<p>Hello,
I'm Alex and I would like a clearer picture between the benefits and drawbacks of liberal arts colleges and vocationally themed education (this doesn't mean community college, rather research universities such as University of Georgia and Georgia State)</p>
<p>(Also the same analysis would be great for especially lower tiered LAC's such as Oglethorpe or Mercer?)</p>
<p>You can study liberal arts majors (math, English literature, biology, economics, history, etc.) at research universities like Georgia. But many research universities also offer more overtly pre-professional majors like business, engineering, nursing, architecture, agriculture, etc… However, the main distinction that makes a school a research university is research activity and PhD programs.</p>
<p>While most liberal arts colleges offer mainly liberal arts majors, some do offer pre-professional majors. Liberal arts colleges typically emphasize undergraduates, which can be helpful in the frosh/soph years (small faculty led courses instead of giant faculty led lectures supplemented by TA led discussions), but could impose a ceiling on very advanced students in some subjects (i.e. the students who may want to take graduate level courses or do graduate level research as undergraduates). A liberal arts college with convenient cross registration with a research university may alleviate the latter limitation.</p>
<p>Hi Alex,
it depends on your profile, too. What’s your GPA? How many AP/IB classes have you taken? Have you already taken college classes through dual enrollment? Would you be applying to the “regular” large university or to the Honors College? Would you be preparing a liberal arts major or are you interested in Engineering? Are you motivated by interactive discussions or would you rather sit unnoticed in the back of a 300-person lecture hall? Are you into competitive, TV-broadcast sports? What do you plan to do after you graduate? Do you intend to graduate in 4 (or 5) years?</p>