Accepted:
Yale (CDE)
UMich (Epi)
Columbia (Epi)
Haven't heard:
UCLA (Epi)
Decision:
Yale (CDE)
Stats:
3.5/4.0 undergraduate GPA (I haven't graduated yet, but that's mine right now)
GRE Q770 AW 6.0 (verbal is embarrassing. lol)
3 years of global health experience, presented research at APHA conference
To the post above, I was trying to decide between Yale and Columbia, and the visit day definitely sealed the deal for me. While I did consider the financial benefits (Yale is giving me more money than Columbia), I wanted to attend the program that I felt was best.
Yale's visit day, in a nutshell, was fabulous. The administration did a wonderful job organizing a wonderful array of group activities--we got to have an informal meet and greet with professors/directors in the morning, followed by a very nice formal introduction by the dean on the program. Then we were broken up into our divisions, and there the directors of each program went through with us further information regarding the program, research opps, etc. Some profs. sat with us during lunch to talk to us, and everybody was super helpful and nice! I was impressed at how genuinely approachable everybody was. Career services, fin aid, and IT gave a nice little hello presentation, and then the student panel went over with us living in new haven, what they like about the program, etc. We then got to break out into small tour groups--we went to see the dorms, the medical library, new haven area, etc.
One of the biggest pros to yale is the small student to faculty ratio...I think that attention is hard to match anywhere else. Besides the visit day, they've been the most attentative and responsive to my inquiries regarding the program, and they've had numerous online chat sessions that I found useful. New Haven seems nice (granted, I'm in a big city right now so that's going to be an adjustment), and I am all for the lower cost of living (compared to columbia). And plus, I like that it's sort of a pass/fail system, and after coming from an ultra weed out university, I'm very much looking forward to taking off the grading edge.
Columbia, in contrast, has not been very reponsive to my e-mails, and I've called them a couple of times, many of which were not at all friendly. I also don't like that I've been hearing poor things about their Epi program, which is not at all helpful, if I'm going to be spending that much time and money on it. I'm judging a lot of my decision based on how I'm being treated by each individual school, granted, this is subjective I know. However, I just feel that if a school like Columbia is not going to make the effort now at least to make me feel excited and well informed about their program after admission, I don't see how they are going to after I take a leap of faith and go there. Yale has been nothing but tremendous.
So hence
Yale pros:
-individualized attention
-get to know faculty and students well
-small townish feel, lower cost of living compared to living in new york
-Pass/fail system
-academic centered (I got the impression that phd route is viable), but yet practical enough for terminal degree
-very friendly/attentative prof/admin/staff
-I like the people I met too during visit day--such an amazing group of people with so many diverse experiences, I found it fasinating to hear
Cons:
-not big city (but I'm ok with this)
Columbia pros:
-it's in nyc, opportunities are there
cons:
-I'm having a hard time getting to know their epi program/finding anyone that has good things to say beyond just a ranking comparison (and I'm all about fit vs. ranking. I rather fit well with a school then not at one with higher ranking).
Hope that helps with people that didn't go to visit day and doing the whole yale vs. columbia thing...people that went to Yale's visit day can add
