<p>I like, in theory, the concept...small class sizes and getting to know your professors. I have spent most of my adult life at research universities. I'm trying to appreciate small LAC's for what they offer, but just can't. I think that I am sending this bad juju to son. I can't get him interested either. Something just seems missing from the 2 we toured.</p>
<p>I then read comments on CC which fuels it more...</p>
<p>the size fit me very well in the beginning, but toward the last 2 years it did feel small to me
S1 was at a somewhat isolated LAC in a small town and got bored there after a couple years</p>
<p>I would guess that they’re just not for everyone, and that’s OK. Interestingly, ds picked a LAC less than an hour from a major metropolitan area, and he has yet to set foot in the city in 18 months, except to fly home and back. I guess the relative remoteness isn’t a problem for him, but I can see it would be for some. Probably will be for ds2.</p>
<p>Want to share which two you saw? Maybe there was something about those two, and we could point you in another direction.</p>
<p>I also think that a lot of LAC kids do study abroad, which breaks things up.</p>
<p>You are not a bad person, you’ve just been deprived.</p>
<p>My wife and I are both products of LACs and both daughters have/will attend LACs. But my wife and I also spent our graduate years at research universities, as D1 is about to do as well. I think all of us can see positives and negatives to both. I went to a LAC in a rural community while my wife went to a LAC in the suburbs of a big city. She actually spent much of her senior year conducting research at the flagship university down the road from her house. By year 4 both of us were ready for a change. Then again, I had friends who attended Syracuse, Carnegie-Mellon and BU who felt the same way by the time they were seniors.</p>
<p>LACs are a great fit for many kids. Others will feel more comfortable at a large university. The important thing for students is that they figure out which one provides the better fit for themselves.</p>
<p>One of my own kids was at a LAC and I found it to be boring just visiting. She became tired of seeing the same people day after day. The nice thing about LACS is that it is a great alternative for those kids who would do far better in this environment.</p>
<p>Your not a bad person but don’t enroll in a LAC. If your son likes them remind yourself that you and he are different people.</p>
<p>DD first thought that an LAC was where she should go. However, she was and is very personality driven, so after she looked at the one Mama Cass sang about and sat in a class, she decided it was not for her. She needed the depth and the breadth of a larger school. Even in a larger school, I hear comments about how she likes the students in this major’s classes over the other majors. It is very interesting.</p>
<p>A friend of mine, who attended a small LAC ( is that redundant?), said that she had dated everyone she wanted to date by the end of her second year. Lol…Don’t let her go to one, she said.</p>
<p>While they were not for us, there are lots of people that fit well.</p>
<p>We toured 2 of our local ones…Grinnell and Luther.
We did really like Truman State…a larger ‘LAC’ with 5,000 students.</p>
<p>Would be looking at LAC’s in the 25-50 ranking range.
I have run the NPC at many and many would not be affordable to us. One that might be as per their NPC is Bates. Another is Rhodes.</p>
<p>How about the flip side, I don’t understand the attraction to the HUGE research universities where there is no community feel and you have to fight to get the classes you need and you and your 400 classmates in the lecture hall can’t hear the TA as they are trying to talk. Point being, we are all different. None of my kids even considered a large school. It isn’t who they are. We were strongly urging our one son to consider UW-Madison, nope, not a chance he would even look at it. Nothing wrong with the school at all, just not what HE wanted. Spent some times at Iowa State, Dh and I loved the campus, the kids hated it, WAY too big for them :). Heading down to Grinnell in a couple weeks, much better fit for DS.</p>
<p>I don’t know a thing about Luther, but ds was accepted at and visited Grinnell. It’s smaller and even more remote than a lot of other LACs. How 'bout Macalester? It’s no. 25 in the rankings and right in the middle of the city. I would imagine that proximity to the Twin Cities makes the school not seem so small.</p>
<p>My older son was looking very specifically for top comp sci programs. He did apply to one pretty small school for a safety (WPI). It seemed too small to me - particularly compared to his (large) high school. S2 specifically wanted colleges that were bigger than his high school - the only exception he made to his rule was Vassar, which is larger than most LACs, but he still thought it felt too empty when visiting for accepted students day.</p>
<p>Personally, I rather liked having a mix of large lecture classes and smaller seminars. My major was small, and had mostly small classes.</p>
<p>Both (like me) ended up in medium sized research unis where the undergrad population is around 5000.</p>
<p>Opportunities for research and face time with professors are readily available at all good LACs and research universities if the student is sharp enough and takes the initiative. For the B-/C+ student who puts a premium on social life? Probably not great odds wherever he or she goes.</p>
<p>^Yes. Professors at decent LACs have to do research and publish in order to get tenure and retain funding; however, they don’t have armies of graduate students to help them, so it’s possible for an undergraduate at a LAC to get some pretty good research experience that might be taken by graduate students at larger schools.</p>
<p>There is a large middle ground between huge state universities and LACs. I would put Rice and Vanderbilt in this category.</p>
<p>My son considered Williams and I got to go on the recruiting visit. I loved the place, and he tried hard to like it, but it just felt too small to him, especially since he had been at boarding school. He wanted more of a city around him, and he got it!</p>
<p>“Fit” (both academic and non-academic) is likely more important for a small LAC than a big university. A small LAC may be a great fit for some, but a poor fit for others. A different LAC may be a great fit for those who find the other LAC a poor fit, but a poor fit for those who find the other LAC a great fit. A big university is more likely to be an acceptable fit for many.</p>
<p>D1 goes to a very small LAC and she loves it. She just loves the intimacy and the close relationship she’s developed with her academic adviser who is also the department chair in what will probably be her major. She loves that it’s pretty, and cozy, and self-contained, and by halfway through her sophomore year she has relationships with a very large fraction of all the students on campus, and most of the rest she at least knows by sight.</p>
<p>i went to a big research university—but not the kind where “there is no community feel and you have to fight to get the classes you need and you and your 400 classmates in the lecture hall can’t hear the TA as they are trying to talk.” There was plenty of community feel, though to be honest it was mostly a set of overlapping communities rather than just one big one (more like real life, IMO); I never had a single problem getting any class I wanted, I never had any class anywhere near 400 students (maybe 100 tops, once or twice, but mostly in the 15-25 range, especially in my major), I never had lecture classes taught by TAs (in fact I never had any classes taught by TAs, only professors), and I never had trouble hearing. And this was at a public research university. It was big, and lively, and a lot of fun, always tons of stuff going on.</p>
<p>I think I’d find my D1’s LAC a bit dull. But she’s clear she’s there for the academics, and it seems to suit her, so who am I to say she’s missing something? I think people just have different preferences about these things, and that’s fine, as long as you know which kind you are.</p>
<p>You can’t be the only one as thousands of kids forgo LACs for big research U’s every single year.</p>
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<p>Well said! This isn’t about us, but them. Lots of people are enamoured of LACs and get fine educations there. If your son is one of them, just smile and nod and write the check.</p>