<p>best LAC geology departmetns (in order of opinion)</p>
<p>what are they?</p>
<p>5 College Consortium, Hamilton, Bates, Williams, Occidental, Bryn Mawr, William & Mary, Sewanee, Caltech, Franklin & Marshall, Carleton, Earlham, Beloit, Wittenberg, Albion, Juniata, Macalester, Pomona, Bowdoin, Whitman</p>
<p>Not really in any order.</p>
<p>What about geography?</p>
<p>how do you get this information?</p>
<p>I went through LACs looking for good programs in science/math/engineering a couple years ago. Questions about sciences at LACs tend to pop up a lot. </p>
<p>momfromme- Clark U (~2500 students) has a superb geography program. Macalester, Colgate, Mount Holyoke, Bucknell, and Middlebury also offer geography. Although not LACs, Chicago and Dartmouth would be worth checking out.</p>
<p>You might want to look at this</a> study, which documents where PhD recipients got their bachelor's degrees. Especially page 35, which covers PhD recipients in Earth Sciences, between 1986 and 1995, who graduated from LACs. Don't know if there is a more recent list. The top LACs by this measure:</p>
<p>1 Carleton Coll (MN) 50<br>
2 Colgate U (NY) 27<br>
3 Oberlin Coll (OH) 23<br>
3 Pomona Coll (CA) 23<br>
5 St. Lawrence U (NY) 22<br>
6 Middlebury Coll (VT) 21<br>
7 Coll of Wooster (OH) 20<br>
7 Franklin & Marshall Coll (PA) 20<br>
9 Wesleyan U (CT) 19<br>
9 Williams Coll (MA) 19</p>
<p>These numbers are not adjusted for school size, so larger LACs will tend to rank higher than smaller ones.</p>
<p>Geography is not a common major at LACs. Clark University is usually named as the strongest geography program in the US. Clark is LAC-sized, but they seem to regard themselves as a very small research university, rather than as a LAC.</p>
<p>Another good indication of strength for LAC geology programs is membership in the higly-regarded Keck</a> Geology Consortium. Current members (listed alphabetically) are:</p>
<p>Amherst College
Beloit College
Carleton College
The College of Wooster
Colorado College
Franklin & Marshall College
Pomona College
Smith College
Trinity University
Washington & Lee University
Whitman College
Williams College</p>
<p>interesting that oberlin isnt in KEck</p>
<p>St. Lawrence U. has a very famous geology dept.</p>
<p>What about Lehigh University? Not a LAC but a strong Earth Sciences department nonetheless.</p>
<p>Here's another measure: LAC geology programs [url=<a href="http://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/Robinson_v49n3p267.pdf%5Dranked%5B/url">http://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/Robinson_v49n3p267.pdf]ranked[/url</a>] by faculty publications. In many cases, these publications would be coauthored by undergraduates. See Table 3 for 1987-1996 data. The top 20 LACs accounted for two-thirds of all publications by LAC faculty. They were:</p>
<p>Williams College<br>
Colgate University<br>
Wesleyan University<br>
Union College<br>
Franklin and Marshall College<br>
Hamilton College<br>
Colorado College<br>
Smith College<br>
Vassar College<br>
Oberlin College<br>
Pomona College<br>
Lafayette College<br>
Mount Holyoke College<br>
Bryn Mawr College<br>
College of Wooster<br>
Augustana College<br>
Amherst College<br>
Denison University<br>
St. Lawrence University<br>
Carleton College</p>
<p>
[quote]
interesting that oberlin isnt in KEck
[/quote]
Oops, they actually are. Keck recently [url=<a href="http://keck.wooster.edu/%5Dexpanded%5B/url">http://keck.wooster.edu/]expanded[/url</a>] from 12 to 18 members. The six new members (in addition to the 12 older members listed above) are:</p>
<p>Colgate University
Macalester College
Mt. Holyoke College
Oberlin College
Union College
Wesleyan University</p>
<p>Rugg’s Recommendations for geology</p>
<p>Most selective:
Amherst (MA) ……….
