UMich vs. Emory

[doctordoctor123]

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I find myself in an extremely fortunate position to have just been accepted into these two schools. I was wondering if I could hear the perspective of other SDNers on michigan and emory. Whether it's the opinion of other accepted students, current students, interviewees, or anyone else, i would really appreciate hearing your thoughts on anything and everything related to these two med schools (the academics, location, happiness of students, etc.) I understand that they are very different schools in terms of grading, geography, weather, etc. but I am having a difficult time deciding where I would be a better fit.

Thanks in advance!

 

[junebuguf]

I have never been to Michigan, but I spent a year in Atlanta and my ex-gf was a med student at Emory, so I spent a lot of time on their campus and got to see a lot of the school's facilities from its student housing (excellent, btw), libraries (pristine), and teaching hospitals (you can eat off the floors at Crawford Long). Plus Emory has affiliations with Grady which is one of the country's largest urban medical centers, so in addition to the cutting edge medicine at Eggleston and Crawford Long, you also get exposed to a diverse array of urban, inner-city medicine.

Emory's student rec center is pathetic, however, though it makes up for it with the quality of its student housing, which has some of the best apartments I have ever seen at a university--then again, for a private institution with the means at its disposal, I would expect no less.

The one big advantage Emory has is in quality of life. Atlanta is a great city, the weather is much more temperate that in Michigan, and it has a lot more to explore culturally. You will have some downtime in med school, and Atlanta has a great nightlife. Emory has no collegiate atmosphere though, so if you're a mich native or even just a big college sports fan, you're out of luck. Atlanta cant compete with the Big House at Michigan, and big ten basketball.

I cannot comment on the catiness of students at Michigan, but at Emory there is a fair bit of competing going on. Since Emory's incoming class size is relatively small compared to most schools, and most everyone is gunning for derm (Emory perennially a 1 or 2 ranked derm program) or ortho or something else competitive, you will work your a** to impress profs--last year several students with straight As in basic science and only one B in rotations got left off for Junior AOA. You could say that competition is tough at every school, but at Emory it is downright fierce.

A good place to start, however, is with each school's match list from the last five years. Find out what fields you are interested in and how much intangibles such as weather, recreational activities, urban nightlife, et matter. Look at where at schools grads have matched, specifically in disciplines you're considering--if you're interested in something competitive, this becomes more important. Also, where would you want to settle eventually? Then rank each school by your subjective score on each metric.

 

[doctordoctor123]

I have never been to Michigan, but I spent a year in Atlanta and my ex-gf was a med student at Emory, so I spent a lot of time on their campus and got to see a lot of the school's facilities from its student housing (excellent, btw), libraries (pristine), and teaching hospitals (you can eat off the floors at Crawford Long). Plus Emory has affiliations with Grady which is one of the country's largest urban medical centers, so in addition to the cutting edge medicine at Eggleston and Crawford Long, you also get exposed to a diverse array of urban, inner-city medicine.

Emory's student rec center is pathetic, however, though it makes up for it with the quality of its student housing, which has some of the best apartments I have ever seen at a university--then again, for a private institution with the means at its disposal, I would expect no less.

The one big advantage Emory has is in quality of life. Atlanta is a great city, the weather is much more temperate that in Michigan, and it has a lot more to explore culturally. You will have some downtime in med school, and Atlanta has a great nightlife. Emory has no collegiate atmosphere though, so if you're a mich native or even just a big college sports fan, you're out of luck. Atlanta cant compete with the Big House at Michigan, and big ten basketball.

I cannot comment on the catiness of students at Michigan, but at Emory there is a fair bit of competing going on. Since Emory's incoming class size is relatively small compared to most schools, and most everyone is gunning for derm (Emory perennially a 1 or 2 ranked derm program) or ortho or something else competitive, you will work your a** to impress profs--last year several students with straight As in basic science and only one B in rotations got left off for Junior AOA. You could say that competition is tough at every school, but at Emory it is downright fierce.

A good place to start, however, is with each school's match list from the last five years. Find out what fields you are interested in and how much intangibles such as weather, recreational activities, urban nightlife, et matter. Look at where at schools grads have matched, specifically in disciplines you're considering--if you're interested in something competitive, this becomes more important. Also, where would you want to settle eventually? Then rank each school by your subjective score on each metric.

thanks for that informative post! anyone else have any thoughts or input on the two schools?

