Obviously coed vs. women’s school is the big difference. But what other differences are there? Do they attract a different type of student, or have a different culture? Or are they extremely similar schools with extremely similar students, just one has a mix of male and female and the other is women only?
It may help to view each school’s overlaps:
Bryn Mawr’s overlap schools:
Barnard, Mount Holyoke, Smith, Swarthmore, Wellesley, & Haverford.
Haverford’s overlaps:
Swarthmore, Hamilton, Davidson, Middlebury, Carleton, Wesleyan, Bowdoin, & Amherst.
I appreciate the reply, although I don’t think that data point is helpful in this case.
Haverford’s overlaps are a bit helpful for figuring out that school, but this doesn’t show much about the differences. When you take out the ones in common, BMC’s only overlaps are women’s colleges.
D visited BMC, but not Haverford. So I’m trying to figure out if there are many differences or if they are pretty much the same except for the 600 guys who go there, rather than it being all women.
My reading of the overlaps is much different than your reading.
P.S. @milgymfam should be able to help.
Agreed. All it shows is Bryn Mawr applicants are interested in women’s colleges.
Bryn Mawr has a lot more traditions. The campus is a bit prettier to my eye as are the dorms although Haverford has more singles and the apartments which many students enjoy.
Bryn Mawr has a couple dining halls and better food, at least a few years back.
My young Haverford alum thought Haverford students were a little more relaxed and chill than Bryn Mawr students. Just on data point however.
I really don’t think you can go wrong with either college. Great academics and thoughtful communities.
OP wrote: = Daughter visited Bryn Mawr College, but not Haverford College.
OP: What did your daughter think about Bryn Mawr College ? Sharing her impressions can help others to highlight differences & similarities.
P.S. It would also be helpful to know which other schools your daughter is targeting.
So, the schools (in the opinion of my D) do have very different feels to them. She visited Bryn Mawr and interviewed/applied, but ultimately applied ED to Haverford. Honestly, Bryn Mawr for her would have been a workaround to Haverford had she not gotten in, though she had many other options and she was conflicted about using a school that way, so who knows what would’ve happened if Haverford wouldn’t have accepted her.
The differences are subtle (beyond the all-female bit), but she definitely felt like Bryn Mawr had a more uptight feel, like they take themselves more seriously. She felt the buy-in there was almost cult-like and she didn’t like some of their traditions (she feels like Hell Week is a “socially acceptable hazing”). She felt Haverford was more laid back. That said, Bryn Mawr dorms are lovely- and have free laundry (!), and she ate many a meal at Bryn Mawr because she liked the variety more and she was there for classes. Brass tacks the food was almost equal in quality and not as different as people make it out to be, she said. She thinks there are more parties at Haverford, but Bryn Mawr’s campus is prettier.
I’m probably doing a bigger post about where she is and what she is thinking soon, so I was trying not to clutter this up too much about her targets and have it be a bigger conversation. But I know that can make answering my post more difficult.
The visit to BMC was mixed. I think the tourguide detracted from the school for D, and her opinion on that has mellowed quite a bit. I have said this before, nice girl, loved her school. But she and D just didn’t click, and by the end of the tour D was pretty much done with her and left with a negative overall impression.
In hindsight, she loved the look of campus, small classes, traditions, honor code. She liked the neighborhood. She was a bit concerned about the small size, although if you add Haverford with it and consider it as one split college then the size issue goes away I think. She is slightly negative on all women rather than coed, but sees pluses and minuses. So while all things considered she would prefer coed, it isn’t a huge factor, and the fact that the 2 schools are so closely intertwined helps.
A concern was how SJW it was, although that may have been more our tourguide rather than the school as a whole.
What I’m really trying to do here is figure out where Haverford fits into the big picture. Not really sure if one or both will be on the final list, but both are probably on the top 40 list, which is obviously not workable. When I get that pared down a bit I will probably do a bigger post asking for advice.
@dadof4kids: You & your daughter seem to understand as does @milgymfam.
From the Fiske Guide To Colleges 2020:
“Mawters may take themselves a bit too seriously.”
