Hello,
My son is a recruited athlete who has been offered spots at Carleton, Amherst, and Kenyon. He loves all three. He is undecided for major and fairly well-rounded academically but loves math and science and is leaning pre-med though possibly pre-PhD. He is not into drinking/partying, but likes fun activities and hanging out with friends. Any input on which school might be a good fit or pros and cons of any of the three?
Thank you!
Presume all things being equal financially for your family (Kenyon could have merit), ability to schedule lab based classes if thinking med school with practice schedule and your student likes team/coach vibe equally? All great schools and would see Carleton and Kenyon as more similar in student body vs Amherst - but guessing others may disagree.
I believe Amherst is more diverse than the other two. They’ve invested heavily in ethnic and economic diversity in recent years. I tend to think of Kenyon as more humanities oriented. Carleton is COLD - does that matter?
Congratulations to him though. All are great schools!
So Amherst historically sends a higher per capita number of kids to med school, Carleton to PhDs in fields like, say, Biology or Math:
But truthfully that is likely mostly self-selection.
Kenyon is probably a bit better known for social sciences and humanities (like, it is extremely good for English), but it is quite good for sciences too.
So for good or ill, these are all fine choices, just with a somewhat different mix. If he visited and liked them all, he can’t really go wrong, just different flavors of good choice.
Wow, one of the tougher choices I’ve seen. I love all these schools.
My thoughts, but others can chime in if they agree of disagree.
In alphabetical order…
Amherst: most prestigious of the three. Best mix of different types of students. Smart, involved students who might be well connected. Probably the most diverse in terms of race, first Gen, etc…
Carleton: fast paced, slightly nerdy, a bit quirky, and friendly intellectual students. Nice town, only an hour to Minneapolis. They march to their own drumbeat. Gentle rivalry with nearby St. Olaf.
Kenyon: stunning campus inspires creativity and sets an atmosphere for intellectualism too. Professors get consistently high marks for best classroom experience. Storied history of former students such as Paul Newman, Alison Janney, EL Doctorow, and Rutherford Hayes. Smart and creative students in a beautiful environment.
Me personally, I’d choose Carleton. It sounds relaxed but also rigorous. I think it’s probably a good mix of pretty normal regular people.
My son didn’t visit Carleton so I can’t give a first hand comparison. I would consider all three equally rigorous academically and similar in culture.
To me biggest point differentation would be the physical setting: Amherst being integrated into a lively small town with plenty of walkable attractions, plus the expanding factor of the consortium.
And Kenyon being fairly insular and bucolic with limited choices for eating, recreation etc outside of the central campus.
For my outdoorsy son who favored rural settings and close knit communities like Kenyon, Hamilton and Williams (where he ended up) Kenyon would have been the favorite.
I’m not a huge fan of rank or prestige.
But Amherst is on a level - where most everyone will know it and it will always impress.
Carleton and Kenyon - just aren’t there - recognition wise. That may not be a reason to choose a school but Amherst is one of those few that they name will always carry cred. Not sure if it matters to your student but it’s like going to MIT instead of RPI or WPI - all great schools but one is the creme de la creme reputationally.
Where did he like the coaches or have the best opportunity to play - perhaps that goes into it?
Unless money were an issue and there was merit at Kenyon or you just hate Amherst which he doesn’t - it’d be hard to pass up.
I was in Spain this summer and talking to a young girl on the train and she had just graduated Macalester and was “shocked” I know of it. That’s like Kenyon and to some extent Carleton as well. That will rarely be the case with Amherst.
Best of luck.
Um, outside the rarified atmosphere of this forum, that would be the case with Amherst, too. Name Recognition should not be a factor here, especially if graduate school is a definite possibility. Personally, I would eliminate Kenyon as the outler academically. As between Amherst and Carleton, as the OP may already have noticed, it’s really going to come down to whether you prefer New England snob appeal versus Midwestern down to earthedness. There, I’ve said it. 
If athletics are important, I would look at Amherst, since the D3 NESCAC teams compete at a very high level and are well funded/supported/attended. My daughter is at a NESCAC school in Maine, and it just seems like the rivalries and traditions are unlike other D3 leagues. As others have mentioned, Amherst is also a little Ivy, and better known than the other two (although in general SLACs aren’t as “known” as the big state universities and Ivies). Plus, there is nothing quite like New England in terms of college life and the connections you make at these small liberal arts colleges. (NESCAC also includes Williams, Colby, Bates, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Wesleyan, Tufts, Hamilton, and others - and the athletes know each other and sometimes have networking events as well).
Having grown up in the Upper Midwest/Great Lakes region, Carleton was generally considered our region’s “best” liberal arts college, and at least not far behind Williams and Amherst in terms of reputation, and arguably “better” for academic types specifically. I’d say our perspective was something like if Williams and Amherst were the Harvard and Yale of LACs, then Carleton was something like the Chicago of LACs. So we understood it was not quite HYPSM (in modern parlance), but in the next peer group after that, with a particularly strong academic focus.