 

[DrRads101]

Umich. Much better reputation. Big ten sports. Huge campus facilities and Big ten school so that means lots and lots of campus resources and tons of college students which makes life more exciting IMO. And though Detroit gets a bad rap, it is a much bigger city than Atlanta, and Ann Arbor is really a suburb of Detroit, in a way, so it's not like you'll miss out on big city cultural things if you are in the mood for them, not to mention you are a couple hour drive from a completely Tier 1 world city... Chicago. So I'm not sure on the quality of life differences unless you just don't like wearing a heavy coat in the winter and you want to trade extreme cold in the winter (Michigan) for extreme humidity in the summer (Atlanta). The traffic in Atlanta is also a nightmare, from my own experience. Just my 2 cents. But as far as schools go UMich is widely regarded as one of the best medical schools in the country while Emory is considered a "great school."

 

[owenmichael]

Umich. Much better reputation. Big ten sports. Huge campus facilities and Big ten school so that means lots and lots of campus resources and tons of college students which makes life more exciting IMO. And though Detroit gets a bad rap, it is a much bigger city than Atlanta, and Ann Arbor is really a suburb of Detroit, in a way, so it's not like you'll miss out on big city cultural things if you are in the mood for them, not to mention you are a couple hour drive from a completely Tier 1 world city... Chicago. So I'm not sure on the quality of life differences unless you just don't like wearing a heavy coat in the winter and you want to trade extreme cold in the winter (Michigan) for extreme humidity in the summer (Atlanta). The traffic in Atlanta is also a nightmare, from my own experience. Just my 2 cents. But as far as schools go UMich is widely regarded as one of the best medical schools in the country while Emory is considered a "great school."

I completely agree, U of Mich easily over Emory. It is one of the best schools in the nation.

 

[Llenroc]

Emory is nice, but it's not a school that I would pay $50,000 a year to attend. I would much rather attend an average in-state public medical school than go there. U-Mich is probably one of the few medical schools for which it's worth dishing out the extra cash to attend, if you've already got an acceptance from your state school.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

Detroit is not a much bigger city than Atlanta.

Census 2003:
Detroit MSA: 4.8 million
Atlanta MSA: 4.6 million

Ridiculous.

 

[ti89]

Go to where you like better. Take a chance to go ot 2nd look weekend etc. Both have great reps and as long as you are motivated you can get just as far from both places.

 

[gostudy]

I find myself in an extremely fortunate position to have just been accepted into these two schools. I was wondering if I could hear the perspective of other SDNers on michigan and emory. Whether it's the opinion of other accepted students, current students, interviewees, or anyone else, i would really appreciate hearing your thoughts on anything and everything related to these two med schools (the academics, location, happiness of students, etc.) I understand that they are very different schools in terms of grading, geography, weather, etc. but I am having a difficult time deciding where I would be a better fit.

Thanks in advance!

You probably will not be able to decide where to go based on these boards. Everyone has biases. You will hear those that say "Go to UMich" or "Go to Emory." The bottom line is that 1. many don't have their facts straight (see the post about Detroit being much bigger than ATL) and 2. what you see on these boards is how certain individuals experienced the school. You should take all advice with a grain of salt. My advice for what it's worth is to go to the second look weekends if each school has one and if they don't it's really worth your while to spend the money and check the school's out for a second time. Everyone experiences things differently and you'll have to find out for yourself what you like. Each school being in the top 20 (if you care about such stuff) means that you are going to be around awesome students. Going to Emory or UMich is not going to hinder your future successes. For that matter you can get pretty much any residency you want at any US allo school. So you must decide what school will most allow you to grow as a person and prepare you as a person to enter a certain field for residency.

 

[DrRads101]

Detroit is not a much bigger city than Atlanta.

Census 2003:
Detroit MSA: 4.8 million
Atlanta MSA: 4.6 million

Ridiculous.

Sure it is...

Atlanta: 416,474 over 131.8 sq miles.
Detroit: 951,270 over 138.8 sq miles.

I think you are confusing "city" with "suburbs."

 

[Wake2Wake7]

The traffic in Atlanta is also a nightmare

**shudders at the thought of living/dealing with Atlanta's traffic nightmare again**

last summer, I lived ~15 miles away from the hospital at which I worked... I had to be there at 530 or 600 every morning... took me 30-45 minutes on a 'good day'

 

[PickyBicky]

I find myself in an extremely fortunate position to have just been accepted into these two schools. I was wondering if I could hear the perspective of other SDNers on michigan and emory. Whether it's the opinion of other accepted students, current students, interviewees, or anyone else, i would really appreciate hearing your thoughts on anything and everything related to these two med schools (the academics, location, happiness of students, etc.) I understand that they are very different schools in terms of grading, geography, weather, etc. but I am having a difficult time deciding where I would be a better fit.

Thanks in advance!

Congrats. I'm a current MS4 @ emory. I would discourage you from coming. PM me for my 2 cents.

-PB.

