Places to study theoretical physics

[CPL.Luke]

I've been looking through a bunch of top notch schools curriculums and am having a hard time figuring out the experimental or theoretical bias of the departments, and I was wondering if any of you had some experience with what schools were very good for theory.

 

[franznietzsche]

I've been looking through a bunch of top notch schools curriculums and am having a hard time figuring out the experimental or theoretical bias of the departments, and I was wondering if any of you had some experience with what schools were very good for theory.

What field of theory?

 

[fliptomato]

Hi Luke--are you looking for grad schools or undergraduate schools? If you're looking for graduate schools you should look at professors rather than curriculua. If you're looking for undergraduate schools, you will also be well served looking at undergraduate research opportunities, overall atmosphere, etc.

 

[Dr Transport]

Every school has only a few thrusts when it comes to their departments. You have to look for the program that fits you, search for theory groups that work in areas that interest you. If you give us an indication of whet you want to try, we can make reccomendations.

 

[CPL.Luke]

well I'm just going into my undergraduate education now at the local community college, but I'm planning to start what will probably turn out to be a very long series of transfers between schools in order to get to a top notch pogram next semester. What I'm really looking for right now is a bunch of schools that I would like to end up at.


I really enjoy physical theory and I'm very good at math and I think I'm pretty good at solving problems so I would like to go into theoretical work. Not to mention I have a very low tolerance for actually conducting experiments. So I would like to know what undergraduate programs take a more theoretical viewpoint of physics.

as for specific interests I like quantum gravity research a lot (I know I've been roped in by greene and smolin and all the rest) So any non-string quantum gravity groups are a bonus.

 

[rickpaul80]

top programs...and you go to community college?

 

[leright]

top programs...and you go to community college?

Sure. Many people go to CC to save money and then transfer to a big name school.

 

[CPL.Luke]

It probably wouldn't hurt to mention that this would normally have been my senior year of high school, but because I wasn't doing well at the high school (I didn't do much homework, and little of anything in my history and english courses) so I decided to drop out, I took the GED test and scored in the top 3% of all traditional high school graduates and I got perfect scores in the science and history subtests. I also took the AP physics C mechanics and E&M tests on which I scored a 5 and a 4 respectively even though I didn't take the course, same with the AP calc BC test.

I'm now taking 19 credits this semester that include the following courses

Calc 3
Physics 2 (thermodynamics, waves and optics)
differential equations
linear algebra
and stat 1


I'm hoping to transfer to Rutgers University next semester and then transfer somewhere else for next fall.

after a brief stay at rutgers I really want to be in a good top notch physics program where the curriculuum/department is biased towards the theory side of things.