were looking at grad schools – outside of some programs where P and Y are stellar – I would give the nod to Harvard and Stanford.

It’s not the easiest thing to quantify. It just seems P and Y – and certainly this applies to Dartmouth and probably Brown too-- try really hard to fashion a great experience for their undergrads.