 

[Dr.Pdizzle]

you are more likely to have your car stolen in detroit than in any other city in america. Point? Go to UMich if you don't like cars and want it stolen No but in all seriousness, Ann Arbor is a really cool town to live in with lots of stuff to do other than swan-dive into books.


PS: why is detroit even considered in analyzing UMich?? It's not like they're right next to each other and they're completely different cities (Ann Arbor and Detroit).

 

[Doctor&Geek]

Sure it is...

Atlanta: 416,474 over 131.8 sq miles.
Detroit: 951,270 over 138.8 sq miles.

I think you are confusing "city" with "suburbs."

What a horrible standard. You know just as well as I that Atlanta city proper is bisected by the Cobb county / Fulton county boundary.

Anyways, your claim that one "city" or whatever your statistical standard is significantly larger than the other is absolutely dubious to anyone who's actually visited both places.

 

[DrRads101]

^

I'm not going to get in an argument about this because it is inarguable so consider this my last post about this... Detroit is a much bigger city than Atlanta. This is an absolute fact and I thought everyone knew this but apparently I was wrong. It's not even close really... it has more than twice as many people! I'm not using some made-up standard.... just look up what the biggest cities in this country are. It will take you a couple seconds to Google this. It doesn't matter where a city is "bisected" in this case because both Atlanta and Detroit take up about the same land area so this is a completely apples to apples comparison, so if you are implying that this comparison "isn't fair because Atlanta is bisected" then you are in effect saying that Atlanta is so suburban that I have to give it at least twice the land area in order to reach the same amount of people?

Detroit has over twice the people in the same land area as Atlanta... the city population and urbanity is not even close. And if you really, really want to include the exurban people living in the woods and the Waffle Houses in your definition of "city" and "culture"... metro Detroit is still bigger, but I don't know of a lot of people that consider the suburbs and how many Super Walmarts are up GA400 past the perimeter in Atlanta or far west past I-275 in Detroit when considering how urban and big a city is. When someone says "show me the city of Chicago" I don't take them out to Schaumburg, IL and show them how far the suburbs sprawl.

Besides Ann Arbor is not really in Detroit anyway... my whole point was that someone mentioned that you would get better cultural opportunities at Emory than UMich because Emory is in Atlanta, while they may not have realized that Detroit is like a 30 minute drive from Ann Arbor and it is a much bigger city than Atlanta.

 

[gostudy]

**shudders at the thought of living/dealing with Atlanta's traffic nightmare again**

last summer, I lived ~15 miles away from the hospital at which I worked... I had to be there at 530 or 600 every morning... took me 30-45 minutes on a 'good day'

Have you lived in LA or Houston? 30-45 minutes to drive 15 miles is hardly out of the norm.

 

[ti89]

^

I'm not going to get in an argument about this because it is inarguable so consider this my last post about this... Detroit is a much bigger city than Atlanta. This is an absolute fact and I thought everyone knew this but apparently I was wrong. It's not even close really... it has more than twice as many people! I'm not using some made-up standard.... just look up what the biggest cities in this country are. It will take you a couple seconds to Google this. It doesn't matter where a city is "bisected" in this case because both Atlanta and Detroit take up about the same land area so this is a completely apples to apples comparison and if you are saying "this isn't fair because Atlanta is bisected" then you are in effect saying that Atlanta is so suburban that I have to give it at least twice the land area in order to give it the same amount of people?

Detroit has over twice the people in the same land area at Atlanta... the city population and urbanity is not even close. And if you really, really want to include the exurban people living in the woods and the Waffle Houses in your definition of "city" and "culture"... metro Detroit is still bigger, but I don't know of a lot of people that consider the suburbs and how many Super Walmarts are up GA400 past the perimeter in Atlanta or far west past I-275 in Detroit when considering how urban and big a city is. When someone says "show me the city of Chicago" I don't take them out to Schaumburg, IL and show them how far the suburbs sprawl.

Besides Ann Arbor is not really in Detroit anyway... my whole point was that someone mentioned that you would get better cultural opportunities at Emory than UMich because Emory is in Atlanta, while the may forget that Detroit is like a 30 minutes drive from Ann Arbor and is a much bigger city than Atlanta.

Detroit and Ann Arbor are not close so bringing Detroit into the talk is completely useless. I don't know about Emory or its surroundings but Ann Arbor is a true college town. As a student in Ann Arbor you will barely go to detroit at all so this idea of cultural opp in Detroit is useless to talk about (Detroit is about 45 miles away so about 45 min to 1 hour drive) and really no one at Ann Arbor makes that drive out there because there is no reason to.

