<p>As driver said earlier, get a copy of "Choosing the Right College". We recently got a copy of this book and found it helpful as yet another tool and perspective on colleges. It is the only one I have seen that discusses the political climate on campus. </p>
<p>I found the entry on Pomona to be very interesting and funny. Basically it said that there is a pretty good climate for politics and debate on campus both left and right (whatever those labels mean). They went on to provide an example of the student activism after the start of the Iraqi war. The anti-war students had a 'hunger strike for peace in Iraq'. A few days later the students that supported the war in Iraq had a 'barbeque for a free Iraq' close to where the anti-war students were.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The anti-war students had a 'hunger strike for peace in Iraq'. A few days later the students that supported the war in Iraq had a 'barbeque for a free Iraq' close to where the anti-war students were.
[/quote]
Now that's funny. And Redstar--congratulations on the Eagle Scout project approval!</p>
<p>IMHO, the Wharton school at Penn is the best of the Ivies for economics, hands down. Plus they cover both theoretical economics and business.</p>
<p>Two other really superior economics departments are U Chicago and the aforementioned George Mason. They are all very different campuses, though-- GMU is huge (25000+ I think) while Penn & Chicago are much smaller, Chicago having 4400 undergrads and Penn somewhat more.</p>
<p>Two Ivy economics departments I would avoid would be Brown and Harvard, but that's just my take on it. Good luck redstar!</p>
<p>Just one question. The OP mentions her son would like to do sports. At a D1 school it is not all that easy to do varsity sports as well as debating, unless he has in mind a club or intramural sport. If not, I would seriously look at Williams, Amherst, etc., the excellent D3 schools where students tell me they can combine a varsity sport with other activities. </p>
<p>Btw, Princeton's economic department is very highly rated, and there is a minor in finance, so that a student can get a broad liberal arts education as well as some specific skills.</p>
<p>aparent5, I agree completely with the D1/D3 consideration. Great point. However, with regard to Princeton (a school that I love!) our somewhat conservative OP might have a real problem with having Paul Krugman (or one of his acolytes) as an economics professor. I know I would.
[quote]
Btw, Princeton's economic department is very highly rated
[/quote]
Of course, one grandstanding professor doesn't make a department...</p>
<p>While I think that Paul Krugman is own worst enemy, it seems that he relegates most of his egregious theories for the tabloid -oops, newspaper! I attended one of his speeches and he was able to tone down the rethoric and deliver a very interesting presentation. Obviously, he must have been reminded that he was in front of a crowd that could have turned quite hostile, despite being on a US campus. :).</p>
<p>Driver, although Krugman is popular with students I certainly don't think the erudite reputation of the economics department depends at all on him! They seem to have had a revolving door with the Fed in recent years, they have the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman, also two recent Bush appointees...something for everybody.</p>
<p>"Finally, I don't agree with your GC re ED. Princeton has an online Early Estimator, so you can see exactly how much aid you would get from them, within $100"</p>
<p>Does any other parent feel the same way about aparent analysis?</p>
<p>Redstar, just to agree with myself here :D you have nothing to lose by calling the Princeton financial aid department. In our info session they said they would be very willing to go over numbers ahead of time with parents who contacted them. I am positive they would be especially interested in talking with you if you tell them that your s's GC advised you to avoid ED schools. Also keep in mind, if you own your home, that Princeton does not consider home equity in calculating family assets.</p>
<p>A conservatve student on most any college campus but especially at east coast and west coast elites should be very circumspect when approaching certain topics with lower level faculty. Your political views can hurt you. The average lecturer in the English department thinks Bill Moyers is an arch conservative and the major media is in the hands of the Christian Right - and it only gets worse in the Anthropology and Political Science departments.</p>
<p>Just as a the politically incorrect answer on the SAT test is never the correct multiple choice answer so too the politically incorrect position is never the correct position to take in a written assignment - or even to hint at. There are social tools you will need to survive as a conservative on an elite college campus. They are very similar to the adaptations that Blacks in general and Black men in particular needed to make in order to survive in the post-reconstruction South. If you want to avoid being lynched get good at grinning and shuffling and let the Man think you are a boob and a yokel, more to be pitied than censored.</p>
