Anonymous wrote:It's close and highly ranked...
Is it the neighborhood? Miserable student body??

Yes, but mainly because it's located in grody Maryland.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hopkins is almost all rich (70% make over $120K) and all asian/middle eastern Americans and international. I think it may be 35% white.

It is a typical international type of undegraduate school. Not a lot of partying, not a lot of sports, not a lot of socializing. The main and only goal is study and get into graduate school. That is not a bad thing, but it isn't the experience many Americans want. For my child, she was in a top rigorous private school and wanted nothing to do with the same atmosphere in college. She wants some socializing, school spirit, and lots of friends and memories. She still chose a top school, but wanted a more social feel. For kids that don't want the American fluff, chose JHU. It is no nonsense.

Also, JHU is less than 10% in-state. People around here know it is in a terrible neighborhood. Unless they truly want to be a doctor, all the other ivy's seem more appealing to kids around here.

New poster here.
I went to public health graduate school at Hopkins and met my husband who was in medical school. I lived in Charles Village and did most of my studying on the main campus (Homewood). I agree with this poster and the one before who's dad was a professor.
While we had a great time in the greater Hopkins/Baltimore community in our 20's, I would never want my kids to go there for undergrad. It's difficult to explain but it just always felt like a pretty soulless and competitive place. Think of your typical pre-med
undergraduate organic chemistry course and then extrapolate it to almost an entire university. I came from a small liberal arts college and my husband from a large state school and both of our undergraduate colleges had about 100 times the joy and life of Hopkins undergrad.
it's just dull. And seemingly very competitive. Something like 99% of the kids are pre-med (I exaggerate but it's pretty darn high). That does not make for a fun environment.

Doe JHU have an inordinately high success rate placing those pre-med undergrads in medical school? I mean wouldnt your odds be much better to go to, a state flagship or a 20-40 ranked SLAC and be THE kid with the great GPA? I mean there must be JHU kids who are middle to low of the pack at JHU who never get into medical school but would otherwise shine at a diff school.

Their pre-med office webpage states that 80% of their graduates who apply to medical school are accepted.

Somewhere else I read said that up to 40% of their graduates will apply to medical school. So not 99% but pretty darn high for any university.

There is no standard way of counting percentages that are accepted, so you have to take anything with a grain of salt. Some may cite all that apply, some only those with over a certain GPA, and others only those that get a recommendation from a committee.

Shhh....dont tell anyone. Its a hidden gem amongst the top 10. Please keep telling yourself its in a bad neighborhood (because Harvard Square, New Haven, Harlem and West Philly are sooooo safe).

Its small like a SLAC but has University resources and every Wall Street Bank, Large Consulting Firm and prestigious employers know its for real academics.

EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY classmates got into one of their first 3 job choices or first 3 graduate schools they aimed for...every single one.

We are a middle Ivy and only about 5 schools could say they are better. But keep ignoring us...to your peril.

Anonymous wrote:Because it’s a miserable pressure cooker in a bad neighborhood

Ah so THAT’S why they have ten applicants for every slot. Gotcha.

Because it’s a miserable pressure cooker in a bad neighborhood

Anonymous wrote:The way Baltimore is different, is that it is hard to travel around town without crossing through those neighborhoods.

I have lived there, in DC and in New York. It was not hard for me to avoid the high crime areas in other cities.

Almost all the areas discussed in that link are in east and west Baltimore, and pockets in northeast / northwest.

Hopkins students will spend all their time traversing the north / south central axis that is known as the White L. It is very easy to spend your four years at Hopkins and never go anywhere near the areas discussed in the link. I know this because I grew up in North Baltimore and we just never went to east or west Baltimore other than for community service outreach events. The sketchiest area that Hopkins students may cross while going to Canton or Federal Hill is probably North Avenue and there's a lot of gentrification going on around North at Charles/St. Paul/Calvert and Maryland in this central corridor.

It's beyond me that some people think going to college in one small part of a large city somehow is akin to being under threat by the entire city. I went to an Ivy League school in another city and 99% of my time was spent on campus and in the immediate adjoining area. The city had problematic neighborhoods not too far away but it meant nothing to me. The same is true of Hopkins students. They will spend almost all their time on campus / Charles Village with the periodic foray to the waterfront areas for the bars or to Hampden for eateries. They will never go to east or west Baltimore or even spend hours hanging out on North Avenue.

I know Baltimore has bad problems. It's frustrating and I'm not blind to the realities. I know unfortunate people have been killed. I'm fully aware of East/West Baltimore and the other deprived areas. But it's not akin to denial. Thousands of people live happily in Baltimore and have a great life and it's frustrating to see people going around acting as if we live in a war zone dodging bullets daily.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to live in Baltimore, on Charles St. 3 blocks up the street from the inner harbor. Absolutely loved it. Fells Point, Federal Hill, the harbor, etc...

But for college students - JHU and Loyola. It is the crappy party of the city. No thanks.

But the kids that go there don't socialize at all.

