@OHMomof2 LAC’s and the service academies have nothing in common. Please do not put words in my mouth and then take cheap shots at me. Thanks.
@GoNoles85 you clearly misunderstand what “liberal arts college” means. West Point and the academies are most definitely liberal arts colleges. Sorry that doesn’t fit in with your disparaging view of LACs.
You can tell the Army it’s incorrect: https://www.army.mil/article/26639/west-point-ranked-top-public-liberal-arts-college
Or USNews: http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/west-point-2893
No. Just because USN ranks WP as the top LAC and WP posts that to brag does not make WP a LAC. The curriculums and student lives at the service academies have nothing to do with what life is like for students at a typical LAC. Don’t confuse an honest and accurate opinion about LAC’s with disparaging them. If you want to take shots at me do not put words in my mouth for things I did not say please. I didn’t say a word about the service academies but you twisted my words around as if I was insulting them. Grow up.
That would actually leave out my undergrad LAC and other similarly sized LACs as its total undergrad population has at points exceeded that by a slight margin in some years.
Some LACs have separate undergrad divisions with separate deans and admissions. Oberlin is divided into the Arts & Sciences College(Known on campus as “The college”) and the Conservatory of Music(Known on campus as “The Con”).
That comment’s very similar in mentality as the older cousin who nearly flunked out of college multiple times from a lower-tiered Big 10 from focusing too much on his frat party/beer double major back in the '80s.
It’s also interesting as I’m of the opinion that if one must “lubricate oneself” with alcohol and attend endless parties to demonstrate one’s social skills or worse…learn them…that is manifest proof the individual concerned is more socially challenged than those who don’t feel the need to do so.
Incidentally, I’ve had an opportunity to attend several undergrad university classes as a summer student and at invitation of Prof/TA friends while a grad student at one of those Us.
Not only did I have no trouble participating/making myself heard even in lecture classes of a few hundred, I was surprised most of the regular undergrads seemed more passive and in the case of one course, acted like shrinking violets* compared with most of the undergrads at my LAC where active boisterous classroom discussion* by all students was commonplace.
- A few of those university's undergrads actually came up to ask me to intercede on their behalf because they were so intimidated by a domineering undergrad who steamrolled and put down any undergrad who disagreed even though the overconfident bluster failed to conceal much nonsense being spewed. I did intercede and the situation was resolved...but at my LAC this situation wouldn't have happened as none of us would have been so intimidated to the point of being afraid to call BS on the nonsense and otherwise debate anyone attempting to be domineering in class to the ground if necessary.
And my LAC isn’t the only one with such an active and confident “willing to debate others to the ground” inclination. Reed and Bryn Mayr alums also have this inclination as well…and it’s one of the things I highly respect about them and their campus cultures.
** A few outside visitors who witnessed some of our LAC classroom discussions without understanding the campus cultural context likened them to “vicious slugfests”.
Indeed. Swarthmore and Smith are two examples of LACs among a bunch which offer undergrad engineering.
@GoNoles85 Forbes also describes West Point as a liberal arts college. http://www.forbes.com/colleges/united-states-military-academy/. The fact that this surprises you shows that you fundamentally misunderstand what makes someplace a liberal arts college. See post #14. It’s the focus on undergraduate education and not graduate programs that is the hallmark of a LAC.
Student life at service academies is obviously quite different from student life almost anywhere else. Doesn’t mean they aren’t LACs.
No, I really don’t. Just because the service academies focus on UG ed doesn’t make them LAC’s anymore than putting lipstick on a pig makes a pig a model. As I mentioned above, the student experience is vastly different at a SA as it is at a LAC. Very few pillow fights for one thing.
I would not categorize a college with engineering, nursing, business or other career degrees as an LAC.
Actually that’s exactly what it makes them.
RIP pillow fights at West Point…
@momofthreeboys My engineering degree is from Lafayette College, most definitely a self described LAC with less than 3000 students and no graduate degree programs. No separate College of Engineering but ABET accredited BS programs in several engineering disciplines.
Another common misconception is that LAC’s aren’t the best route to go for students who are interested in pursuing post-graduate studies, such as PhD’s, in science. As a matter of fact, many LAC’s are among the largest contributors of students who go on to earn PhD’s in Science and Engineering.
Look at TABLE 4 in this document (PDF): http://www.reed.edu/ir/NSF-PhD-STEM2011.pdf.
While Caltech, MIT, UChicago, and other major research universities are major contributors of science and engineering PhD’s on a per capita (per 100 bachelor’s degree’s awarded) basis, several small liberal arts colleges are found near the top of the list, e.g., Harvey Mudd, Reed, Swarthmore, Carleton, Grinnell, Pomona, and Williams, among others.
Other documents are available from the National Science Foundation on a field by field basis, e.g., Math, Physics, Biology, etc. Here’s a link: http://www.reed.edu/ir/phd.html
Hard to let this one pass, since my wife double-majored in Psychology and American Studies back before anyone had “Women’s Studies.” Her American Studies program was almost completely devoted to women’s history and feminist theory. So she pretty much represents your straw person. Apart from the first six weeks or so after she graduated – she did not look for a job before that, because she planned to move across the country to be with me – she has never been unemployed. If she were an engineer and made what she earns, she would be a very high-paid engineer.
If you are a smart, organized, effective person, and you feel like majoring in “Eastern European women’s studies,” you are going to be fine. If you are not a smart, organized, effective person, majoring in something career-oriented isn’t going to cure your personal flaws.
This means that the following would not be LACs under that definition:
Harvey Mudd College
Smith College
Swarthmore College
Bucknell University
United States Military Academy
United States Naval Academy
United States Air Force Academy
I doubt that’s been a long-standing tradition as I read it started sometime ~the year 2000 and none of the West Point alums who graduated in the '90s or before recalled having that tradition.
No, what it means is that most LAC’s do not offer such programs. There are exceptions. But, the general rule is that most LAC’s do not offer programs in business or engineering. Thank goodness for the ones that do to make the others look much better statistically.
By the way, the service academies are not “free.” The tuition and fees are paid by the US taxpayers. The students repay that debt with military service. Do LAC students have to do that? No. No they do not. LAC students pay upwards of $50K a year. Pillow fights aren’t free either apparently.
Little in life is free. But students at most academies do not pay anything upfront for their education. And obviously many students attend LACs for far less than $50K, given that they all offer either merit awards, need-based financial aid or both. And I named a couple of public LACs in my earlier post. Those cost far less than $50K for their state residents. Some LACs have ROTC programs as well and those students also “pay” for their LAC education with the promise of later military service.
It’s interesting. Many liberal arts colleges like Amherst and Dartmouth College are offering engineering or affiliating themselves with another university to offer it. And many research universities try to say they’re mainly a liberal arts institution, like at the info session I attended at Princeton and Yale. I think it depends whose atop the Forbes list that year. When LACs are in–everyone wants to be one.
@preppedparent Most (all?) universities have undergraduate colleges that may be very much like a LAC, but they are still universities. Also, Dartmouth is “LAC-like” in it’s undergrad focus but it is a research university, not a LAC (because it has a medical school and other graduate programs). But when colleges are trying to sell their product - in this case an education for undergraduates - of course they emphasize those aspects that they believe will appeal to undergrads and their parents.
Usually, you’re a LAC or a research university, not both. Each type draws different students.
But you proved my point–when it comes to selling yourself to families, suddenly all colleges become all things to draw everyone.
True. But I think many students like the idea of a “college of arts and sciences” or whatever Us call their undergraduate colleges, being within a larger community of grad and professional students. Diff’rent strokes.
FYI Amherst (college) doesn’t offer engineering.