Barnard (NY) …….
Bates (ME) ……
Bowdoin (ME) …..
Brown (RI) ……
Ryn Mawr (PA) …
California Inst. Of Tech. …..
California, U. of (Berkeley) ….
Carleton (MN) ……..
Chicago, U. of (IL) ……
Colgate (NY) …..,
Colorado Co. …….
Colorado School of Mines ……..
Columbia (NY) …..
Dartmouth (NH) ……
Franklin & Marshall lPA) ………
Furman (SC) ……….
Geneseo (SUNY) (NY) .,
Harvard (MA) ..,
Lafayette (PA)….
Lehigh (PA) …..
MIT (MA) .,…
Pennsylvania, U. of …..,
Pomona (CA) ….
Princeton (NJ) …….
Rochester, U. of (NY) …..
Skidmore (NY) ….
Smith (MA) ……
Vanderbilt (TN) …
Washington & lee (VA) ,”
Washington U. (MO) …..
Whitman (WA) …..
William & Mary (VA) .. Albany (SUNY) (NY) ……. </p>
<p>Very selective:
Alabama, U. of …….
Allegheny (PA) ….<
Arizona, U. of ..
Beloit (WI) ……
California, U. of (Davis) ……
California, U. of (Santa Barbara)
Centenary College (LA) ……
Colorado State ……….
Colorado, U. of….
Cornell Coll. (lA) ….
Denison (OH) …….
Earlham (IN)….
Guilford (NC) .
Hope (MI) …….
Indiana U. …..
Michigan Tech ..,….
Millsaps (MS) ..,….
Minnesota, U. of …..
New Mexico Inst. Of Mining & Tech. ._
Oklahoma, U. of ……….
Oklahoma State …….,
Purdue (IN) ..,…..
St. Lawrence (NY) …..
St. Thomas (MN) …..,
South Dakota School of Mines ……
Stony Brook (SUNY) (NY) ……
Texas A&M ………….
Texas Christian…….
Texas, U. of (Austin) ….,
Tulsa, U. of (OK) …..
Vermont, U. of …….
Washington, U. of ….,
Wisconsin, U. of …..
Wooster, College of (OH) ……</p>
<p>i have been to dartmouth and it has crap geology</p>
<p>I wouldn't count on any of these lists as definitive. They all have shortcomings. </p>
<p>For example, the Bryn Mawr geology dept. is highly regarded, and is known for producing a lot of PhDs, yet is not shown on the list of PhD-producing LACs in post #6 above. The reason is that this department serves both Bryn Mawr and Haverford Colleges, since Haverford doesn't have a geology dept. of its own. If you combined the PhDs from both schools, then Bryn Mawr would easily make the top 10. </p>
<p>If you look over the lists referenced above, you'll probably notice that certain LACs tend to appear repeatedly. Those might be the ones to focus on.</p>
<p>Another suggestion: As you visit/research these schools, ask them about how many of their geology grads have geology-related job offers upon graduation. That can be another telling measure of program success - where geology employers recruit new hires. Also ask them about how many of their students have received research grants from the American Geological Society (which is also a good resource for any student interested in geology).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Also ask them about how many of their students have received research grants from the American Geological Society (which is also a good resource for any student interested in geology).
[/quote]
It's always good to ask about funding, but in this case you probably mean the "Geological</a> Society of America" (usually known just as "GSA"), rather than the "American Geological Society".</p>
<p>Forgot to mention: The American Geological Institute maintains a database of geology programs. It's a good place to get quick data about faculty backgrounds, size of the department, etc. for many schools:</p>
<p><a href="http://guide.agiweb.org/ggd/index.html%5B/url%5D">http://guide.agiweb.org/ggd/index.html</a></p>
<p>Another school not yet mentioned -- Guilford College.</p>