Quoting a Bryn Mawr sophomore:
“We are social-justice minded, fiercely independent trailblazers who do not take no for an answer. I am absolutely certain that we will run the world someday.”
@milgymfam thank you, that’s what I was looking for. I’m still having a hard time putting my finger on it 6 months after the visit, but cult-like is probably as good a description as any about our tour guide. She was extremely earnest about everything. I felt like everything in her life probably has an exclamation point after it. My daughter felt like an hour with her was exhausting, and 4 years surrounded by people like that would be unbearable.
So maybe Haverford would be a better fit for D21, she’s pretty chill. Of course BMC is an easier admit, and she is a sucker for a postcard like campus (which is a good description of the grounds at BMC). Argh, I’m going to be very happy in 11 months when I can stop worrying about all of this.
Part of the problem is that even though I think she would be happy at 50 different places, she is kind of negative about all of them because she is afraid to fall in love with any of them. She always says something like “I don’t get to decide anyway”. Which may make March less painful, but it isn’t making this process any easier right now.
@publisher thanks for pulling out that quote. I have probably read the Fiske description a half dozen times, but I never really thought about how that fits in with our tour. It does all kind of come together, those both seem to describe our tour guide. Maybe she was more typical of the students there than I thought.
Really look forward to the list of other potential target schools as it should provide more insight into your daughter’s preferences.
We went to the area to see Haverford and threw BMC in because it was so close, and because we both thought it would be interesting to check out a women’s college. As it turned out she was MUCH more drawn to BMC than Haverford. More quirky, with (as others have said) a stunning campus. She also liked all that all of the dorms are multi-year, and yes, even the cult-like traditions. She felt that Haverford was much more mainstream, which certainly isn’t a bad thing, just not as good a fit for her. (Grain of salt, of course, as she tends to judge every campus on the elusive “vibe” I only sometimes agree with!)
We visited both Bryn Mawr and Haverford, and here are my impressions:
Bryn Mawr felt slightly warmer, they have a lot of traditions, and a distinct sisterhood vibe. Rightly or wrongly, I expected it to have an intense, alternative vibe, but that’s not how it felt at all. On the Haverford tour, my D21 noticed that people didn’t smile, nod, or say hello, and she felt it was somewhat disingenuous given the emphasis on community.
Both have beautiful campuses but Haverford buildings were significantly more updated. The Bryn Mawr dorms have a dusty, threadbare, and slightly unkempt feel. My preppy D21 loved Bryn Mawr; it was her favorite among Haverford and Swarthmore. I felt differently and couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
@GoldPenn it’s so funny how the same schools give different people the exact opposite impressions. My D chose Haverford because of how happy and welcoming everyone seemed- a stark contrast to Swarthmore and a slight contrast to Bryn Mawr, where people seemed nice enough and happy enough, but the vibe was just wrong to her. I feel for all the kids who can’t visit in person these days because it is all so personal and variable.
Here is what a friend posted about her freshman’s Bryn Mawr experience so far: D is doing great, loving the experience. Mix of online and in person classes have been going well so far. In some ways, being isolated on a small campus without the distractions of the outside world is helping my kid get adjusted well to campus. It also seems like bonding with others has also been easier probably because she and her peers all accept their circumstances and that they’re all “in this together.” Overall great experience so far.
With respect to facilities, Haverford offers a very nice astronomical observatory, with an exterior in the style of its traditional architecture. On Bryn Mawr’s campus you will find an accessible pool (Haverford reserves its pool for faculty, I believe).
Among notable curricular differences, Bryn Mawr offers geology.
Cross-campus privileges in the above examples may lessen the importance of the distinctions, however.
@merc81 yes, it’s hard to understate how integrated the two schools are together. My daughter not only majors in a Bryn Mawr only Major (with a double major in a TriCo major), she is a major rep for the school. She has swam at the Bryn Mawr pool and eaten at the dining center. I don’t think there has been a single class on either campus that she’s taken that didn’t have students from both campuses in it.