<p>Idad certainly has brought out another interesting dimension for the analysis - how much a school is spending per student. I like dstark’s analogies and analysis more, though. The way I look at it, if school A spends $100/student and B spends $50, just how much better is A compared to B? If in fact a student in a class of 5 learns about the same as one in a class of 10, then the second school is actually more efficient and the fact it’s spending less is not a bad thing. So while this is a new parameter to consider, I wouldn’t go overboard on it.</p>
<p>^ Usually the classes are not caped at 5. The difference between the 2 schools in your example will usually be that the school #2 will cancel the class unless more than 10 students enroll. This greatly hurts students who want to take classes that do not attract many other students.</p>
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<p>I would suggest digging into some of the budget-cutting plans at US colleges and universities this year to get a sense of whether this is about the differences in class sizes of 5 or 10. </p>
<p>Not to pick on OSU, but they had 316 courses in the fall 2008 semester with 100 or more students. Assuming each of these had just 100 students and not 125 or 150 or 400, that means that 31,600 students at The Ohio State University last fall were sitting in a class of 100 studetns. That’s out of a total undergrad population of about 42,000.</p>
<p>Swarthmore had 2 courses with 100 students. So, using the same methodology, that’s 200 students in a 100-person lecture class, out of 1500 undergrads. That’s not factoring that both of those courses also had lab or discussion sections, capped at 20, led by PhD professors in the department in addition to the lectures.</p>
<p>Faculty cost is, by far, the biggest single expense in undergrad educational program. Less per student spending almost always means less faculty payroll per student.</p>
<p>OP - Is it just about fit vs finance? Or are there things you like a lot about the OSU option too?</p>
<p>Mostly finance. When I say that, I mean the amount we’d have to borrow for Swat wouldn’t be an unbearable burden. I recognize that both schools have their strengths and weaknesses. What I love about Swarthmore is its academic rigor and the honors program. I talked to a kid at OSU in the honors program who had gotten the Presidential Scholarship and he said the worst thing about OSU was the feeling of not being challenged-something that I don’t want. When I visited Swat I also loved how everyone was so excited about the school and were extremely welcoming. They also had lots of diverse interests and backgrounds. I also liked how they emphasized that almost all the extracurricular groups on campus were open to complete novices. I also liked the close student-faculty interaction. For OSU, the plus is that I’d be going for free. It seems to have a strong poli sci department and opportunities for research and I’d also be part of the honors collegium and honors college. But one thing that keeps getting me is its size and the sense that most students there aren’t there for the school’s academics.</p>
<p>There is no question that there will be greater geographic diversity at Swarthmore than at OSU. The question is does that translate into a much better education?</p>
<p>Certainly, every university tries to maximize diversity under the mantra of a ‘better education.’ Most folks assume that this is true.
In fact diversity in hiring, faculty, students etc., has been the clarion call for the better part of the twentieth century by almost every major educational institution. HOWEVER>…
I have seen no study that shows that having greater diversity, either racially, economically or geographically, improves the educational quality.
In fact, studies have shown that groups tend to congregate with those similar to themselves regardless of the diversity in a school. Thus, the rich tend to stay with rich kids etc. Folks also seem to congregate with those of the same race and religion. This has been a major outcry among university administrators for years. I am not saying that this right. I am saying , “it is what it is.”</p>
<p>However, if having a diverse student body is important, I would bet that OSU has a greater degree of both racial diversity and especially economic diversity among its students than an expensive school such as Swarthmore.</p>
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Maybe “it is what it is” at OSU, but it is not true for Swarthmore.</p>
<p>nngmm, How do you know it isn’t true to some extent at Swarthmore? Moreover, if it is true for Swarthmore,maybe being a much smaller school encourages more intermingling of social and racial groups. That would be a great sociological study.</p>
<p>However, I will say again, I wonder if schools like Swarthmore have the same amount of economic diversity as a school like OSU. Generally private schools tend to attract wealthier students. This shouldn’t surprise you. Yes, schools like Swarthmore might give some scholarships to needier students in order to attract them,but I do wonder what percentage of the total population this represents vs. that of schools such as OSU.</p>
<p>Again there are no studies supporting that diversity in students or faculty increase the eduational quality for everyone. I suspect that one reason that no study may exist is that many universities don’t want to really know the answer or don’t want the answer to be unpopular.</p>
