<p>I go to a private, religious, tiny, heavily conservative school, which is not very open or accepting of diverse political/ethinic opinions. For the longest time, I thought that going to a large university would be a good idea, so that I could learn about other cultures and meet people who were more open and accepting of others beliefs, but now i've developed a certain fondness for LACs, and the small, but diverse atmosphere they usually uphold. I also appreciate how some, such as Haverford and Swarthmore, have religious roots, but even though they aren't affliated to them they still hold to their policies of tolerance and well-being to all students.</p>
<p>Random facts that might help with selection:</p>
<ul>
<li>I am not a party person (Do not drink)</li>
<li>More Liberal/Independent idealogies</li>
<li>Suburbanite</li>
<li>Minority student, pro-diversity (both sexually and racially)</li>
<li>Overachiever, but not crazy about academics</li>
</ul>
<p>...sorry if this is a lot, but i'd really like some opinions on this. Thanks :)</p>
<p>One thing that you might consider is how you would feel if you went to a small school and were not happy with the smaller group of students in your major or the professors. This obviously isn’t a problem for everyone or LACs would not exist; however, it is something to think about. Smaller colleges also tend to be more limited on their offerings, so if you change your mind, you may need to transfer.</p>
<p>Hmm, I’ve always thought that the smaller number of students/professors would be more appealing, as you would get to have a more personalized relationship with your professors. Though I could be wrong.</p>
<p>My daughter tends to be very personality driven (people in general annoy her), so the chance of spending four years with a small group changed her mind about LACs. When the process started, she thought she would go to an LAC. I think that you can develop relationships with your professors at larger universities if that is something you are interested in doing. At the larger universities, professors appear to be somewhat surprised by student interest.</p>
<p>i would say, the vast majority of small, private, highly selective LACs have no problem keeping studious, non-drinking suburbanites interested and busy. The party scenes are pretty much limited to the weekend (unless you make the effort to extend the weekend) and easily circumvented. Science and math prodigies might find larger schools more attractive because of the bragging rights associated with with Big Science; but, for the most part, the science and math majors I’ve met on the Williams, Wesleyan, Swarthmmore, and Haverford CC forums have been extremely happy with their choices.</p>
<p>Generally, I’m a fan of LACs because of the opportunity for mentoring by faculty, among other things. But there are students for whom they aren’t a good fit. </p>
<p>1) Most LACs are suburban or rural. If you have interests that are better suited to an urban area, your choices may be limited.<br>
2) They are less well known, especially internationally-even the top ones.<br>
3) You will not be able to take graduate level coursework in your field if you are very advanced, because LACs don’t have grad schools. (Although LACs have a great track record for creating independent study opportunities one on one with faculty.)<br>
4) If you have an unusual major or academic interest, it may not be available, or there may not be a lot of depth in your subject area.
5) If you want a big Division I sports scene, LACs don’t offer it.
6) Very few top LACs offer engineering, business, nursing, accounting and similar pre-professional majors
7) Because they are smaller, the alumni networks, although often very committed to helping their own, are likely to be smaller, especially if you end up in a location distant from your LAC and distant from a major urban area.<br>
8) Fewer companies will recruit on campus in your senior year. You will have to take more initiative on the job front.