 

[DrRads101]

^

Yeah.... I just more or less brought Detroit up because someone mentioned "big city" type stuff as being in advantage of Emory, and for about the same amount of time it apparently can take to go 15 miles in Atlanta, you can be in a much bigger city when living in Ann Arbor, though I doubt many people make these trips to Detroit as Ann Arbor has everything you'd ever really want for its size. Though I have known a few UMich students who took day trips to Chicago fairly regularly on the weekends (like once a month).

 

[QofQuimica]

Congrats. I'm a current MS4 @ emory. I would discourage you from coming. PM me for my 2 cents.

-PB.

Never mind the size of the cities. 🙄 Who else is dying of curiosity as to why PickyBicky discourages people from coming to Emory??? Come on, PB, don't be so mysterious. What's so horrible about Emory that you would discourage everyone from coming?

 

[gostudy]

Never mind the size of the cities. 🙄 Who else is dying of curiosity as to why PickyBicky discourages people from coming to Emory??? Come on, PB, don't be so mysterious. What's so horrible about Emory that you would discourage everyone from coming?

Especially as an M4, so it's not like one year's bad luck.

 

[kid_ic]

I dunno where JPaikman is coming from ... CTwickman is right. Atlanta isnt even close to Detroit in size. Not that we're talking about this anymore, but JPaik's posts are completely off, thats all.

What a horrible standard. You know just as well as I that Atlanta city proper is bisected by the Cobb county / Fulton county boundary.

Anyways, your claim that one "city" or whatever your statistical standard is significantly larger than the other is absolutely dubious to anyone who's actually visited both places.

 

[Bones2008]

so, as an M2 at UMich, my thoughts:

*to put the whole detroit thing to rest, the presence of it nearby is a plus and not a negative in any way. detroit, compared to other cities, sucks; but we never have to go there except for fun things. it's great to have pro sports teams and many major medical centers within an hour's drive or so. there's also a lot of concerts, etc.

*I really like this school. the people here are a lot of fun. if you felt like you fit in with the people on your interview day (and even if you didn't), there is a good chance you will enjoy going to school here from the social aspect. we work hard here (especially during 2nd/3rd years), but having good people around makes it better.

*michigan football is awesome.

*do not come here if you want a lot of PBL or small group experiences. do not come here if you want no PBL or small group experiences. on the whole (of course it depends on the sequence), they represent a portion, though not a significant one, of a curriculum here.

*I cannot tell you how much I love sleeping in till noon and watching lectures online at two times the normal speed in my pajamas.

*in reference to the competitiveness discussed above, I can personally say that, at least in the first two years, there is none of it at umich. the pass/fail grading system works wonders in fostering a pleasant, cooperative atmosphere. there is no longer junior AOA here.

alright then, good luck with your decision.

 

[thegenius]

Detroit is not a much bigger city than Atlanta.

Census 2003:
Detroit MSA: 4.8 million
Atlanta MSA: 4.6 million

Ridiculous.

Detroit proper has under 1 million. Detroit City is desolate and empty. There is nothing in Detroit.

I lived in Bloomfield Hills (a suburb of Detroit) for 24 years and I know a ton about Detroit.

Ann Arbor is not a suburb of Detroit (it's 45 minutes away) and is 3.5 hours from Downtown Chicago.

 

[veenut]

just want to point out that detroit may suck, but the pistons are SICK right now. good lord.

 

[deleted77919]

Never mind the size of the cities. 🙄 Who else is dying of curiosity as to why PickyBicky discourages people from coming to Emory??? Come on, PB, don't be so mysterious. What's so horrible about Emory that you would discourage everyone from coming?

I too am curious, the thoughts of an M4 are particularly relevant, and I along with many other people applied/interviewed at Emory and always prefer more data to less . . .

 

[DrRads101]

Detroit proper has under 1 million. Detroit City is desolate and empty. There is nothing in Detroit.

I lived in Bloomfield Hills (a suburb of Detroit) for 24 years and I know a ton about Detroit.

Ann Arbor is not a suburb of Detroit (it's 45 minutes away) and is 3.5 hours from Downtown Chicago.

1. The City of Detroit has about 950,000 people. For a city that is "empty" that is a hell of a lot of people (which begs the question, if that is an "empty" city what does that make Atlanta when it has less than half the people in the same area? Not that you care though...).

2. I said Ann Arbor is a suburb of Detroit, IN A WAY, in the sense it is as close to Detroit and even closer than many true suburbs of other cities, and it is officially part of the Detroit consolidated metro area (Detroit's CMSA is 5,456,428 as of Census 2000, and part of the official "metro area" is Ann Arbor). Saying "it's 45 minutes away" as a reason a place is not close enough to be considered part of the metro area doesn't do much when these days there are suburbs in many cities that are over an hour away from the downtown.

