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<p>foreign language or of linguistics>></p>
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<p>I'll clarify my response now that there is more information. If you are interested in foreign language study or English literature, Middlebury would be great. However, if you are interested in linguistics, I would suggest you look into some of the large research universities where this would be a course of study...Ohio State, Michigan, etc. A large research university would also have sufficient course offerings in foreign language study and literature. If you plan to teach on the college level, you most likely will need to plan doctoral studies at some point, or be sufficiently published that you would be a notable person for the college to employ. An undergrad degree will not place you in the position to teach on the college level. There are many smaller LAC type schools with fine English departments....Colgate, Haverford come to mind. Most of the colleges folks are posting to your response are highly competitive (Middlebury, Dartmouth, Swat, Dickenson, Kenyon...). Is this what you are looking for? You haven't really given much for criteria other than major...and English and the "common" foreign languages (French and Spanish) are offered at almost all colleges.</p>
<p>I have no problem with "highly competitive", but that is definitely not my main focus. My top priorities are getting the best education in my field as possible and getting into a great school for graduate studies.</p>
<p>As far as large universities go, I am more partial to small LACs because my high school is small (around 500 students). I feel like I would be lost in the crowd at a large university.</p>
<p>Other things I am looking for in colleges include great instrumental performance opportunities (I'm the first chair saxophonist at my school), newspaper opportunities, great connections to graduate studies programs, art classes (including graphic design, if available), and the opportunity to do some theatre.</p>
<p>To JHS: I actually have an application from St. John's and stuff already, but I am deeply concerned about the fact that it's not a normal college program. I like the general atmosphere or whatever, but I feel I would prefer the normal classes and stuff, a la high school lit classes.</p>
<p>If you want to be a professor of English literature, an important criterion is the percentage of future PhDs produced. For English literature, the top ten undergraduate schools are:</p>
<p>St. John's
Yale
Amherst
Bryn Mawr
Swarthmore
Bennington
Simon's Rock (Bard)
Oberlin
Reed
Williams</p>
<p>According to Weighted Baccalaureate Origins Study, Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium.</p>
<p>To JHS:
Most european literature courses - comparative or not - are heavily steeped in theory, the result of theory-driven PhD programs which dominated in top american grad schools in the the 70's and 80's. Theory is also going to play a large part in the studies of, say, contemporary French literature. I'm not saying that is a good thing. But it is a reality. </p>
<p>On the other hand, I agree something like a 'Great Books' progarm would be less theory and more history-driven.</p>
<p>I didn't mean the actual reading material, I meant how they don't have written exams and they don't give grades and everyone takes the same classes, etc. etc. etc.</p>
<p>literatus, I think you are inadvertently presenting contradictions. On the one hand you say "My top priorities are getting the best education in my field as possible and getting into a great school for graduate studies." There is none better at this than St. John's. But you also say "I would prefer the normal classes and stuff, a la high school lit classes." My guess is that you won't find both at top schools. Is your goal the end result, or a process with which you are familiar?</p>
<p>katliamom: I basically agree with what you are saying. However, a number of schools (including the one I went to) still use "comparative literature" to mean "double language major" (which is how I think you were using it in your earlier post), while others use the phrase in its more common, although less intuitive meaning "literary theory". </p>
<p>Also, I agree that there is more likely than not to be a high level of explicit theory in, say, your average high-level French literature course. But there are plenty of anti-theory courses in French and English departments. And many undergraduate courses are heavily informed by theory that is nonexplicit. (My D, a very sophisticated kid, was extremely confused by her freshman lit seminar until she read -- on her own -- a book on New Historicism that could have doubled as a class outline. The class was completely theory-driven, just without any discussion of the theory.)</p>
<p>literatus: You kind of have to decide what you want. If you are going to study literature, you are going to write a lot more papers than exams, and what your professors think of you is going to be more important than your grades in getting into grad school. A St. John's kind of program -- which in academic terms is extremely conservative; "great books" is not a phrase uttered without a sneer in many institutions -- is much closer to a high school literature class than any other program you are likely to encounter. </p>