<p>I will say that there were some very informal studies done at the high school level particularly at our high school. We have an overwhelmingly upper middle class population. We do have a small minority of black and hispanic students,who generally perform better than their black and hispanic counterparts at other schools. Thus, the study seems to show that some diversity does seem to help under represented minority students. However, there does not seem to be any effect on the affluent majority in any way. I should note that the good scores by our URM at our high school could also be due to having more affluent parents who are more supportive of education and not because of the diversity. I don’t know the background of the black and hispanic kids at our high school in order to make any determination.</p>
<p>I should also note that for schools that have a high representation of poorer kids, the effect on SAT scores for these kids isn’t as markedly improved as in schools like our high school with a small minority of under represented minorities. What does this mean socially? I don’t know. It would be a good study though.</p>
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<p>Those percentages are easy to get. Here they are from the most recent USNEWS. I think these are from Fall 2008.</p>
<p>Percentage of students receiving need-based grant aid (i.e. need based price cuts):</p>
<p>37% The Ohio State University
47% Swarthmore College</p>
<p>I can’t give you the overall economic diversity at Swarthmore. They only report the family income distribtion for the roughly half of the student body receiving need-based aid. 52% of the financial aid students have family incomes below $100,000.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/administration/ir/FAStats.pdf[/url]”>http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/administration/ir/FAStats.pdf</a></p>
<p>I already gave the ethnic breakdown. I bellieve it is the most ethnically diverse co-ed college or University on the East Coast, just slightly more diverse than Havard.</p>
<p>56% white
10% black
11% Latino/a
16% Asian American
1% Native American
7% International</p>
<p>Uhhhhh…</p>
<p>OSU is a lot cheaper than SWAT…</p>
<p>The median income for SWAT is probably round $200,000.</p>
<p>I would bet it is a lot lower at OSU… probably closer to $100,000.</p>
<p>I might be a little high on the median income for Ohio State…it might be substantially lower…</p>
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<p>I think I already knew that. Believe me, you don’t have to tell me. I’ve seen the tuition bills. :)</p>
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<p>Probably a little lower than that. That would assume that basically all sticker-price customers have family incomes above $200,000. That’s not accurate. There are families with lower incomes that have access to assets for college payments.</p>
<p>But, your point is well taken. I don’t think anyone would be surprised by higher median incomes at one of the top private schools in the country compared to a huge state university. That’s seems pretty much obvious.</p>
<p>Perhaps not so intuitively, you wouldn’t know the family incomes from the campus culture. Every event, concert, and performance is free, so students don’t need extra cash unless they want to spring for the $4 for all you can drink beer at the Senior class sponsored Pub Nite every Thursday. Only about 10% of the students have cars on campus. Groups of students going to NYC for the weekend take a Chinatown bus because it’s cheaper than the train, etc. I wouldn’t be surprised if there isn’t more outward showy wealth in some parts of OSU.</p>
<p>I’m just guessing…</p>
<p>I’m thinking with unearned income…I’m close. It’s true…some people might have wealth that isn’t income producing that counts as part of an asset that can be borrowed against for college.</p>
<p>I don’ t know how Swat counts personal residences when calculating aid. I have a feeling you do know. 
So how does SWAT view personal residences when considering need-based aid?</p>
<p>Edit: And I’m shocked your daughter drinks.</p>
<p>One of the first questions I asked on CC years ago was something like…which schools would a poster recommend where non drinkers are a large percentage of the population of the student body. Turns out, I didn’t need to worry about that. :)</p>
<p>You’re probably not far off. The tougher guess is the median family income at state universities. A lot of them have shifted significant aid dollars out of need-blind and into merit discounting schmes (“honors colleges” and the like) to attract higher income students (errr. I mean higher SAT students…).</p>
<p>We were looking at the cost of out-of-state at places like UNC-Chapel Hill compared to the privates like Emory with a similar admissions profile for out-of-state applicants. Honestly, the difference wasn’t really big enough to offset the differences in quality of the student body, class sizes, TA teachers, and so forth. Paying out-of-state tuition at somebody else’s state university has to be one of the worst values in the college market.</p>
<p>“Paying out-of-state tuition at somebody else’s state university has to be one of the worst values in the college market.”</p>
<p>Yeah…I did that twice. lol</p>
<p>What can I say? </p>
<p>I love my kids.</p>
<p>I hope you see my edit from the prior post. A little off topic.</p>
<p>Taxguy,</p>
<p>There are several factors at Swarthmore that contribute to integration. </p>
<p>One, as mentioned above, is the fact that all cultural and other events on campus are free for all students, so no extra cash is needed to participate in campus activities.</p>
<p>Another is the fact that dorms costs are the same for everybody, regardless of the quality and location of the room. As a result there are no “rich kids” vs “poor kids” dorms - something that is very common at other schools.</p>
