I am creating this thread to continue the conversation started on the UChicago AMA page: Why Should You Choose a Liberal Arts College? - Exclusive ASK ME ANYTHING w/ U. Chicago on Thu, Mar 23 from 8-9pm ET
UChicago has a core liberal arts curriculum for all students:
but I don’t think this thread is named correctly. When many CC users think of a liberal arts college, they think of a LAC - Oberlin, Pomona, Davidson, Bates, etc.
University of Chicago is a university like Northwestern or Duke…
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You’ll notice that it took exactly 7 posts before this particular thread hopelessly jumped the shark:
What defines a liberal arts university? - Parents Forum - College Confidential Forums
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Is she interested in attending an urban campus?
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It’s odd that someone joined 4 days ago, go to a sub-forum for a particular college, and tell them they don’t want to go there. It’s puzzling why someone would waste their time that way.
Having gone to UChicago (graduate school), it’s like other urban universities where you need to be careful of your surroundings.
There seems to be some confusion between Liberal Arts, Pre-professional, and Research. They are not mutually exclusive.
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Actually it was the first post…not 7th. The title is “misleading.” In no way is Chicago an LAC.
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Could someone please change the title of the thread?
What’s next? → “Why should you choose an urban research university? - exclusive AMA by Grinnell College”
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Yeah, I tried changing the title a couple of times and someone (perhaps the OP) kept changing it back. IMO, it did lead to a lot of dead-end sub-threads.
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In terms of the larger, ongoing competition - such as it is - between small colleges, sometimes referred to as LACs, and large research universities, I think there is a case to be made for certain units of particular universities that are so devoted to the liberal arts AND sciences that they identify as liberal arts institutions. The undergraduate college of UChicago may be one of those institutions. But it takes a lot of needle-threading to make that argument (the use of the word college perhaps being the initial “stitch”.)
Perhaps UChicago wants to target traditional LAC applicants who wouldn’t normally consider UChicago? CC is a perfect place for that strategy, isn’t it?
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There was another thread here recently on Liberal Arts Universities, which is a term that could be applied to UChicago, or at least it is less of a stretch. To my mind, Princeton, without the traditional professional schools of Law, Medicine, and Business, fits that term much better.
However, I think the distinguishing factor of the liberal arts colleges usually labelled as LACS is that all of their undergraduate classes are taught by faculty, not graduate students. That is at least as important as their curricular emphasis. I can’t stretch my definition of LAC to include UChicago.
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Because its one of the top 4-5 University’s in the country. Would you consider Columbia?
Now that it is a new thread I think we can say definitively say NO. Lets close the thread 
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I think a fairer question is Liberal Arts College only? And the obvious answer is no, but there are many Universities that have Liberal Arts colleges within their structure. Take for example UCLA and University of Minnesota. Both are National Universities, but one of the colleges within each are liberal arts colleges. For UCLA, it’s the School of Letters and Science. For Minnesota, it’s the College of Liberal Arts. They both have research and pre-professional programs. For UChicago, they require kids go through the core, which is a liberal arts program.
I guess at the end of the day, does this really matter to have a discussion? Seems like people are nitpicking.
I think Bernard College and Columbia College, within Columbia, are Liberal Arts colleges.
We aren’t nitpicking at all. The UNIVERSITY of Chicago is a University, not a LAC. Kids usually go to LACs for the environment and size…NOT the curriculum. The idea that any typical LAC kid would be happy at UCLA is silly.
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Barnard College which is one of the 7 sisters is absolutely a LAC…as are the other 6 (now 5) sisters.
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If it’s not cirriculum, would you consider Caltech LAC? How about Dartmouth?
Agreed. A liberal arts college does not offer graduate school.
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