3. "There is nothing in Detroit." Wow. Well, you gave yourself away when you mentioned where you grew up and your comments get down to the very root of Detroit's problems. I'm going to take a wild guess and say you're parents are most likely very wealthy. You are white. And you are now living in one of the most expensive cities in the country and doing it off of mommy and daddy's bank account. Most of your experiences with Detroit was going "into the city" to see a hockey game and getting the hell out for all we know since you obviously didn't live there. My point is... you are from Bloomfield Hills. You would never hear comments that a mostly white city of 950,000 people was "empty." 950,000, mostly African American people... that equals "nothing" there--better just to ignore them right? I mean why bother with Detroit when you are from Bloomfield Hills. In my opinion nearly all of Detroit's problems can be rooted to racist attitudes like this, coming from wealthy, well off suburbs who only exist *because of* Detroit, no less.

 

[ti89]

Detroit itself is fine and plenty of happenings and rebuilding right now with the superbowl there this year, the final four next year I believe etc and with the casinos and all. I grew up outside of detroit also and saying it is desolate and empty is way off.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

I don't know about the rest of you, but if one has the habit turning statements like "X city is empty" into "that guy is racist", well, has something more than just an axe to grind.

The point being it is dubious to name as fact that Detroit is a *much larger city* than Atlanta. By the most reasonable and accepted standard (MSA) the size is nearly equal. Pointing out that just because the city itself has a higher density proves nothing other than one city has more sprawl than another. It would argue that cities like San Francisco (population 600,000), Kansas City (KS? MO?), Washington DC (no benefit of Virginia side?), Dallas/Ft Worth, Minneapolis/St Paul are not large cities or at least do not have underestimated size.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_metropolitan_statistical_areas_by_population

Eh, whatever, we're all off topic here. If you can't tolerate heat, or if you don't have an outstanding reason to be in the South, then go to Michigan.

 

[DrRads101]

^

You're just sour because you were way off about Atlanta being a bigger city than Detroit. Now you have an axe to grind with me apparently rather than just admitting you were wrong.

I want you to look at this just to get a sense of where I am coming from...

Single-family new house construction building permits in Bloomfield Hills, MI:
2001: 11 homes, average cost: $1,033,900
2002: 8 homes, average cost: $2,481,900
2003: 9 homes, average cost: $1,000,000
2004: 14 homes, average cost: $1,431,200

I do get angry when I hear someone from Bloomfield Hills, where over 90% of the residents are white, the average house is a mansion, the average income is $170,000 (!), and the average residents' knowledge of Detroit comes from the news and an occasional Redwings game on the weekend, talk about how the mostly black, middle and lower income city of 950,000 people, that is the very reason their suburb exists, is "empty" has "nothing there."

 

[Doctor&Geek]

Really, you need to get a grip, because you aren't answering any of my points, and in the meantime, you're off in lala land berating against the attitudes of the rich, when in fact there are plenty of better things to argue for.

(This comes from the owner of a <$100,000 home with income <$25000.)

 

[DrRads101]

OK what is the question you posed?

 

[DrRads101]

Ahh I see... you edited all of your posts....

Face it, you lost and you are grasping at straws. I can't believe someone is this stubborn. Detroit is a MUCH LARGER CITY THAN ATLANTA. This is a fact, and there is no argument. We are arguing about FACTS. I am fully aware that the official "MSA's" are similar but that is METRO AREA and even that is not comparable because there is also a thing called consolidated metro area which is used for places like Detroit. If you look up Detroit CMSA you will get a lot more relavant results than Detroit MSA on Google because the CMSA is what more people refer to when talking about metro Detroit, which BTW is around 5.6 million people which I would say even on a suburban sprawl level is "much larger" than Atlanta. But I never claimed Detroit's metro area is "much larger" than Atlanta so I don't know why you even brought up suburbs to begin with.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

Ahh I see... you edited your post....

Face it, you lost and you are grasping at straws. I can't believe someone is this stubborn. Detroit is a MUCH LARGER CITY THAN ATLANTA. This is a fact, and there is no argument. We are arguing about FACTS. I am fully aware that the official "MSA's" are similar but that is METRO AREA and even that is not comparable because there is also a thing called consolidated metro area which is used for places like Detroit. If you look up "Detroit CMSA" you will get a lot more results than "Detroit MSA" on Google because the CMSA is what more people refer to when talking about metro Detroit, which BTW is around 5.6 million people which I would say even on a suburban sprawl level is "much larger" than Atlanta. But I never claimed Detroit's metro area is "much larger" than Atlanta so I don't know why you even brought up suburbs to begin with.

