<p>U/Chicago is close to sui generis. The dimension that separates U/Chi from Smith, Amherst, UC Berkeley, Yale, Tufts, etc. doesn't have a thing to do with the caliber of the students per se. </p>
<p>It's an approach. When one of D's best friends first mentioned U/Chicago, I instantly saw it as a great fit <em>for her</em> and I'm glad she's there now despite some nasty financial rows with her parents. It would be difficult to separate D from her U/Chi friend on intelligence. D would actually win any "work ethic" competition because friend is snotty about not working on something that doesn't interest her. But there's a difference of temperaments that is clear to me and that suggests each is in the right place and that much happiness would ensue if their places were reversed.</p>
<p>I don't know. Your daughter (possibly quicker than me) might perform well at UChi (w/ probably a lower GPA than Smith). I took the hardest classes I could at Smith including mostly classes with upper-classmen, and studied more than the people directly surrounding me, and made what I consider a good GPA. Yet in three weeks of mostly intro classes at UChi, there were many more people as engaged in class as me, and assignments were more rigorously graded than at Smith, to the point where I felt maybe a little-above-the-middle of the class. Which is not bad at all, just not nearly as well as I did from day-1 at Smith. My guestimate is that I would have began making .3-.4 grade pts lower at UChi, which COULD be called comparable to Smith, or not... </p>
<p>I'll agree I've heard stories from Amherst students that only a handful of students usually make class interesting at Amherst by participating, which to me sounds similar to Smith. So obviously there's more to academic challenge at a school than selectivity. I really think it's a combination of how bright students are and work-ethic. I think the most selective schools (Amherst, Swat, UChi, Hahvard, etc.) tend to get more of the brightest students. And I think schools with particular reputations (UChi, Reed, Swat) tend to get a larger % of the hardest-working students. So you put those two things together, and you get the justified legendary intensity of schools like UChi and Swat. But that's just my best thoughts on the matter. I'm not saying that's completely correct.</p>
<p>{{I regret that the internet does not allow for tone-of-voice}}</p>
<p>Yes it does. VOIP Voice over Internet Protocol. It's cheap, you can call anywhere in the world, and I'm sure you get by the Smith servers and firewall.
Your puter already has a mic in it.</p>
<p>The combined enrollment of U/Chi, Swat, and Reed comprise but a pimple on the elephant's butt as far as the fraction of intense students. It's the same fallacy as all the smartest students go to Harvard, the next smartest to Yale, etc.</p>
<p>It's not a question of my D not peforming well at U/Chi and her friend doing well at Smith...it's a question of temperament, which is completely different from intelligence. D's profile and achievements are much more conventional than her U/Chi friend's. Both have a potential to go far but I strongly suspect that they will manifest in different ways and that the U/Chi friend may turn into a lab rat in about six-seven years, blinking in the sunlight when forcibly extracted. D is more well rounded, approaching a triple-threat generalist; her friend is brilliant in a narrow range, high achieving but merely competent in others, and outright deficient in still others.</p>
<p>Anent Amherst, I hear anecdotally that the Amherst guys are actually a little intimidated by Smith women on the basis of in-class participation. Or, as one Smithie (not my D) put it: "The Amherst girls are bright, they have to be to be there, but they just sit back in class and let the guys dominate the discussion. Smith women don't let that happen." I've accumulated data points on this but am not willing to call it conclusively yet.</p>
<p>TD: I KNOW there's overlap in student-quality at all the elite schools. Otherwise I would not have felt above-average at UChi! That's not my point. My point (and I think you would agree) is that the %s of each type of student tend to differ a little from school to school, and THAT can result in REAL differences in the levels of in-class participation, and REAL differences in how easy it is to make x GPA.</p>
<p>Anyway, this has once again gotten really irrelevant -since I am who I am and other students are who other students are and just because you transplant someone they don't change into a completely different person.</p>
<p>Does anyone else have suggestions for me on specific LACs as strong or stronger than Smith that offer an excellent environmental studies program, pretty-please?</p>
<p>Smith differs from many LAC's in one important respect: they go for diversity of background. Ten percent are Ada's. 25 percent are lowest economic quartile (Pell grants). 25 percent (with overlap with the first two sets) are first-in-family to college. Given all that, the <em>statistical</em> profile of the student body, whether by SAT score or percentile-rank in high school class, is not going to match that of many other schools. It's a flabby reach from that, however, to extrapolate that either the students or the general academic climate are somehow inferior when you take into account that SES accounts for significant differences in both SAT scores and high school performance.</p>
<p>It would, however, at least partially explain why Smith has lower first-year retention and graduation rates (90/83) versus, say, Wellesley (95/90) as some of the "calculated risks" don't pan out. Hmm. Numbers for U/Chi are (94/84)...more stick the first year, virtually the same percentage make it to graduation.</p>
<p>A Smith board is not the best place in the world to ask about environmental studies programs at other colleges.</p>