<p>Because most of the classes are very small and very interactive (even the ones not officially labeled as “seminars”), many friendships develop through classes and common academic interests, which often transcend class and race.</p>
<p>The campus culture of activism results in much more awareness of everything that has to do with social justice.</p>
<p>
This seems to have been brought up more than a few times, so I thought it might be a good idea to point this out:</p>
<p>I actually just went on a visit to Ohio State today and according to my guide, all events such as concerts and whatnot that happen on campus are free to students and then things happening in Columbus, such as Columbus Blue Jackets games etc, are significantly discounted for students. </p>
<p>So in other words, this would not be some sort of small advantage that Swarthmore would hold over OSU because they actually both do it.</p>
<p><<i actually=“” just=“” went=“” on=“” a=“” visit=“” to=“” ohio=“” state=“” today=“” and=“” according=“” my=“” guide,=“” all=“” events=“” such=“” as=“” concerts=“” whatnot=“” that=“” happen=“” campus=“” are=“” free=“” students=“” then=“” things=“” happening=“” in=“” columbus,=“” columbus=“” blue=“” jackets=“” games=“” etc,=“” significantly=“” discounted=“” for=“” students.=“”>></i></p><i actually=“” just=“” went=“” on=“” a=“” visit=“” to=“” ohio=“” state=“” today=“” and=“” according=“” my=“” guide,=“” all=“” events=“” such=“” as=“” concerts=“” whatnot=“” that=“” happen=“” campus=“” are=“” free=“” students=“” then=“” things=“” happening=“” in=“” columbus,=“” columbus=“” blue=“” jackets=“” games=“” etc,=“” significantly=“” discounted=“” for=“” students.=“”>
<p>Yes, we were told the same thing when we visited for the honors open house a week ago, with some of these being very popular acts for college-age students (which I know little of). There was one singer advertised at a local concert hall we walked by; I
can’t remember his name because I am old, and D could not believe that it would be free. I recall a few other colleges we visited making the same claim (Grinnell comes to mind). So I am not sure this is as much a distinction as a few have touted.</p>
</i>
<p>nngmm:</p>
<p>I think it’s all that, plus one key lesson the Swarthmore learned as an institution in the wake of The Crisis in 1969: that to become a successfully diverse insitution, Swarthmore actually had to become a diverse institution instead of a white institution with some minority students. I think we now see the results of several decades of movement in that direction with diversity fundamentally integrated into every level of the College.</p>
<p>President Chopp talked about this extensively in her remarks about the three waves of diversity. The first wave being the effort to start enrolling a diverse student body. The second wave being achieving numeric diversity, but having the various groups exist mostly in separated spheres. The third wave being institutions where diversity is a part of the fabric of the institution and minorities are not attending a “white” institution, but have agency and a stake. I think Chopp is correct that Swarthmore is at the leading edge of colleges that can legitimately claim to be moving on to the third wave.</p>
<p>One way to approach this type of decision is to list all that you’re looking for in a school.
I would guess from your posts that some of the things that are important to you are
- opportunity to graduate debt-free
- interaction with other top students
- admission to grad schools
Other posters have mentioned things like small classes, classes taught by professors, easy access to professors, students primarily from your state, or students from all over, money spent by college on each student. </p>
<p>List as many of these criteria as you can think of. Then, before you think about which school “wins” in each category, try to do something very difficult: next to each item, assign a score from 1 to 10 of how crucial it is. In other words, really think about which factors are “deal-breakers”, which are pretty important, and which are nice but not essential. </p>
<p>Maybe graduating without debt is a 10 and everything else is a 5-you clearly should go to OSU. It is the only school that meets your most heavily weighted criteria.</p>
<p>Maybe the level of the other students, small class sizes and the prestige of the school are all 10s, and the zero debt criteria is an 8. That would probably lead you to Swarthmore.</p>
<p>We can all answer your question based on our own criteria, but ultimately, you are an exceptionally bright young person with 2 excellent options, and you are the only one who knows how heavily to weight each of these factors.</p>
<p>On this fee issue, lots of schools make claims. I’m telling you that in four years, we never had one dime of misc. fees added to the tuition invoices. Not one dime. And, I know that my daughter never paid one dime for anything. Not for printing at the library. Not for printing on the printers in each dorm. Not for lab supplies. Nothing. Except the $4 to the senior class when she went to Pub Night.</p>
<p>I know for a fact that this is not the way most schools operate. For example, freshman “entries” at Williams collect social fees from their residents. I could be wrong, but I would be shocked if The Ohio State University doesn’t nickle and dime students with fees – lab fees, course registration fees, and so forth. It would be the first public university lately that isn’t doing that. For example, OSU just started charging a new Student Union facilties fee, each quarter. Ohio State charges students $155 plus a $5 handling fee for football tickets.</p>