Frankly, I'm less concerned with whether or not believe that by city boundary Detroit's population is larger than Atlanta than your blanket statement that Detroit is "much larger" than Atlanta. Its getting ridiculous the way you're changing standards from "city population" to CMSA (actually now called CSA) to whatever. Calling a city "much larger" by difference of 10% between CSA sizes (Atlanta being about 5 million) and <5% in MSA size, is well, inaccurate and misleading.

I also question whether or not CSA should be considered reasonable for comparison - after all what kind of measure includes Flint, MI (68mi from Detroit) as part of its city?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metro_Detroit

All I have to prove is that one city isn't *much* larger than the other. By all reasonable standards except population within city boundary, it's not.

This isn't helping applicants either, and I'll close by saying that I only point out inaccuracies without attempting to introduce regional biases.

 

[gostudy]

Frankly, I'm less concerned with whether or not believe that by city boundary Detroit's population is larger than Atlanta than your blanket statement that Detroit is "much larger" than Atlanta. Its getting ridiculous the way you're changing standards from "city population" to CMSA (actually now called CSA) to whatever. Calling a city "much larger" by difference of 10% between CSA sizes (Atlanta being about 5 million) and <5% in MSA size, is well, inaccurate and misleading.

All I have to prove is that one city isn't *much* larger than the other. By all standards except population within city boundary, it's not.

This isn't helping applicants either, and I'll close by saying that I only point out inaccuracies without attempting to introduce regional biases.

Another thread that has "jumped the shark." I think a healthy UMich and Emory discussion will help a lot of people here. But a "what city is more totally cooler than the other" discussion should be a thread all its own in the drslounge.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

Another thread that has "jumped the shark." I think a healthy UMich and Emory discussion will help a lot of people here. But a "what city is more totally cooler than the other" discussion should be a thread all its own in the drslounge.

Yeah, I'm somewhat of a nut for urban (re)development and statistics. I apologize.

 

[DrRads101]

^

LOL, you are making stuff up that wasn't even said. I didn't change a single definition. You were the one that brought up MSA's and changed the definition from "city" to "suburbs and city." i.e. MSA. I merely just brought up that if you are going to bring up MSA's, you might as well bring up CMSA's too.

I did not make one single erroneous statement. I said that Detroit is a much larger CITY than Atlanta and this is a factual statement. I never made some blanket statement that Detroit's metro is larger than Atlanta's. You need to read through page 1 again. I never was talking about anything other than the actual urban area. You however made the statement "Detroit is not a much bigger city than Atlanta" which is an erroneous and completely false statement and still won't admit that Detroit is a larger city than Atlanta, let alone much larger.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

What the **** man.

You call me stubborn, and then this?

OK fine, you win. I've made my point - I have no intention with arguing with a sophist with unreasonable standards of comparison.

 

[QofQuimica]

^

LOL, you are making stuff up that wasn't even said. I didn't change a single definition. You were the one that brought up MSA's and changed the definition from "city" to "suburbs and city." i.e. MSA. I merely just brought up that if you are going to bring up MSA's, you might as well bring up CMSA's too.

I did not make one single erroneous statement. I said that Detroit is a much larger CITY than Atlanta and this is a factual statement. I never made some blanket statement that Detroit's metro is larger than Atlanta's. You need to read through page 1 again. I never was talking about anything other than the actual urban area. You however made the statement "Detroit is not a much bigger city than Atlanta" which is an erroneous and completely false statement and still won't admit that Detroit is a larger city than Atlanta, let alone much larger.

No one is answering MY question, which is, WHO GIVES A FLYING RIP? Can you BOTH please knock it off so that people can discuss the actual schools? Please? You've totally hijacked this thread. 👎

 

[Doctor&Geek]

No one is answering MY question, which is, WHO GIVES A FLYING RIP? Can you BOTH please knock it off so that people can discuss the actual schools? Please? You've totally hijacked this thread. 👎

Hey, at least I said something of value.

I don't like to lose either, and I have a penchant for pointing out gross inaccuracies and faulty logic. I already said I was sorry, please forgive me? 😳

 

[DrRads101]

Yeah, I'm somewhat of a nut for urban (re)development and statistics. I apologize.

You should hop on over to forum http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/

It's a great site to discuss urban issues and demographia, I'm sure you'd like it. I've been on there for many years now. You won't be able to convince anyone on there that Atlanta is a bigger city than Detroit though, 😀. Everyone there is very much into urbanity and urban living.

Are you a mod JPaikman? You might as well lock this thread. We did hijack it you know. And don't act like your posts had any more "value" than mine, come on.

 

[thegenius]

I too am curious, the thoughts of an M4 are particularly relevant, and I along with many other people applied/interviewed at Emory and always prefer more data to less . . .