9) Most importantly, fit really matters. The culture at a small LAC is typically very strong and there is no place to hide. In a large school, you are always likely to find compatriots even if you are well-out of the mainstream. If you are any kind of minority (racial, social, political, religious), you need to make especially sure you pick a LAC where you will feel comfortable. You don’t want to spend four years on the defensive.</p>
<p>There are off-setting benefits for each of these drawbacks, and as I said above, I am a huge fan of LACs, but they clearly are not for everyone.</p>
<p>Aside from minor details, I agree with most of M’s Mom’s comments.</p>
<p>My kid’s school (Colorado College) is neither suburban nor rural. It is located in a small city at the foot of Pike’s Peak (Rocky Mountains). And, it does offer 2 Division I sports teams (men’s ice hockey and women’s soccer).</p>
<p>Other selective, more or less urban LACs include Macalester (St. Paul), Wesleyan (Middletown, Ct.), and Barnard (NYC).</p>
<p>I think a few other LACs do offer DI sports, or sometimes play against DI teams, but if so it is generally in very few sports. What you do get in many selective LACs is a rather high rate of participation in intramurals or D3 team sports. Schools like Colorado College, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Whitman (LACs with nice recreation areas nearby, and snow) tend to attract many outdoorsy kids. Climbing a 14K-foot mountain, or skiing down at 60+mph, is not terribly compatible with heavy drinking. Not that it never happens (and rural LACs do often have a drinking problem); however, a robust outdoors program is a good sign that many students can find other ways besides drinking to have fun.</p>
<p>All this information is very good to know, since I was thinking about double majoring in computer science and biology, but I also like the small, cozy feel of a LAC. Would you say that they have average-below average computer science programs?</p>
<p>I think that for the purposes of a computer sci double-major, the top LACs are perfectly adequate, but, none would compare to a true techie school like Stanford or MIT. Wesleyan is considered pretty good in the sense that the department covers a wide variety of subject matter: [Wesleyan</a> University: Mathematics & Computer Science: Undergraduate Computer Science Courses](<a href=“http://www.wesleyan.edu/mathcs/undergrad-compsci/courses.html]Wesleyan”>http://www.wesleyan.edu/mathcs/undergrad-compsci/courses.html) But, my sense is that a true CS geek would burn through them in a year or two.</p>
<p>I think only a rather exceptional undergraduate computer geek would be likely to burn through all those Wesleyan courses in a year.</p>
<p>Yes, a really tip-top CS department at a larger school like Stanford will have more courses (for example a whole course in “Introduction to NP Completeness”, which presumably is touched on in one or more of the Wesleyan courses). However, I think a bigger difference is that a university will have more research projects going on. It will have world-famous faculty who have all sorts of irons in the fire (e.g. Donald Knuth or Edward Feigenbaum – check out their Wikpedias). A Bio/CS double major probably would find more interesting project opportunities in areas such as Bioinformatics. This is a difference between LACs and universities in general, not just CS departments.</p>
<p>But a solid LAC like Wesleyan outta provide enough course material to keep most CS majors busy. If you buy into the LAC concept, you really out to be taking a broad variety of courses anyway (in Math, Physics, Econ, whatever.) </p>
<p>Here are the IEEE/ACM Curricula Recommendations:
[Curricula</a> Recommendations - Association for Computing Machinery](<a href=“http://www.acm.org/education/curricula-recommendations]Curricula”>Curricula Recommendations)
Download the Computer Science document; go to Appendix B “Detailed Body of Knowledge”. Any decent CS department is likely to at least pay lip service to these recommendations by having courses that cover the main headings (“Discrete Structures”, “Algorithms and Complexity” etc.) Wes, for one, seems to meet at least this basic standard.</p>
<p>LAC CS departments vary widely in quality. Wesleyan has one of the best, by virtue of also awarding graduate degrees in CS. There are others but I can’t remember them off the top of my head… Harvey Mudd / any Claremont school? (Just cross-enroll at HMC.) Swarthmore has a decent program. So does Oberlin. Vassar has (one) course in Bioinformatics, IIRC.</p>
<p>You’d be a better fit for LACs.
Big universities can be very impersonal if you’re not the proactive type to be social or take advantage of the resources. No one will hold your hand at large universities. Also in regards to diversity at large schools, statistically a school might seem very diverse, but your expectations of meeting others from other cultures might be to high of an expectation. Often times different cultures tend to self segregate. The only interaction that is made might be in class and even then I don’t know how realistic that it is when you’re in a class filled with hundreds of students.
I remember when I attended one of my former institutions which was small in size, people were essentially forced to interact with each other because of small class sizes and student bodies(especially if a campus is residential). I feel that environment is offered at LACs moreso than Big Universities.</p>
<p>^^ Wes also has a bioinformatics certificate (basically minor), for what it’s worth. You could easily major in bio and CS, get the bioinformatics certificate, and still have other classes to do other things, if that is appealing. </p>
<p>I think if you are leaning towards LACs anyway, an LAC with a good comp-sci program will probably be fine, especially since you are planning on doubling with bio, which many LACs are very good at. But definitely look closely at some of the programs to make sure they will be sufficient.</p>
<p>Overall, a Top LAC program in subjects like CS and Biology is comparable and in some cases superior to what you can get from a at a larger institution. You need to do your homework!!! LACs like Swarthmore, Williams, Pomona, Bowdoin and Amherst offer outstanding programs in the sciences and liberal arts. All the LACs listed are top feeders schoos for Ph.D. programs in the sciences.</p>
<p>^No, you need to do your homework. Bio–absolutely, top LACs excel. CS–surprisingly sparse. As I’m considering a double major in CS and looking primarily at LACs, I’ve done a lot of research in this area, looking at individual programs. As a relatively new, interdisciplinary science, CS is not developed nearly to the extent as other sciences at LACs.</p>