Pressure cooker schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone have fairly recent, firsthand experience with Wellesley? My D26 loved Smith and Mt. Holyoke, but I've avoided asking her to check out Wellesley bc of the historically competitive nature of the school. But the marketing stuff they send is heavy on the collaborative, supportive vibe and I've seen current students online raving about how it's extremely supportive. Any input is appreciated!

Yes, school is fantastic in all respects, kid will love it, but it is very very liberal even for a liberal person. In terms of pressure, it depends on major, CS is much tougher than others, I know a girl studied in MIT for a whole semester, her gpa is 3.6, but it doesn't matter, she got a job at Microsoft, now she is in law school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:+2. Everything I’ve read recently suggests that UChicago is no longer cut throat pressure cooker?

Chicago has changed a lot in recent years, so it's not the pressure cooker it was, and a lot of alumni are upset about it. It was part of the charm - where fun goes to die and somehow you survive.

I think these days Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, and Berkeley are the worst - mostly because they are all very good at STEM but absolutely garbage at managing human beings, particularly 18-22 year olds. Very stressful schools for those students in already difficult majors.

So, is Chicago premed more enjoyable these days?

No.

Is premed "enjoyable" anywhere? You just don't go to med school to party.

Depends on school I guess, JHU is very very demanding, lots of students burned out, then changed track.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Any of the schools on a trimester system are going to be much more challenging than a university on a traditional semester system.

Instead of a 15 week-ish semester, those schools cram a full semester of work into three 10-week terms.

The pace is intense, and the students need to be very naturally organized and focused, especially in more demanding classes such as calculus or chemistry for example, because the classes are covering the same material in 33% less time.

If your kid is not organized, gets overwhelmed, or gets run down/sick easily, I would avoid the trimester universities, such as Stanford, U Chicago, Northwestern, etc.

On the bright side, they're taking fewer classes at a time.

No, they still take 4 or 5 classes each term, more if they are double majoring or dual degree.

They have the same full class load as students at a traditional school, just condensed to 9-10 weeks.

It is a very intense pace.

[Anonymous]

I went to Cornell and did engineering. Schoolwork is your life 24/7 but you're in it together, you bond, you get through it. Pride in rite of passage. If this is not for you don't apply, it is intense but works for some students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:VT is not even known as a work hard play hard school. It is a good school, but definitely not a pressure cooker. They don’t even have weed out classes in engineering like many other schools have.

Laugh. TJ grad’s experience is that VT had multiple weed-out classes in the first 2 years. It is well known their Junior year Engineering student numbers are visibly lower than for Freshman year in Engineering. Its beneficial for down-state smart kids with fewer HS opportunities, to be sure, but to claim no weed out classes is pretty rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Any of the schools on a trimester system are going to be much more challenging than a university on a traditional semester system.

Instead of a 15 week-ish semester, those schools cram a full semester of work into three 10-week terms.

The pace is intense, and the students need to be very naturally organized and focused, especially in more demanding classes such as calculus or chemistry for example, because the classes are covering the same material in 33% less time.

If your kid is not organized, gets overwhelmed, or gets run down/sick easily, I would avoid the trimester universities, such as Stanford, U Chicago, Northwestern, etc.

WPI -- they have four 7-week quarters. Imagine taking your hardest engineering class in just 7 weeks. You have midterms or finals every 3. 5 weeks.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Princeton

P Y and M. Not sure about H or S.

Huh? Yale inflates grades.

Harvard's average GPA for undergrad's is higher than Yale and Princeton is tied.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:+2. Everything I’ve read recently suggests that UChicago is no longer cut throat pressure cooker?

Chicago has changed a lot in recent years, so it's not the pressure cooker it was, and a lot of alumni are upset about it. It was part of the charm - where fun goes to die and somehow you survive.

I think these days Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, and Berkeley are the worst - mostly because they are all very good at STEM but absolutely garbage at managing human beings, particularly 18-22 year olds. Very stressful schools for those students in already difficult majors.

Perhaps it's not the pressure cooker because it's now more collaborative than competitive? Maybe the students are just nicer now than the UChicago of before.

I don't want to derail this thread into the usual cesspool of Chicago hatred, but I do think it's ironic that the school gets flak for being a pressure cooker, and also gets flak for attempting to lower the pressure (relaxing common core reqs, expanding the Greek system, admitting more "fun"/athletic kids). Can't win.

[Anonymous]

Mt. Holyoke grad here, and I felt like it was a bit of a pressure-cooker due to the rural atmosphere and the quiet, studious nature of my classmates, especially in STEM - it just felt very serious a lot of the time, though professors were wonderful (the stress seemed student-driven). Just wasn't a typical collegiate party atmosphere at ALL. Best friend attended Dartmouth and it seemed to have a nice blend of work hard, play hard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anyone have fairly recent, firsthand experience with Wellesley? My D26 loved Smith and Mt. Holyoke, but I've avoided asking her to check out Wellesley bc of the historically competitive nature of the school. But the marketing stuff they send is heavy on the collaborative, supportive vibe and I've seen current students online raving about how it's extremely supportive. Any input is appreciated!

Not firsthand but Wellesley is having issues.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/students/academics/2025/04/01/wellesley-non-tenure-track-strike-may-impact-class-credits

Smith's culture is delightful.

MHC grad posting again - just saw this. I don't think you could go wrong with any of those three schools but Wellesley's atmosphere is suburban (wealthy small town, easy access to Boston); Smith is a rural but college town (Northampton) in the 5 college consortium; MHC is in a very rural but beautiful town, also within the Consortium. I believe all three schools are extremely demanding but supportive, but as I said in my prior post, MHC was so remote that it felt like studying took center stage. Great for a quieter kid who values low-key but deep connection, but a kid who wants a more rowdy or traditional college scene might get bored.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bucknell, Virginia Tech, Davidson

My son just graduated from VT, and it definitely wasn't a pressure cooker. Challenging, sure, but he and his friends seemed to be pretty relaxed about it and had a lot of fun too (STEM major, not engineering, and not in a frat if that matters).

VT is not even known as a work hard play hard school. It is a good school, but definitely not a pressure cooker. They don’t even have weed out classes in engineering like many other schools have.

That definitely wasn’t true back in the day. I knew lots of really smart kids who washed out of tech engineering.

[Anonymous]

Swarthmore. Felt way more intense than the rest of the WASP schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:VT is not even known as a work hard play hard school. It is a good school, but definitely not a pressure cooker. They don’t even have weed out classes in engineering like many other schools have.

Laugh. TJ grad’s experience is that VT had multiple weed-out classes in the first 2 years. It is well known their Junior year Engineering student numbers are visibly lower than for Freshman year in Engineering. Its beneficial for down-state smart kids with fewer HS opportunities, to be sure, but to claim no weed out classes is pretty rich.

The average VT engineering student has an SAT math of 700. That is a low average of course many will be weeded out. For those attending with 750-800 they find it easy. Its a joke compared to cornell or hopkins or other ivy engineering

[Anonymous]

Montgomery College - Germantown Campus

[Anonymous]

Culinary Institute of America.