Not that this is definitive, but US News sorta supports this view. In terms of general peer reputation, from what I have seen, WASP are usually in (or at least among) the top, and Harvey Mudd is the MIT of LACs, so that is your HYPSM of LACs. And then Carleton is in fact usually in the next group.
The other US News peer thing Carleton prides itself on is it is usually at least tied for #1 for the undergraduate teaching peer scores. This year so are Amherst and Pomona, but again this is on brand for Carleton.
And, of course, as I pointed out before Carleton places extremely well in PhD programs, which is also a similarity to Chicago.
Anyway, make of that what you will. Personally, I am the sort of person who thinks it is perfectly fine to prefer Chicago to some or indeed all of HYPSM, and I feel the same about preferring Carleton to some or all of WASP + HM. But obviously that is an individual decision.
Based on how you describe your son and given that he needs to make a decision, I’d focus on Carleton and Amherst. Carleton may be a hair less social, which might be the environmenthe likes. NESCAC athletics are very competitive, so that may be appealing.
One thing to consider here is the academic calendar and how it fits in with the sports schedule. Balancing season end championships and finals is no picnic, nor is missing class or labs for travel, and one may fit better with the competition season. This is a difference between these schools, and it has implications for an athlete. This can also matter if he wants to take time abroad. (Study abroad often appeals to students at LACs, even ones who initially weren’t that excited about it, as a way to see different faces and a different place for a while. )
This is a tough one, and really, if he chose based on how he liked his prospective teammates, that wouldn’t be wrong either. The beauty of a choice like this is that whatever the outcome, it’s a good one!
Agree with much of the above. If he thinks he might want to use a math major to break into finance or consulting, then he should choose Amherst because there will be more student connections to those industries.
I think it is a good idea to look at the sports situation. The NESCAC schools all have more of a sporty vibe to campus because of the NESCAC tradition. The MIAC, Carleton’s conference, is more laid back. Carleton doesn’t have a social divide between athletes and non-athletes. By far the biggest sport at Carleton is Ultimate Frisbee, a club sport. Carleton has so much depth in Ultimate that it fields both D1 and D3 teams in both mens and womens that contend for national titles each year. Many athletes play Ultimate in their off-seasons, and continue with Ultimate after graduation. There are Carleton teams of players in their 50s winning national Masters titles.
Amherst likely does have better athletics and sports conference. There is also the consortium where one can take classes and attend events at other campuses.
One thing that hasn’t been mentioned about Carleton is the trimester system which isn’t for some students. While you do get to take more classes over 4 years, the speed, rigor, and intensity are greater than in the semester system. Then, adding sports to that for at least one quarter will make that quarter difficult, maybe not even advisable for a pre-med. Just depends on the student.
I would also look at the pre-health depts of each to understand how they function, the level of services they provide and if they write committee letters, do they do that for every applicant.
Good luck.
I edited my post.
This is exactly what I was referring to. It’s key to look at this is the context of the arhletic schedule.
I would strongly consider Amherst, because it is more widely known than Carleton and Kenyon (not that Carleton and Kenyon don’t have great reputations, but when applying to med schools, the admissions committee might be more impressed with the applicant coming from Amherst).
In addition, the 5 college consortium offers an enormous range of courses, although taking a class anywhere other than UMass Amherst next door would involve some travel time on the shuttle bus. Plus the cute small town of Amherst offers a lot of restaurants and shops right there, and similar Northampton is about a 20 min shuttle bus ride away, offers more restaurants and shops, good for a special night out.
That’s kind of not true.
Thanks I edited my post.
Yes, I think people who specialized in gatekeeping next steps, such as med school admissions, are going to tend to know all about every good college.
For the record, Amherst’s advisor for health professions recently reported that typically 75 to 80% of their applicants get into med school on their first try (which is very good!):
Carleton reports the first-try admittance rate is “approximately 77%”:
There is a difference–Amherst says with reapplications, it gets up to 90%, and Carleton says it gets up to only 82%. I wonder if more of the Carls who do not get in first try go to grad school instead.
In any event, I would suggest this is well within the range where pretty obviously your individual attributes (including how you do on the MCAT) are going to dominate as a factor. In cases like that, I think the key is honest self-assessment. Where will you be happiest, most enthusiastic, most able to maintain a healthy balance of academic work and non-academic activities? That place will probably work best for you in terms of next-steps because it will likely help you get the best grades.
Of course those are good questions even if you don’t apply to medical school . . . which is good news! I think in cases like this, sometimes people get wrapped up in which college is “better” for certain careers when really they can choose from a range of colleges where the best one will be whatever one is actually best for them as an individual.
This.