<p>I don't know why a student would want to gratuitously interject partisan politics into an academic paper. But, I think professors at most good colleges would reward an intellectually sound, well-supported argument, regardless of the viewpoint.</p>
<p>One of the reasons my S choose UChicago over a very liberal LAC was that he felt all dialog and points of view would be well represented by a school that produced both Seymour Hersh (AB '58) and Paul Wolfowitz (Ph.D. '72).</p>
<p>It's ridiculous to deny that these areas have become closed loops, echo chambers of leftist thought. And the anecdotal evidence of its effect on conservative students is compelling and widespread.</p>
<p>Simply arguing a conservative position in a paper is not gratuitously injecting partisan politics, unlike the professors who go off on political rants totally unrelated to the subject matter, hand out politically biased assignments, or ding students on their grades for disagreeing. It happens - and conservative students have to decide whether to go along or fight back.</p>
<p>Oh, puhleeze. The poor pitiful put-upon "conservatives", repressed, surpressed, and held powerless by the "liberal, elites"! Are you guys still buying that Limbaugh/Gingrich/Falwell nonsense?</p>
<p>Hello. Who has controlled the White House for the last 40 years? Who controls both houses of Congress? Now, it is certainly arguable whether or not the Republican party is "conservative" or not. But, there is little doubt that the Republican party is firmly entrenched as the majority party in this country. Do you think that the policy wonks in the Republican administrations for the last 40 years all went to Bob Jones University? If I'm not mistaken, both Bush I and Bush II attended a "liberal, elitist" university in Connecticut. Doesn't seem to have rubbed off on them. They both have been quite adept at shaping their politics to cater to their religious-right core constituencies.</p>
<p>Of course registered Democrats dominate college faculties. Voters with no college and voters with graduate degrees are the only two demographic groups the Democrats have left. I suppose an easy solution (and I'm surprised Limbaugh hasn't proposed it) is a federal law banning PhDs from faculty positions.</p>
<p>My advice to the majority party. Quit bellyaching. You run the joint and have for decades. Honestly, the whining makes it sound like you are afraid of being exposed to different viewpoints. It's not like the wicked witch in the Wizard of Oz. You won't melt just because somebody disagrees with you. Stop with the red-meat demagog buzzwords (e.g. "leftist thought"). Stand up and state your case on campus.</p>
<p>I have to disagree with I'Dad here, & agree with the posters here who express a concern about strong political opinions emanating from an instructor, as an aspect of the core curriculum of a class. The prospect of that at any college made a definite difference in the composition of my D's ultimate college list. She did not want to have dished up to her a slanted or limited (or "corrective," versus the "predominant political party") view of history, culture, economics, etc. That works both Rightward and Leftward. She is as much opposed to religious biases, hidden or not so hidden, within the curriculum or the approach to a subject matter, as she is opposed to setting the curriculum & choice of reading matter to achieve a particular end-result (of opinion or "stand") in the opposite direction.</p>
<p>As much as possible, and despite our individual subjectivities, the classroom should be apolitical in its <em>approach</em> and in its <em>goals</em>. This is what the discipline of academics is all about. That is very different from observing & analyzing the political <em>content</em> and political <em>intentions</em> of a dominant culture, sub-culture, etc. That is definitely part of academics, and should be always a core part of a curriculum which addresses culture.</p>
<p>But that brings me to my next point, which is the unfortunate absence of training in and knowledge of Rhetoric as a discipline and tool. In previous European educations (perhaps even still), learning Rhetoric was an aspect of basic academic training (recognizing it, utilizing it). If students in this country were well-trained in rhetoric, they would be in a position to Call him/her On It if a professor was inappropriately injecting persuasive argument into the teaching of substantive facts about history, culture, economics.</p>
<p>So my bottom line is, I just believe there continues to be too much Rhetoric <em>in place of</em> facts within academia and journalism, at least in this country, & a sloppiness about acknowledging this difference. Rhetoric's an important persuasive tool; it just has its place.</p>
<p>Rhetoric, of course, being the study/use of language -- persuasiveness, oratory, etc. being a subset of that. Rhetoric can be "loaded," even when seemingly not used persuasively. Not enough attention to the teaching of this, i.m.o.</p>