Yea, the M4 has to speak up. He/she can remain anonymous and talk about Emory. I'm really curious about what he/she has to say.

 

[deleted77919]

Yea, the M4 has to speak up. He/she can remain anonymous and talk about Emory. I'm really curious about what he/she has to say.

I second this for the second time. Yay for getting back on track.

 

[thegenius]

1. The City of Detroit has about 950,000 people. For a city that is "empty" that is a hell of a lot of people (which begs the question, if that is an "empty" city what does that make Atlanta when it has less than half the people in the same area? Not that you care though...).

I have no idea what that makes Atlanta. A really small "big city?" I frankly thought Atlanta had more people.

2. I said Ann Arbor is a suburb of Detroit, IN A WAY, in the sense it is as close to Detroit and even closer than many true suburbs of other cities, and it is officially part of the Detroit consolidated metro area (Detroit's CMSA is 5,456,428 as of Census 2000, and part of the official "metro area" is Ann Arbor). Saying "it's 45 minutes away" as a reason a place is not close enough to be considered part of the metro area doesn't do much when these days there are suburbs in many cities that are over an hour away from the downtown.

I didn't know that A2 was part of the official metro area. Strange really because 50% of the land between Detroit city and Ann Arbor is rurual or uninhabitated. It's not like in Chicago where you might have a suburb that is 1 hour away but at least there is a sense that you are close to a big city.

3. "There is nothing in Detroit." Wow. Well, you gave yourself away when you mentioned where you grew up and your comments get down to the very root of Detroit's problems. I'm going to take a wild guess and say you're parents are most likely very wealthy. You are white. And you are now living in one of the most expensive cities in the country and doing it off of mommy and daddy's bank account. Most of your experiences with Detroit was going "into the city" to see a hockey game and getting the hell out for all we know since you obviously didn't live there. My point is... you are from Bloomfield Hills. You would never hear comments that a mostly white city of 950,000 people was "empty." 950,000, mostly African American people... that equals "nothing" there--better just to ignore them right? I mean why bother with Detroit when you are from Bloomfield Hills. In my opinion nearly all of Detroit's problems can be rooted to racist attitudes like this, coming from wealthy, well off suburbs who only exist *because of* Detroit, no less.

"3. Well, you gave yourself away when you mentioned where you grew up and your comments get down to the very root of Detroit's problems. "

I'm not the root of Detroit's problems because I had nothing to do with them. And neither did my parents. Detroit's steady erosion from a once prominent metropolitan area to a shell of a city occurred over many decades starting before the time I was born.

I'm not going to even dignify the rest of what you wrote. These anonymous forums are not conducive to conversations of this sort.

 

[thegenius]

I don't know about the rest of you, but if one has the habit turning statements like "X city is empty" into "that guy is racist", well, has something more than just an axe to grind.

Of course. If you take "X city has nothing" literally, then one would say there is more to Rogers City, MI than Detroit. That is obviously not true.

But if Detroit (metro) is in the top 10 (I believe, or very close), and compare Detroit to its other comtemporary cities like Miami, Houston, Phoenix, Dallas, San Francisco, etc. there is less economic advancement and infrastructure advancement in Detroit than in those other cities. And I can't speak for those other ones, but Detroit proper's population is dwindling over time, not rising or even staying steady.

Of course there are things to do in Detroit, I love the DIA, the Waterfront is cool, go to Tigers or now Lions new facilities. But just go take the tram around the downtown; you'll notice building after building that is uninhabitated and run-down. It's really sad. My grandma worked in one of those buildings for 25 years before her company went out of business. You won't find that in many of Detroit's comtemporary cities.

 

[Doctor&Geek]

You should hop on over to forum http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/

It's a great site to discuss urban issues and demographia, I'm sure you'd like it. I've been on there for many years now. You won't be able to convince anyone on there that Atlanta is a bigger city than Detroit though, 😀. Everyone there is very much into urbanity and urban living.

Are you a mod JPaikman? You might as well lock this thread. We did hijack it you know. And don't act like your posts had any more "value" than mine, come on.

I'm a long time lurker on SkyScraperPage. IRL friends of some of the mods.

If your problem is sprawl, that's one thing, and we could discuss things like New Urbanism forever. But making qualitative claims of size differences as fact when there are too many confounding factors is not conducive to truth finding. I've already explained why the standard of city boundary isn't a good one. It makes it seem like more hand-waving with statistics. One can claim that by population in city proper makes Karachi significantly bigger than Tokyo, or that Paris is "much larger" than London. No one would agree to those suppositions, so why should we when looking at Atlanta vs. Detroit?

