<p>Hi, I am trying to decide between the schools listed above and wanted some insight that wasn't from my parents and friends. </p>
<p>I think I want to study econmics, but I'm not really sure. Does anyone know how these schools compare with each other overall and life after college?</p>
<p>Have you checked their placement percentages for after graduation?
What percentage have jobs? What percentage are going to grad school? </p>
<p>All excellent schools! You are very fortunate!</p>
<p>my mistake, I should have been more specific, I was was hoping to hear about differences in the schools, such as food, campus, scene, academics, everything!</p>
<p>“Everything” is a little broad. You might get better responses if you first do enough research to come back and ask more focused questions. But maybe you’ll luck out and hear from people who have seriously investigated 2 of them or more.</p>
<p>They are all about equally selective; none stands out as being distinctly better than the rest for economics. If you cannot visit, you could at least order the “Collegiate Choice Walking Tours” videos.</p>
<p>Based only on my research, (never visited), I would rank them in order of: Kenyon (by far the best reputation), Conn College, Holy Cross, and Lehigh. But your choice would depend on many different factors, some I might not even consider.</p>
<p>According to Princeton Review they are indeed quite comparable:</p>
<p>Admissions Selectivity
Kenyon 96
Holy Cross 96
Lehigh 97
Connecticut 95</p>
<p>Academic Rating:
Kenyon 96
Holy Cross 95
Lehigh 89
Connecticut 95</p>
<p>My impression is that Holy Cross is the most conservative of the bunch, Lehigh the most Greek, Holy Cross more Catholic (of course), Kenyon and Conn more liberal-preppy. </p>
<p>The only one I have spent time at is Conn, which my D is applying to. Very impressive school, beautiful campus, seemingly excellent academics, no Greek system (but a party scene, of course), strong sense of community, lots of campus events, train ride to Boston, NYC and Providence.</p>
<p>Kenyon and Connecticut are both pretty similar as people have already said. They are liberal preppy schools that don’t have big greek scenes, but there is still a strong drinking scene going on. Lehigh is incredibly greek, and is on the borderline of being a party school. It’s really good in engineering and business. Holy Cross is very conservative, and that’s about all I know.</p>
<p>Holy Cross has the strongest alumni network-54% alumni giving rate,which is one of the best in the country. The HC alumni network helps in summer internships and greatly in job placement. HC also does very well in the Payscale salary study of alumni earning. With many CEO’s and a strong Wall Street alumni network, Holy Cross does very well. Lehigh is well known for engineering.</p>
<p>Holy Cross and Lehigh have much larger endowments and HC is need blind for admissions as are the Ivies and Duke. HC’s political alumni network is more liberal than conservative with 3-4 US Congressmen, Obama’s chief speechwriter and Chris Matthews of MSNBC.</p>
<p>They should be ranked:</p>
<p>Kenyon
Lehigh
Holy Cross
Connecticut</p>
<p>If you aren’t religious, you may want to steer clear of Holy Cross. It isn’t like some of the other univerisites that provide a more secular education.</p>
<p>Per this year’s US News ranking- LAC category Holy Cross and Kenyon are both ranked 32nd with HC having slightly lower admission rate. HC, Kenyon, Lehigh, Conn. College.</p>
<p>par72 - going by your post history, do you work for Holy Cross? Every post you have is a ■■■■■■■■ post for HC (sometimes rediculously so).</p>
<p>I agree, but what he/she says is true. Holy Cross is ranked similar and is higher than Conn College. I never put a lot of stock in the rankings, some things are helpful some aren’t, but they all have different flavors. My son got into Conn College, didn’t like the feel and very rich students (when he applied anyway) and turned it down. He almost went to HC but got better aid elsewhere. Lehigh had frats and not very diverse, they also had issues with that when we were looking, and it turned him off.
To show how the rankings are skewed, Smith, where my daughters friend went, she pointed out, if you put it side to side on US New’s camparison tool, Smith is the same or lower in almost every catagory they rate, but the peer ranking, but is rated higher. The things that meant the most to us though, HC was higher in. It’s all really fit and what you can afford.</p>
<p>Par72 means well, but might be too biased. What she says though in statistics is true. The endowment rate, etc. is high and I think because of the location, it sometimes doesn’t get as much publicity, although top newspapers highlighted it this year. If she does work there, she just probably feels she is reminding students of another college to consider.</p>
<p>Lehigh has 5,000 students, making it slightly larger than Holy Cross (3,000 students) and significantly larger than Connecticut College (2,000 students) and Kenyon (1,500 students). </p>
<p>Also, I would not use the word “preppy” to describe Kenyon. </p>
<p>Academically, all are good, but my favorite of the four is Kenyon. I love its campus vibe, friendly and laid back atmosphere and commitment to writing.</p>