i know, it’s #1 liberal arts, but seriously, in west coast, nobody knows. (okay, maybe 1 in 100.)
how’s williams reputation in east/south/midwest?
<p>well...in the west coast, based on the people i know,...they don't what what it is. They usually get it confused with william and mary college. well..anyways, i think it has a great reputation out side of the west coast</p>
<p>The valedictorian of my school is going there. It was a shock to us because we thought he would be attending an IVY. Nobody had heard of the school until he chose it.</p>
<p>The valedictorian at my school is also going there and she got a 1600 on her SAT I.</p>
<p>it has better grad placement than all the ivies save for HYP ive heard.</p>
<p>Often, if a val goes there, that's all a school needs to gain community recognition. Maybe people don't know anything about it, but they know it's good because the valedictorian went there. I wouldn't really worry too much about regional reputation. Most people who matter know what it is.</p>
<p>heard of it through CC, not really known about in the South</p>
<p>Yes.. My history professor went there for his bachelors degree... Really smart guy and speaks highly of Williams..</p>
<p>Yeah, I know it's a really good school, but only 'cause of CC and college searching in general. I wouldn't worry about it -- everyone who matters (grad school adcoms, potential employers, etc.) will know about it.</p>
<p>williams is very well known in my town (NY)</p>
<p>It doesn't really have the name recognition as HYPSM, etc... but like entropicgirl said - the ppl. who matter will know - Williams is highly respected in academic circles</p>
<p>my friend is going to williams and chose it over amherst and rice
hes also the winner of the gates millennium scholarship</p>
<p>wait... so does that mean that people in the west coast get some sort of... advantage...?</p>
<p>Probably not; lots of people from Cali apply to east coast schools. The proportion isn't nearly as high as northeastern states, but that gets balanced out because California is so enormous. Places like Amherst, Williams, etc. aren't as well known here because in CA, everyone and their mother applies to Stanford and that's all they seem to be concerned with.</p>
<p>Heh, whereabouts in California do you live in (er, not everone has "Stanford" standards to live up to)? Californians for the most part love our public education system- UCs, Cal States, and Community Colleges. "Liberal Arts colleges? What are those? Williams? Huh? Under 10,000 students on campus? You've gotta be craaaaaaaazy!" I guess that's why we live in big ol' California and not, hmm.. (which state shall I make fun of today?), Wyoming. </p>
<p>TTG</p>
<p>Yes, but mainly through U.S. News and the fact that one of my friends will be attending Williams in the fall.</p>
<p>From the South</p>
<p>I live in the South. NO ONE applied to Williams from my school. Very few people have even heard of it. Then again, they haven't heard of Vassar or Wellesley or Amherst or Pomona, either. Highly selective liberal arts colleges are not big draws at my school (fairly well-respected private prep). Everyone knows HYPSM etc, but the LACs are at an extreme disadvantage, unfortunately. </p>
<p>It seems at my high school everyone wanted to get into some big-name university and looked down on LACs. Probably 85% of my classmates are heading to unis this fall. Probably 70% did not even apply to more than one liberal arts college, if any.</p>
<p>Williams is awesome, though.</p>
<p>okay, so i think we've pretty much established that reputation doesn't matter, that important people will know. </p>
<p>What i want to know is, though, do poeple who live in your region think williams is less better (if it makes any sense) than IVY's?
if you don't mind, specify your region plz. btw, i'm from san diego and nobody i've talked to knows about williams (not that it matters really).</p>
<p>Well, it's not that reputation doesn't matter, it's that no one knows Williams in the first to place to even have a reputation! So yeah, talking about Central Orange County here, there is a virtual consensus that IVY is much better than Williams.</p>
<p>But then again, IVY is considered better than the rest (ugh). Of course, everyone can only name some of the more popular Ivies (Harvard, Yale, Princeton) and mistaken other good schools for Ivies (Stanford), but then again when they hear that Columbia, Dartmouth, and Brown are IVY too, those schools' respective reputations shoot up. In the end, all people in this region care about (beside state schools) are Stanford, CalTech, USC, NYU, anything with 'Boston' in it, Georgetown (maybe), and Ivy Leagues; anything else is left for the dogs.</p>
<p>TTG</p>
<p>It might interest you to know that on the admitted students' discussion board there's a thread going on that's about Williams being "blissfully under the radar" or something like that. Most of the prospective students who post mostly aren't bothered by the lack of reputation in certain parts of the country (or the world for that matter). After all, if anyone hasn't heard of Williams, it's their loss!</p>