University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is occasionally known as the University Where Fun Goes to Die. Students proudly wear T-shirts proclaiming this fact, for they know better. This year the University had its largest applicant pool ever. Seems like more and more people want to go here, to live up to the school's official motto: Crescat scientia; vita excolatur. For any non-Latin-scholars out there (i.e., 92% of the Columbia student body), that translates to "Let knowledge grow from more to more; and so be human life enriched."
U of C is located in Hyde Park of Chicago, otherwise known as one of the world's most cultural neighborhoods, and considered as one of the safest in Chicago. Students usually do not travel after dark, but that's just because they are either studying in the library or hanging out with their awesome House. Students often tell others how safe they feel on campus, as the Campus Police is second only to the Chicago City Police Force.
Chicago claims to have either an older or more rigorous Core Curriculum than Columbia. It's true. According to a WikiCU contributor from Chicago[1] (he attended Columbia University until he transferred to UChicago as a sophomore), "the University of Chicago's Core Cirriculum is generally recognized as superior to Columbia's in both depth and difficulty". Such assertions have been many a time verified.
While Columbia did plagiarize the concept for its Committee on Global Thought from Chicago's prestigious Committee on Social Thought, UChicago students are merciful, and they do not wish to insult the intelligence of Columbia University students, the way some have tried with the attempted effrontery on their "WikiCU" page on UChicago. "We are here to enrich our lives," says one current UChicago prospect, "not to quietly attempt to sabotage our inferiors through pointless Wikipedia-like pages."
Finally, the University of Chicago students call themselves the Maroons, referring to beautiful, sharp color that goes greatly with the unofficial Phoenix mascot. The University of Chicago chose this mythical creature to represent the rebirth of the city of Chicago and the original university that burnt down with it during the Great Chicago Fire. We don't make the same mistake twice.