<p>If you want exposure to the real world of literary studies, you want to go to a university with a good graduate program. Forget the crap about not wanting grad students as your teachers/discussion group leaders. Coming out of high school, you are unlikely to be ready to take advantage of top profs; good grad students will get you up to speed, and help you see what that kind of career is like. But if you want to deepen your knowledge of literature and get qualified for a good graduate program, any decent LAC will make that possible, especially the ones listed above that traditionally send a lot of students to grad school.</p>
<p>"The real world of literary studies" comes from TAs? If I understand JHS's point, this is the first time I've heard the claim that TAs are just as good as profs at teaching undergrads. TAs are usually presented as a necessary evil of attending a major research university as an undergrad. Some prestige research universities are indeed harder to get into, but nine of the top-ten future English PhD producers are LACs. This should be a major consideration for a high school student whose goal is to become a professor. The OP also does not want to be lost in the crowd of the big U.</p>
<p>Re TAs, I was speaking from personal experience. The TAs who were most important to me -- two of whom I loved, one of whom I feuded with but learned a lot from -- have, at various points, chaired the English Departments at Harvard and Yale and the German Department at Michigan. They were not second-rate by any standard. I didn't say they were "better" than the professors -- I had fairly close relationships with a number of professors, too, and was the semi-official "pet" of a very famous scholar -- but that they helped me understand what the professors were doing and got me up to speed on how to get the most out of my access. Also, when I was considering graduate school I had a very precise, realistic idea of what was involved. The TAs' experiences and interests were much closer to mine than most of the professors'.</p>
<p>I met my favorite TA in the spring of my sophmore year, in a discussion section for a great lecture course. That course and that section totally changed what I was doing and thinking. A year and a half later, he offered a seminar where he was the only teacher. More than half of the people who had been in his discussion section three semesters before signed up to take the seminar. So I wasn't the only one who thought he was great.</p>
<p>If you go to a school with a top graduate program, you get good TAs. You also get a really wide range of professors, grad students, and visitors with varying interests and approaches, and a vibrant, deep intellectual community where those interests and approaches get debated constantly. You don't HAVE to go that route. The LAC option (more intimate relationships with a much smaller number of teachers, who probably have a greater interest in teaching) is a perfectly fine one, especially if you think you need to be coddled a little. But, when you think about it, it's absurd to say "I plan to go to grad school, but don't make me spend time with any grad students; they don't have anything valuable to offer." </p>
<p>Top programs = top grad students = really interesting, passionate scholars. Many of whom you would be lucky to have as a professor in a LAC.</p>
<p>I am pretty sure the top 10 large schools produce far more English PhD's than the top 10 LAC's. LAC's just have higher percentages of people going into academe but the big numbers in volume are at the bigger schools.</p>
<p>I agree about TAs - many can be excellent. For one, they're younger, more energetic and maybe more idealistic than professors. They can make excellent role models for undergraduates. At the school I went to, TAs taught all the language classes, professors taught the literature courses with, in some cases, TAs leading the discussion sessions. It was a good mix.</p>
<p>I don't have a probem with TAs leading discussion or something like that, but the TAs teaching "all the language classes" doesn't sit very well with me.</p>
<p>It's the percentage rate at which PhDs are produced which is important to a high school student wanting to maximize chances; the raw number is irrelevant. Making up numbers just for illustration: If a large U has 1,000 English students with 30 eventually earning PhDs, and a small LAC has 200 with 15 doing so, all other factors being equal, the LAC presents a higher likelihood, which is all that matters to someone wanting to maximize that likelihood. All other factors are clearly <em>not</em> equal, but the HEDS data shows what is happening, and LACs are simply far and away the leaders <em>for this one statistic</em>. A high school student needs to consider many issues, and this is just one.</p>
<p>I was a top graduate student (highest academic fellowship) and TA at a top graduate school (Chicago) and you'd have to be NUTS to pay $45k/year to listen to or be guided/mentored by me in those days. 10 years later, and with better skills, and more self-assurance and the benefit of more experience, I taught at the Community College of Philadelphia. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that my teaching at the community college was better than my teaching at University of Chicago, and I'd bet the same was the case for 9 out of 10 TAs.</p>