<p>As pointed out above this is way off topic for this thread, but probably is the most important issue about college today. What you wrote above is fine if the family is well off and the child is smart enough to get into a very selective school. Unfortunately this only accounts for maybe 5% or at most 10% of the students in college. Are you saying it makes economic sense for most students to spend 250k on getting a humanities degree? Where exactly are the jobs? A friend’s daughter just finished up a history degree at Columbia this year and the only job she could find was entry level as a “healthcare consultant”. So her 250k degree from Columbia really only served as a convenient screening tool for the company to hire entry level 35-40k workers. The educational system as it exists today is wasting trillions of dollars on nearly worthless degrees. The sad truth is that the colleges along with the gov’t loan system are well on the way to destroying the educational system in the US and very soon this bubble will burst.</p>
<p>Who died and left you in charge of everything to pass judgement on everyone else’s decisions? You’ve expressed your opinion. That’s fine. But I don’t think you have the authority to pass judgement on what is fine and what is not.</p>
<p>Sadly my post reflects the hard cold reality of today’s college costs. No one is passing judgement on anything except that the unsustainable rising cost of college are a massive looming crisis. </p>
<p>[Why</a> the Education Bubble Will Be Worse Than the Housing Bubble - Economic Intelligence (usnews.com)](<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/economic-intelligence/2012/06/12/the-government-shouldnt-subsidize-higher-education]Why”>http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/economic-intelligence/2012/06/12/the-government-shouldnt-subsidize-higher-education)</p>
<p>[Peter</a> Thiel: We’re in a Bubble and It’s Not the Internet. It’s Higher Education. | TechCrunch](<a href=“http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/10/peter-thiel-were-in-a-bubble-and-its-not-the-internet-its-higher-education/]Peter”>Peter Thiel: We're in a Bubble and It's Not the Internet. It's Higher Education. | TechCrunch)</p>
<p>[When</a> Will the Education Bubble Explode? - Forbes](<a href=“http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterjreilly/2011/11/02/when-will-the-education-bubble-explode/]When”>When Will the Education Bubble Explode?)</p>
<p>[‘Higher</a> Education Bubble’ is about to burst - BostonHerald.com](<a href=“http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/op_ed/view/20220610higher_education_bubble_is_about_to_burst/]‘Higher”>http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/op_ed/view/20220610higher_education_bubble_is_about_to_burst/)</p>
<p>This thread has value as a pointed discussion of Carleton v. Williams. It is rare that these two colleges receive an airing, one relative to the other. The discussion even has merit beyond the immediate needs to help the OP from last April, who has presumably decided by now. Others will someday read this thread from the archive. The clear title is most helpful to future readers who will call up by Searchword… so thank you.</p>
<p>Please feel free to continue the Carleton v. Williams comparisons. </p>
<p>The introduction of much wider topics, such as college funding costs across the country for students from diverse economic backgrounds, merits its own thread, or participation on numerous other CC threads on those large and important issues. </p>
<p>Basically, if a statement or research does not directly help parse “Carleton v. Williams” it will serve better purpose on a more general thread.</p>
<p>I’m at BU right now doing taking two summer courses and though I will admit Carleton’s courses are more enjoyable (though it may be due to the time crunch during the summer) and the instructors are perhaps more intimate, or gifted in teaching, it’s not significantly different. You go to class, you learn a lot, if you apply yourself. BU is nowhere near in ranking as Carleton, and it’s a big university on top of that, you’d expect me to have a mediocre experience, yet that is not the case. This convinces me more than ever that rankings are meaningless once you rise above, say, Top 50, and this is exactly how I view this discussion about “caliber”.</p>
<p>I’m not overly impressed by Carleton (namely, the experience) though I will admit my expectations are probably too high after a kickass summer course at UChicago, but I don’t think I’d like the other Top 10 colleges any better. After all, life is life, and you’re always going to be a little ambivalent about it.</p>
<p>I graduated from Carleton 22 years ago, so I realize that it might be easy to dismiss my comments on this discussion as those of an out of touch, middle aged alum. However, I did work in college admissions for three years in my 20s and continue to work as an alumni volunteer for Carleton’s admission office, so I think I have a bit better sense of the admission realities today than most people who graduated in 1990.</p>
