Harvard or Columbia - Where would you go?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s a back door. Terrible for the Columbia girls.

Are you talking about Malia Obama at Harvard?

I thought it was a reference to Barnard students being able to attend Columbia classes, even though Barnard is less selective than co-ed Columbia College or SEAS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Harvard, from an overseas perspective. We lived in Asia and it is said "Harvard" is probably the most valuable 'brand name' in all of Asia. It's an instant door opener in the business community in some countries.

I think I'd also rather be a student in Cambridge than in New York. I love NY, but the idea of four years there in 'student mode' would be a bit rough.

In many foreign countries, Harvard has less of a pull than state unis simply bc there aren’t many Harvard grads in position of power. Those who studied overseas and returned (and are now in position of power) often went to less expensive unis such as the U of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, UCLA...

I've lived overseas and my experience is they'll know Harvard, Stanford, and MIT and associate them with the top level in education. They don't distinguish as much between schools that are further down.

You seem to be suggesting OP's kid should be picking a school based on the name recognition of Harvard among ill-informed middle managers at some random company in China? How sad. Scores of American universities besides Harvard have been full of international students for a long time.

Where did I mention middle management or a random company in China? Harvard has the highest and best name recognition period. MIT and Stanford are in the ballpark with Harvard.

And why is what the foreigners in Asia think about Harvard so important here? Is OP’s kid going to work in China? [/quote

Harvard seems to have a very cozy relationship with the Communists. Gross.

[Anonymous]

Harvard. Why is this even a question?

[Anonymous]

I went to Yale, so I don't have direct experience with either one, but I have friends who went to both and I visited both schools when I was in college.

First, they have very different campus feels so which does he prefer? I didn't really like Columbia at all. It didn't have a college feel. The students seemed to go to clubs in the city instead of doing college or campus activities. If he wants a NYC experience, then he would love it, I wanted a college experience so it wasn't for me.

Harvard is still urban but there are bars right near the school that are Harvard hangouts so it seemed more collegy. The Harvard campus is beautiful and Cambridge is very nice.

Beyond that, you can't beat the name recognition of Harvard, so edge to Harvard. I think I'd need a pretty good reason to pick Columbia over Harvard. I got into a lower ranked Ivy too and didn't pick it over Yale.

My friends who went there are smart and interesting people. I'm sure the same is true of Columbia.

Congratulations on this amazing choice!

[Anonymous]

Columbia.

In a heartbeat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to Yale, so I don't have direct experience with either one, but I have friends who went to both and I visited both schools when I was in college.

First, they have very different campus feels so which does he prefer? I didn't really like Columbia at all. It didn't have a college feel. The students seemed to go to clubs in the city instead of doing college or campus activities. If he wants a NYC experience, then he would love it, I wanted a college experience so it wasn't for me.

Harvard is still urban but there are bars right near the school that are Harvard hangouts so it seemed more collegy. The Harvard campus is beautiful and Cambridge is very nice.

Beyond that, you can't beat the name recognition of Harvard, so edge to Harvard. I think I'd need a pretty good reason to pick Columbia over Harvard. I got into a lower ranked Ivy too and didn't pick it over Yale.

My friends who went there are smart and interesting people. I'm sure the same is true of Columbia.

Congratulations on this amazing choice!

Yuck. Yale really didn't teach you to do anything more than look at everything through a Yale lens? Columbia has an urban campus that takes up several blocks in Morningside Heights. There are plenty of clubs and campus activities but they are supplemented by the experience of living in New York City, which you don't get at Harvard.

Granted, it's not as grand as Yale, but it has its own "college feel." I can only imagine the response of a Yale graduate if someone from Dartmouth or Princeton opined that Yale wasn't sufficiently "collegy" (?) because it's in a run-down mid-size city rather than in a more bucolic setting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to Yale, so I don't have direct experience with either one, but I have friends who went to both and I visited both schools when I was in college.