<p>TD: I think it's great that Smith is so diverse. I also think that's a separate issue, since my high school was proportionately much more socioeconomically and ethnoculturally diverse than Smith, and I still had to work a heck of a lot harder there for lower grades.</p>
<p>With regards to comparing schools on academic rigor: I won't say you're wrong. I'll just say I think you should sit in on several classes at Smith and then at Wellesley, or UChi, or wherever, before making empirical statements like "Smith is as easy to make grades at as all those institutions" without evidence. Because I sense that you are arguing from a gut-feeling you have that Smith is wonderful (it's good you feel that way), w/o really having extensive experience with multiple institutions, their alums, or talking to grad schools, etc.</p>
<p>To the person who suggested an ES college: Thanks.</p>
<p>WITH REGARDS TO THE 12:32 POST, I'm sure I'll get teased for this, but in the quotes should have been that "Smith is as HARD to make grades at as all those institutions"</p>
<p>The question isn't one of diversity. It's one of using SES-sensitive metrics to establish strength of student bodies. </p>
<p>As for Wellesley, the differences for grad/professional schools admissions are insignificant.</p>
<p>I've never made any statement about easiness to make grades, one way or the other. </p>
<p>Oddly enough, I've been talking to students, profs, alums of various schools possibly longer than you've been alive. You may have forgotten that at least by marriage I'm a member of an academic community where conversation about same--often with people who either studied or taught elsewhere. Moreover my current occupation for these past 15 years includes faculty and senior administrators relocating into the area from upper-tier academic institutions from around the country. Plus in my four years of total immersion during D's undergrad college search I interrogated several current students and alumnae of Wellesely, going so far as to attend some alumni events. </p>
<p>I don't stake out positions just on gut feel.</p>
<p>Okay. Basically, this all started b/c I discovered what I'd consider a large difference between UChi and Smith. Those are really the only two schools I know about. I DON'T KNOW HOW to compare rigor of schools on-paper. I'm just trying to find a way -and you're not going to convince me there isn't a difference, when I myself have experienced one. UChi has a comparable acceptance %, but also SATs nearly 200-pts higher than Smith's. Maybe you're right. Maybe it isn't about the student body. Maybe it's about how the faculty organize classes? For example. I think if student's think they will get a C if they don't do readings and talk in class, they WILL do readings and talk in class. </p>
<p>With regards to Smith and Wellesley. Maybe they're the same. I don't know. But when a Wellesley prof who was a Smith alum told me Wellesley was a little more intense, rlt blamed it on politics. But couldn't "politics" also be a reason for many people not wanting to claim a difference between Smith and Wellesley, b/c they attract so many of the same applicants and it's a sensitive issue? Someone (I forget who) on this forum, said his daughter chose Carleton over Smith b/c she perceived Carleton to be too studious. Doesn't that indicate a difference?</p>
<p>I don't know. I just want all of my questions answered. And if YOU can do it in such a way that is consistent with the idea that a 3.5 GPA Hahvard or UChi student could transfer to Smith and not make a much higher GPA at Smith, I'll accept it.</p>
<p>Another question: I agree you have to pass college to go to graduate school at all, and I know Smith sends women to the top graduate programs every year. But considering some graduate programs are much harder to get into than others, wouldn't looking at WHAT GRADUATE SCHOOLS Smithies are going to in WHAT NUMBERS be more meaningful than simply saying many Smithies go to SOME form of graduate school, when you are arguing Smith is the exact same as x other school?</p>
<p>No. I'm not in college now. I'm home on break a bit bored, working full-time in the evening. I wouldn't be spending so much time on the computer at all, except that this is a topic I'm currently really interested in breaking down. There are few things I'm very opinionated about: one is politics and current events (and this whole matter of how schools differ is sort of a current event for me, since I'm still looking at trying to transfer), another is civil rights philosophies. My parents are both lawyers, so I'll blame my compulsive-debator tendencies on them. I guess I find the ability to explore such controversial issues with other people as willing to debate as me in an impersonal manner sort of a novelty. It definitely started to wear off about two days ago though. I expect I'll be disappearing from these boards little by little.</p>
<p>TD: I re-read your post and realized you said you weren't making claims about grading. I think we agree on more than we disagree on. Ignore my most recent posts and let's just drop any talk about Smith vs. other colleges in terms of rigor now, okay?</p>
<p>In fact, let me just apologize to everyone. I took up way too much threadspace for someone who was primarily being reactionary to her own particular past mistakes. A lot of my stuff fits in better with the "transfer students" inquiries. Smith's a good place, overall, and I'm happy to be leaving my more boring home-life to go back there for the spring semester.</p>
<p>I personally wish you the best, Ecape. Although we have vehemently disagreed about many things you said about Smith, you are a big person for admitting your foibles. May you find happiness either at Smith, or somewhere else you think may be a better fit for you.</p>