LSE vs Columbia vs Oxford vs Wharton
For undegraduate what is the best choice for finance/start ups given that I could bolster my chances by applying ED. I know HYSP seems too idealistic so I am applying to these.
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Best choice for what ?
Perhaps I need connections to later get into private equity/ IB or startups.
This is a flawed question tbh. These are two different countries with different recruiting practices. If you want to work in London, Oxford would be the best bet but its marginal when compared to LSE. In the states, Wharton would be better than Columbia.
You think HYSP is out of reach but you're applying for Oxford? Good luck
Please don’t compare Oxford to HYPS.
Oxford is obviously a great school but Oxford and Cambridge have 20% acceptance rates. I know you can’t apply to both but as an American, you can get in with a couple of 5s on APs and a decent SAT score. It’s a much smaller ask than the shit you have to do for Ivies these days.
This is coming from someone who got into Cambridge but chose an Ivy because placement within the US is way better (I also got placed in one of the very worst colleges - it was placed terribly on that one college ranking, had a ton of grad students, and the buildings looked like shit).
But Oxbridge has minimum entry requirements listed on there websites, because of which way less people apply than to the ivies, as the people who may have lower grades just apply because of „hope“ which can not be said about Oxbridge.
In the UK you can only apply to 5 universities, that's it. There's no way someone who knows they won't get in or even is pretty sure they won't get in will ever apply. In the US you have a few reach universities when you apply, in the UK you have at most 1
Also, for Oxbridge you have to apply in October so only the people who are really gunning for these two universities will actually apply because most other people aren't ready. If you look at acceptance rates all UK unis have high acceptance rates.
As someone who "got into Cambridge" you should really know all of these things
Delusional
I profoundly disagree with your Cambridge take. It is extremely hard to get into Cambridge for courses like Economics, Land Economy, HSPS, Mathematics and Natural Sciences for example. However it is less competitive to get in for courses like Classics. Overall, it is still hard very very hard to get in. College choice for Oxbridge does not really matter unless you go to one of the mature colleges but even then it does not matter. I cannot comment for HYSP but I know for a fact that Oxbridge is top rated not just in the United Kingdom and Europe but around the world too.
The difference between Oxford and LSE is not "marginal". One is universes ahead of the other.
For recruiting its not really a big deal. Plenty of kids from both get shunned for non targets in London anyway. If you're talking about academic reputation then... yeah there's a big difference. But then the same could be argued about Harvard/Yale and Oxbridge anyway....
In what universe is the difference between Oxbridge => LSE academic reputation anything like Harvard/Yale => Oxbridge.
The ignorance of some yanks on this website is actually astounding.
I'm British, but I went to Harvard over Cambridge/Imperial since I have American citizenship. I briefly considered academia for a time before ending up in M&A; I'm not going to argue that the academic reputation of Oxbridge is deemed inferior for humanities/social sciences at all. You have fellows from HYP+ going to Oxbridge to take up roles there quite often; but I remember in my area of study (interface of science and tech), there was a chasm in reputation between MIT/Harvard/Yale and other US schools and Oxbridge...
Outside of mathematics research and some areas of material sciences, the STEM-centric academic reputation of American schools is broadly better.
Ancient texts and humanities are a different story.
Funny, I have similar background (British schooling, American blood & passport) but I chose the UK route. Small world.
What on earth are you talking about my friend. Firstly, Harvard & Yale are not broadly considered STEM powerhouses globally at all. Especially Yale - the fact you even mention Yale in a STEM context vs Cambridge is frankly delusional. Princeton / Stanford / MIT have the best STEM reputation, both academically and at the UG level amongst the US colleges.
I'd be the first to admit that Stanford & MIT edge out Cambridge & Oxford in cutting edge STEM research, but it is by no means a "chasm" like you describe. As a quant researcher at a prop shop I spend an inordinate amount of time reading papers, and a very substantial number of them are co-authored by Cam/Ox/ICL. Cam seems to be overrepresented in the field of RL (thanks to multiple Deepmind links - people always forget this is an English company) and Ox is usually overrepresented in quant finance (oxford-man institute does loads of shit).
And this is all relative to the chasm which is Cam/Ox/ICL => LSE in terms of academic rigour. I frankly cannot remember the last time I read a paper from LSE. I think they do a lot in the social sciences space perhaps - not my field of expertise.
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