<p>One thing I will point out that I don’t think has been mentioned (sorry if it has and I missed it) is the fact that Carleton’s applicants tend to be a somewhat more self selected bunch and this has an effect on their overall admission rate compared to Williams. Williams is a school that nearly all strong students are familiar with, and while Carleton is certainly well known and respected, it tends to be known by a somewhat smaller group of students which naturally results in a smaller group of applicants.</p>
<p>I loved Carleton and thought the education and the student body were top notch across the board. If you go to Williams and you live outside of th midwest, you will probably find that more people recognize where you went to school and the fact that it is one of the best schools in the country. It can be a bit frustrating when people look at you quizzically after mentioning that you went to Carleton. The one place I can say, though, that Carleton is extremely well known and has a sterling reputation is with medical schools and Ph.D programs (especially in the sciences). Carleton is known for being a breeding ground for future college professors - if you think of yourself as going in that direction (which I realize can be very difficult until you’ve taken college level courses and done serious research), I wouldn’t hesitate to go to Carleton.</p>
<p>S is a Williams alum and hardly anyone has heard of it. He just began dating a girl who graduated from Johns Hopkins, lives on Long Island and said she may have “vaguely heard of it.”</p>
<p>Sadly, most Americans are amazingly ignorant about top undergraduate institutions. Williams is confused with William and Mary, Swarthmore with Skidmore, etc. Simply put, LAC’s are given short shrift by the masses. That said, top graduate and professional schools, recruitors in many sectors do know that they are at least on a par with the top ivies. Johns Hopkins is, frankly, a safety school for people who have a serious shot at admission to SWAP. Back to the subject at hand, however, Carleton is even less widely known than other top LACs but is a fantastic place and, I believe, a very happy place according to the students.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Frankly, I’m not sorry LACs are given the cold shoulder coming from a student’s perspective. I used to be enamored with UChicago as what one CC user called a “think tank factory”. Ever since it gained mass popular appeal under the Zimmer/Nondorf regime, it is gradually becoming “Princetonized”, as they say, and watch that acceptance rate plummet as Chicago gradually have more cross-applicants with HYPS than Reed, St. John’s, Shimer, etc. Think tank factory is exactly what I was after and frankly the (admittedly vain) regard for rankings kept me from it. In fact I still wonder if I should have applied to a Great Books program or Reed. You know, even more out-of-the-way, purely intellectual and little known.</p>
<p>Even though the OP must be preparing to set off for his/her chosen school, I wanted to add a characteristic that I observed at Carleton that I know doesn’t exist at all schools. (I’ve been away from CC for a while; my Carl graduated in 2011, but his little sister is now in HS and so it begins again . . .).</p>
<p>Carleton students don’t seem to be competitive about grades with each other. They don’t discuss them and seem to “compete” only with themselves as to how well they do. My son noticed the difference between Carleton and UChicago in this respect. And recently I was speaking with someone who’s familiar with both Swarthmore and Haverford. He characterized the former as having a study body that was more competitive about grades and characterized Haverford as being more like Carleton. Obviously, this anecdotal and others may have different experiences, but I do think that different LACs can have very different cultures. </p>
<p>The other thought that’s stayed with me (and that I’ll pass on to my D when the time comes) regarding choosing schools, is that an overnight doesn’t always give you the full story. Based on his overnight stay during accepted students weekend, my son wouldn’t have chosen Carleton. He was put with a student that he had nothing in common with, etc. However, Carleton was a great fit and he loved his time there. Just a thought to keep in mind. ;)</p>
<p>As the parent of 2 Swatties and 1 Carl, I would say that neither Carls nor Swatties are focused on grades or discuss grades to any significant extent. Swarthmore may be marginally more competitive to gain admission than Haverford, and therefore the students may have been marginally more focused on grades in high school, but once at college the dominant Swarthmore culture strongly discourages focus on grades per se.</p>
<p>dadx3, thanks so much for that perspective. Our younger kid is starting to look at colleges now, and she loved Swarthmore.</p>