 

[thegenius]

I also question whether or not CSA should be considered reasonable for comparison - after all what kind of measure includes Flint, MI (68mi from Detroit) as part of its city?

Flint is considered part of the population of Metro Detroit? Wow we really are getting liberal here. But this is something that is not worth arguing over, if it is then so be it (I have no control over this kind of thing.)

 

[bubbleyum]

well, i am not an emory med student but i have been living in atlanta for the past 10 years so i can tell you a bit about the city.

usually when people refer to "atlanta" they are referring to the whole large surrounding area of atlanta. this includes the suburbs, downtown, midtown, highland area, buckhead, emory area etc.

in terms of the traffic issue, atlanta traffic is known for being bad, true. but as an emory med student living on or close to the campus this should not be much of an issue at all for you. emory is very close to cute neighborhoods to hang out in like virginia highllands, midtown, and downtown decatur, which have a lot of cute shops and restaurants & bars. you will probably not be having to drive your car up and down i-85 during the busy rush hours to egt to your class. (assuming you are migrating to atlanta to go to emory, and not a georgia resident who already owns a house in suwannee or something!)

unless you are a crazy party animal and are worried that you won't have anough nightclubs to go to every night, i don't see how you can be too worried about "atlanta being a smaller city than detroit/ann arbor" or similar claims being made here. (atlanta has plenty of clubs/bars in midtown or buckhead. they are close to emory.)

the egleston children's hospital is right on campus. crawford long and grady(best er facilities) are in midtown/downtown area. still pretty close to emory campus and not a bad drive.

in terms of college sports teams, yeah you are screwed if you wanna be an emory fan. all the atlanta people are either georgia bulldog fans or tech fans. hah. but you can be a falcons/hawks/thrashers/braves fan!

 

[Surgeonizer]

I'm a med student at Michigan and my recommendation is that you go to Michigan! This school rocks! The teaching during the preclinical and clinical years is outstanding. The standard of excellence here is very high--faculty expect a lot from us and this place is filled with bright, highly motivated students. The career advising system here is one of the best in the country, and the technological infrastructure (computer services during the preclinical years, CareWeb during the clinicals) is amazing. Research and clinical opportunities for medical students abound. An increasingly strong emphasis on international study exists here, such that more and more clinical and research partnerships with other countries are being forged. Michigan truly is a great place to study medicine. Don't pass it up.

Plus, Ann Arbor is a really cool college town. The only drawback is the winter: it gets cold here! But if you dress appropriately (i.e., wool and multiple layers) you may actually enjoy the winters here. The upshot to the cold winters, however, is that the other seasons are absolutely gorgeous.

 

[taehong81]

I am a second year Emory med student, so anyone has specific questions about the school just pm me. I love Emory and glad that I chose to go here. I don't know anything about UMich so I can't really compare the two.

 

[CaveatLector]

Let's not hijack the thread.

I grew up in Michigan, specifically Flint. I am also a UMich Alum and hopeful UMichMS in a couple of years. I can tell you about Ann Arbor and its campus. Like someone said, it is a true college town. Everything about it reeks college life. It is a very unique, fun, exciting, lively, and diverse campus. You have students from all over the world. I don't mean one or two, it has a large population of foreign students. I don't think any other campus could be more ethnically diverse.

People who talk about culture and going to Detroit probably haven't spent much time in Ann Arbor (affectionately known as A^2). Frankly Ann Arbor has anything you could want in regard to culture and there is no need to travel. It has the arts, theatre, sports, an eclectic mix of restaurants and small eateries. The campus is comparable to ivy league schools in regard to its look, architecture, student aptitude, and in many other ways.

I cannot speak to Atlanta as I have only visited. But one search I did ranked it 12th in the top 100 least safe cities. Detroit was ranked 37th but that isn't the least bit relevant. Some are calling A^2 a suburb of Detroit. To me a suburb is a city that would not have sprung up but for the city proper. In other words, people who work in a big city often do not want to live there and thus move to the outskirts where small cities pop up with no real industry or other economic mainstay/business of its own. A suburb can be thought of as a city that is, or at least was, dependent on the main city's existence. If a city, like Flint for example, pops up because of the auto industry within the city then I wouldn't label that a suburb of another city. With that said, Ann Arbor, and even UMich, is older than many of the Detroit suburbs. Its existence was not dependent on Detroit. Therefore, to me it is not a suburb. Furthermore, A^2 is far enough from Detroit that Detroit's crime rate is not relevant.

Detroit City's pop. is just under 1 mil. The surrounding counties have many millions more people. Southeast Michigan is not New York but it's no lonely place.

Bottom line--I would choose UMich 👍 , but then I am WAY partial. 🙂