Reply to What’s in the water in Chicagoland? (Univ. of Chicago & Northwestern)

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]“ Parent to a recent Northwestern grad here, and yes, that's certainly one of the key selling points of the university, and something Gwynne Shotwell talked about in her commencement speech last week: She knew she wanted to be an engineer but didn't want to be surrounded by other engineers her entire time in college. If you're a high-performing student interested in any of Northwestern's "spiked" fields that it's really good at (engineering, certain humanities/STEM fields, theater, journalism, film, music) but also know you don't want to be at just an engineering school or a conservatory or what-have-you, Northwestern's the place. I don't think there's another school in the country that does that as well as NU does.”

Michigan does it with most of the above majors and some not listed;  like fine arts, architecture, and a dedicated undergraduate business school among many others. [/quote]

DP and I say this with all the respect to Michigan, but I think there's a notable difference in size, intimacy, and avg. student caliber between those two schools.[/quote]

Really?  There is a difference in size and intimacy?  Gee, who would have thought that?  The average student difference is not that great, especially in STEM fields.  It was mentioned that NU does “other” things better than any other school in the country.  My point was Michigan does that as well, except it has an even greater breadth and depth than NU or almost all privates can offer.  There really is no other university in the country that combines so many areas of academic excellence.  [/quote]

Berkeley and UCLA instantly come to mind.  [/quote]

These are all great schools, but they are massive. At Berkeley in particular, if you're a CS major (or you're a student trying to get into the major, of which there are hundreds, if not thousands) you'll feel like you're swimming in an ocean of other CS and STEM majors. Scale matters.

As a counter-example, Northwestern has dedicated schools to journalism, music, and communication, respectively; the theater department is large and occupies a significant portion of student life. No one field dominates, and inter-disciplinary cross-collaboration is actively encouraged. The percentage of students double majoring or double degree-ing across these different schools/departments/majors is markedly higher than at peer institutions, and certainly higher than large state flagships like Michigan, Berkeley, and UCLA. The funding per capita is also much higher.

This isn't to bash Michigan, Berkeley, UCLA et al, lest their boosters get offended. Those are all fantastic schools in their own right, as well.[/quote]

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