First, they have very different campus feels so which does he prefer? I didn't really like Columbia at all. It didn't have a college feel. The students seemed to go to clubs in the city instead of doing college or campus activities. If he wants a NYC experience, then he would love it, I wanted a college experience so it wasn't for me.

Harvard is still urban but there are bars right near the school that are Harvard hangouts so it seemed more collegy. The Harvard campus is beautiful and Cambridge is very nice.

Beyond that, you can't beat the name recognition of Harvard, so edge to Harvard. I think I'd need a pretty good reason to pick Columbia over Harvard. I got into a lower ranked Ivy too and didn't pick it over Yale.

My friends who went there are smart and interesting people. I'm sure the same is true of Columbia.

Are you sure you went to Yale? Not a very cogent response

Congratulations on this amazing choice!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Harvard. Why is this even a question?

Columbia.

[Anonymous]

Columbia College has some of the best undergraduate programs in existence with its core requirements, university departments and libraries. These are famous foundational courses in western civilization and the greats in literature, frontiers of science and music humanities. The classes are small, and the teachers are hand picked to lead these seminar classes.
Along with these requirements and afterwards, students select the classes and majors they want. The college is really a tightly run institution that imparts the very best in educational commitment. Add the opportunities of NYC, with museums and yes- bargain tickets to playsm, and every imaginable type and cuisine in restaurants to fit every budget,along with student discounts, and the combination of Columbia and New York can't be surpassed anywhere.

I am from Boston and as great as that city is, it just does not hold a candle to what NYC offers with fantastic transportation infrastructure.

Columbia provided me an endless buffet of academic and cultural opportunities which will last the student a lifetime of training and experiences.

Where else can you get things like the United Nations, Lincoln Center and the New York Times within a 20-minute subway ride from the Columbia campus ?

[Anonymous]

There is functionally little difference in these schools. The students are pretty much on par, the professors are going to be no more or less accessible at either institution, and they both offer great engineering and liberal arts programs. Columbia’s core curriculum is wonderful, but you can piece together a similar experience at Harvard if you so desire. Harvard’s main advantage is huge: its name has greater global cachet.

Columbia would only have the advantage if your son wanted to pursue certain art and finance-related fields that really only exist at the top-tier level in NYC, and he has the charm and natural initiative to start networking while an undergrad.

[Anonymous]

Harvard Harvard Harvard

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Harvard.

(And I went there, and hated it. )

I’m not the OP, but I’d love to hear more about why you hated it. The Harvard boosters are willing to always speak out because, duh, they loved Harvard and are generally the loudest voices in the room. It would be good to get some more nuanced views.

Over the years, I've worked with several people who went to Harvard for undergrad, and none of them liked it. None of them found their fellow students to be "easy going", and all felt that undergrads are relatively ignored in favor of grad students. And indeed, everyone I've known who went there for grad school loved it.

A kid who got into both Harvard and Columbia will not need the word "Harvard" on his resume to open doors.

[Anonymous]

I went to Columbia, then to Oxford for graduate work, and taught undergraduates at Oxford. While both are great universities, Columbia provided in my experience a better education with its combined structure and options for study.

Notwithstanding Oxford's vaunted tutorial method, Columbia invested more resources into providing for the education of its undergraduates, with about 80% of all classes being small classes of 22 students maximum across the faculties for undergraduates, and with the outstanding core courses.

I can't comment about Harvard, but it is not possible to duplicate the core course requirements which the entire freshman and sophomore classes take at Columbia. There is something unique and bonding about the entire entering freshman class taking the same required courses in small sections with a teacher who knows each student individually, and then promoting dialogue amongst the students over shared texts and issues, dissected and analyzed. One comes out of this training with the confidence that any book or article can be shredded to pieces and then re-assembled. This experience lasts a lifetime; the training remains useful in many ways in later life.

[Anonymous]

Harvard

Because it's HARVARD

[Anonymous]

Seriously OP? Harvard. And I went to Columbia.