Dartmouth v Georgetown v Cornell Undergrad

Hey everyone,

Current high school senior fortunate enough to have been admitted to Dartmouth, Georgetown, and Cornell. Interested in hearing about how these schools place into IB and PE out of undergrad. Cost for each school comes out to around the same --- just wanted to hear some perspective about (1) general student life at these schools and (2) what placement looks like.

From what I've been able to read up on so far, it seems like Georgetown / Dartmouth >> Cornell. Already pretty decided against Cornell (weather, competitive, etc.) but am interested in hearing about how the other two size up. I've heard good things about Dartmouth's alumni network but haven't been able to find much information about Georgetown.

Thanks in advance

30 Comments
 

Also for what it matters here, i'd personally take dartmouth. But ppl choose between gtown/cornell 50-50 and the data shows it.Know ppl at gtown who took it over HYPS much less fucking cornell/dartmouth. No shame to dart tho, i heavy fuck with that school. Those kids r cool. Great place.

My ultimate take is u probs have the best / easiest IB / PE chances from Gtown, but dart is the best school / environment. Would go dartmouth fs.

 

Lol georgetown over HYP. I literally cannot believe that, have a friend at gtown, very smart guy, but he says no one would ever choose dartmouth over HYP, far worse everythinng

 

You can make a legit argument for any of these schools. I chose Georgetown over both of these, and I'm doing fine and have no regrets. Georgetown's alumni network has been very helpful, the location is great, the basketball team will be getting better (adding to the school environment). Georgetown and Dartmouth are such different schools:

Georgetown: catholic/jesuit school, not as fratty (still fun parties/bars in DC), near DC, more well known sports

Dartmouth: fratty, ivy-league, rural, small-school

Gotta pick the school you think you'll like better socially/culturally. Can't go wrong with either tbh.

 
Most Helpful

You may have already decided against Cornell but let me tell you, the school gets more flak than almost any other school on this forum (and from USNWR relative to other rankings polls). I went there and I had a great time, as did most of the people I knew. The kids who didn’t like it as much (that I knew) were almost all pre-med kids who were struggling to keep up with the coursework. Majors like AEM, Hotel, ILR, and Econ aren’t all that difficult. Absolutely loved Dyson and picked it over Dartmouth (didn’t apply to Georgetown but got into other schools of similar or better prestige / ranking / whatever the hell people care about). Also weather at Dartmouth is just as bad, if not worse.

It’s worth sharing that a fellow Dyson guy hooked me up with my banking internship, which set me up nicely for my UMM PE gig out of my analyst stint. And a Cornell alum hooked me up with my sophomore buyside internship as well.

Can’t go wrong with any of the three schools. Part of the reason I picked Cornell was for the major and cost – absent that, I might have picked Dartmouth. 

 

This! Honestly most of my pre-med and engineering kids at Cornell have social lives too and do fun stuff but there's a vocal minority of them that struggle and their voice kind of drowns out everyone else who is having a solid time. I'm curious do you still keep in touch with your friends from Cornell?

 

You're in HS. Don't overthink it. You might become a freshman and not even want to do IB/PE anymore. 


Don't choose your college for what you think you want to do. Open up the possibilities and go to the school you think you'll gain the biggest network from. Those 4 years in college but a stamp on your resume for the rest of your life and you'll be talking to people about your experience/network moreso than which IB / PE firm you work at. 

lifeandlevfin dot com does a nice job catering to people in your age range (though more PE/DCM focused). I strong suggest not to pick your college based off of IB/PE aspirations. 

 

Going to a top Ivy, but if I had the choice between these schools, I would choose Georgetown.

Georgetown absolutely destroys Dartmouth in IB placement, and if anyone says otherwise, look at the plethora of online data.

Georgetown places slightly more than Cornell. But you have to remember that the Cornell student body is about 3x the size of Georgetown, and most people at Georgetown are interested in something other than IB (government/law/consulting, etc.).

So you have a better chance for IB coming from Georgetown.

And don't worry about the Ivy branding. Everyone knows that Dartmouth and Cornell are just wanna-be HYP.

At least Georgetown has its own unique brand. And although being in a rural area like Ithaca, NY, or Hanover, NH has its pros, DC sounds more exciting. Georgetown is tucked away from the rest of DC but is close enough to take an Uber into the city.

 

FYI OP there is no shot this dude doesn’t go to Georgetown. If you’re really a high school or college student going to Princeton, don’t opine on recruiting when you haven’t gone through it yet..?

For PE, Georgetown is substantially worse than Dartmouth or Cornell. No clue why that is but the numbers support that. For IB, school barely matters and as long as you’re at a target and not visibly dumb or socially incompetent, you’ll get something.

Georgetown is a great school but unless you’re a multi-generational legacy, there’s no reason to handicap yourself for no reason. Dartmouth kills it in buyside recruiting and is extremely fun (have friends who went there). Cornell is a strong STEM school that can open up quant gigs if you’re smart enough to major in something like that, or you can also land IB/PE roles because alum are everywhere. I really don’t see what Georgetown has on the other two. Maybe Carlyle DC placement but who the hell wants to live in the sleepiest city in the US.

Last point, Cornell and Dartmouth may be wannabe HYPs but literally every school in the world is so I’m not sure what you were getting at there. 

 

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