Three blocks north of the Harbor on Charles means you lived in the traditional downtown core, near Lombard or Baltimore streets. While it's fine in the daytime it's sketchy at night. Of all the places to live in Baltimore, downtown is not where I'd want to live. It's certainly sketchier and crappier than anything near the Hopkins Homewood or Loyola's campuses.

NP

You don’t know Baltimore very well

I don't think you're a new poster. I grew up in Baltimore. I grew up in Roland Park! In the bad, bad days of the 1980s and 1990s when Baltimore was even worse than today. I grew up surrounded by Hopkins faculty and administrators. I go back to Baltimore all the time. I have friends who live all over the city although most along the north central corridor from the harbor to Towson, in other words the "White L" and Hopkins is in this corridor.

Downtown Baltimore especially around Baltimore and Lombard streets three blocks north of the harbor is sketchy at night. It's not east or west Baltimore by any stretch of the imagination but it's certainly sketchy at a level you don't see in Charles Village, with homeless people and bums and the through traffic from east/west looking to prey on people. There's never many people on the streets and feels too empty for comfort. While I have no problems walking around Canton or Federal Hill late night with some sensible street smarts, I can't say that about downtown Baltimore, and even Mount Vernon is a bit sketchier late night than I'd like. Some areas are better than others, of course.

Too selective, too hard, too close, too expensive. Oh and racism. This pretty much sums up why JHU isn’t discussed much here.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to live in Baltimore, on Charles St. 3 blocks up the street from the inner harbor. Absolutely loved it. Fells Point, Federal Hill, the harbor, etc...

But for college students - JHU and Loyola. It is the crappy party of the city. No thanks.

But the kids that go there don't socialize at all.

Three blocks north of the Harbor on Charles means you lived in the traditional downtown core, near Lombard or Baltimore streets. While it's fine in the daytime it's sketchy at night. Of all the places to live in Baltimore, downtown is not where I'd want to live. It's certainly sketchier and crappier than anything near the Hopkins Homewood or Loyola's campuses.

NP

You don’t know Baltimore very well

The way Baltimore is different, is that it is hard to travel around town without crossing through those neighborhoods.

I have lived there, in DC and in New York. It was not hard for me to avoid the high crime areas in other cities.

I went to Loyola in the early 90s which is just a mile or so north of Hopkins. I work in Baltimore City and drive past Hopkins a few times per week. Just like at Loyola, we knew exactly where not to go past especially alone. To the north, west and south, it was safe. To the east, don’t go there. I’m sure it is similar at Hopkins. How is this different than other cities? My nephew went to Penn and said the same thing. My other nephew went to school in Chicago and told us the same thing. Hopkins is very well known but I think of it as a school for students who only really want to study. That’s fine if that’s what you want from your four years there but I would think most students want more than that.

As one of the negative posters, just let me state that:

1) I lived there (in Homewood) for more than 4 years (as a student)

2) I have never watched the Wire

3) My doctor was kidnapped at gunpoint in Baltimore, put in the trunk of his own car, and forced to take money out of ATM's around the city. Luckily, he survived, physically intact but mentally traumatized.

So just stop. I am glad you like it there, but other posters are not making this stuff up.

Anonymous wrote:Homewood is part of Baltimore. The whole city is not that big.

College students don't stay in the leafy suburbs, they drive to parties and bars late at night.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/baltimore/370675-poll-most-dangerous-strip-baltimore.html

College kids take ubers these days.

I was intrigued so I looked at your link. The irony is that anyone who knows anything about Baltimore knows that the dangerous roads and areas discussed in your link are not near the Hopkins Homewood campus and Hopkins kids are not traversing these areas in their ubers to Fells Point or Canton or Federal Hill.

Anonymous wrote:I used to live in Baltimore, on Charles St. 3 blocks up the street from the inner harbor. Absolutely loved it. Fells Point, Federal Hill, the harbor, etc...

But for college students - JHU and Loyola. It is the crappy party of the city. No thanks.

But the kids that go there don't socialize at all.

Three blocks north of the Harbor on Charles means you lived in the traditional downtown core, near Lombard or Baltimore streets. While it's fine in the daytime it's sketchy at night. Of all the places to live in Baltimore, downtown is not where I'd want to live. It's certainly sketchier and crappier than anything near the Hopkins Homewood or Loyola's campuses.

Anonymous wrote:Homewood is part of Baltimore. The whole city is not that big.

College students don't stay in the leafy suburbs, they drive to parties and bars late at night.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/baltimore/370675-poll-most-dangerous-strip-baltimore.html

What are you trying to say? That students at Hopkins are being murdered left and right and the campus overrun with heroin addicts?



I'm confident there are posters on this thread who have never been to Baltimore and are basing everything they say off of watching the Wire. Yeah, sure, you need some street smarts, Homewood is in what I'd call a semi-urban area and gets petty crime targeting Hopkins students. The university just got permission from the state to arm their police. There are plenty of schools that have this problem too, like Penn in West Philly, or Chicago. Does it justify it? No. But screeching about some non-violent unethical donation/petty corruption of the Baltimore mayor as a reason for not going to Hopkins is pretty bizarre.