<p>I have heard that universities offer more resources for the very, very top students, whereas LACs offer equally good resources for the top half or so. Is that what you mean by "cater to different people"?</p>
<p>A possible "but" -- maybe not universally applicable, but still perhaps worth considering: the top graduate school MIT undergrads choose to attend, at over twice the rate of the other popular graduate schools combined, is MIT itself.</p>
<p><a href="http://web.mit.edu/career/www/infostats/graduation03.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://web.mit.edu/career/www/infostats/graduation03.pdf</a>
<a href="http://web.mit.edu/career/www/infostats/graduation04.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://web.mit.edu/career/www/infostats/graduation04.pdf</a></p>
<p>LAC graduates obviously don't have the choice to attend their alma maters for graduate school.</p>
<p>I just feel like any analysis like this is sort of doomed, because from the outside it's very difficult to tease apart the many, many factors that go into admission and matriculation into graduate school. I mean, maybe all the MIT kids applied to Caltech, and none of them got in. Maybe they all got in, but decided that they really like blizzards and they should stay in Cambridge. The point is, it's impossible to tell.</p>
<p>Look, molliebatmit, again, I'm not saying that the LAC's are 'better' than MIT. That's not the point. That's not what I'm saying. </p>
<p>What I am saying is that it obviously isn't that bad to be at a LAC, because clearly the LAC's have demonstrated decent success at getting their people into top doctoral programs. Is that success comparable to MIT's? I don't know. But the point is, the LAC's certainly don't suck. Just because you go to a LAC does not mean you're doomed to never get into a top doctoral program. </p>
<p>Which then calls into serious question, at least to me, about just how important it really is to work with superfamous profs or go to schools with highly ranked research departments with myriad bigtime research projects and so forth. The LAC's don't have superfamous profs. The LAC's don't have highly ranked research departments. So then how exactly are all these Harvey Mudd, Williams, and Amherst graduates getting into places like Caltech for graduate school? Is Caltech being dumb? </p>
<p>Consider this quote:</p>
<p>"According to data from the National Research Council and the U.S. Department of Education, Harvey Mudd College has the highest percentage of graduates who go on to earn doctoral degrees in science and technology.
* A Ford Foundation study entitled "Undergraduate Origins of Women and Men 1970-1982-Graduates Who Received Doctorates Between 1970 and 1986" showed that nationwide, the leading colleges for production of students who went on to earn engineering Ph.D.s were 1) Caltech, 2) MIT, and 3) Harvey Mudd College. The leading colleges that produced Ph.D. recipients in mathematics and the natural sciences were 1) Caltech, 2) Harvey Mudd College, and 3) MIT."</p>
<p>"Everyone has heard of M.I.T. and Cal Tech, but most laymen would be surprised to learn that Harvey Mudd College has a higher percentage of its graduates go on to receive doctorates than either of these renowned institutions. Many would be surprised that Cooper Union comes next among engineering schools in this respect."</p>
<p>Look, again, I'm not saying that the LAC's are the greatest thing in the world. What I am saying is that I think they are pretty good. In particular, I am saying that places like Harvey Mudd, Cooper Union, Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Wellesley, Pomona, Middlebury, and places like that are pretty good places to go to school. </p>
<p>However ultimately, my real point is that you can get into doctoral programs just fine without going to an undergrad school that has major research departments. The LAC's are living proof of this. Plenty of people from the elite LAC's get into plenty of elite doctoral programs, after you've accounted for just how small the LAC's are.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I have heard that universities offer more resources for the very, very top students, whereas LACs offer equally good resources for the top half or so. Is that what you mean by "cater to different people"?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I mean that the educational environment is different. Now, obviously there are certain schools that are classified as research universities that are very LAC-ish, like Dartmouth and Brown, and to some extent Princeton. Hence, it's a difference of degree (no pun intended). But what it basically boils down to is that the LAC's strongly emphasize teaching and personal attention. Class sizes are small and are often times seminar-based. Professors are selected for their teaching ability, not their research. And the whole environment is built to foster undergraduate teaching and learning. As an undergrad, you don't feel like you're a second-class citizen to the graduate students.</p>
<p>Anybody's who been to a research university knows the feeling of getting a prof who's a brilliant researcher but who either can't teach well, or doesn't WANT to teach well (because he feels that it's not important and he'd rather get back to his research). Anybody remember the movie "A Beautiful Mind" where Russell Crowe taught at MIT and was just being a complete jerk to his students? He didn't care about teaching the class, he didn't want to be there, and he saw that task as not only useless, but downright annoying. The sad thing is that it's not just people like John Nash who behave that way. That's the sort of attitude you will sometimes get from faculty members at research universities - that they're not really interested in teaching. I won't say that bad teaching never happens at a LAC, but I will submit that it happens far less often. The fact is, LAC faculty members are not hired for their research prowess, but rather for their teaching skill. Hence, great research can't make up for poor teaching. </p>
<p>Hence, LAC's feature small, intimate classes, faculty members who are selected for their teaching skill, extremely strong culture and community bonding (because of the small student body), highly personalized attention. On the other hand, it is true that LAC's don't offer the vast array of resources that the bigname research universities offer. Yet I think the biggest issue is that the LAC's just don't have the big prestigious name brand. MIT is famous. Harvey Mudd and Cooper Union are not. And I understand that for some people, name-brand and pop-culture prestige is important. </p>
<p>The point is, when I say that they cater to different people, what I mean is what are you going to school for? If you are going to school for the brand-name, or you want to go somewhere that has lots and lots of students and lots of resources (but not necessarily lots of resources per capita), and you don't really care about teaching quality or interpersonal attention, then you should go to a research university. However, if you can forgo the brand name, and you want a highly intimate educational environment with small class sizes and strong teaching, then you should look for a LAC.</p>