Question on Liberal Arts Colleges

<p>what LACs have both good science and liberal arts programs? can you assume that all of them have good LA programs? I want to apply to some LACs, but my parents are kind of worried about the prestige of LACs, because they have never heard of Swarthmore or Amherst. I don't think they'll know Harvey Mudd or any of those.</p>

<p>I have a question abt the WSJ rankings. Are you guys of the opinion contain some fundamental truths...like I was surprised to see Williams at #5 but even if it isn't top 5 would it be fair to say it was top ten? top 15?</p>

<p>or no bearing whatsoever? what do you all think?</p>

<p>I agree with you Driver. The WSJ is on to a great concept...but it is too one dimenssional. Yale, Penn, Duke are at an unfair advantage because they have two of their own programs in the study. Harvard is part of all three!!! A professional graduate program will usually have a disproportionately large contigent come from within its own undergraduate ranks. I believe that to get an accurate picture, the study must include the top 15 programs in each professional field, INCLUDING Engineering. If that is done, the list would look completely different and far more balanced.</p>

<p>Here are the programs I would include in the study:</p>

<p>BUSINESS:
Columbia University
Cornell University (Johnson)
Dartmouth College (Tuck)
Duke University (Fuqua)
Harvard University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan)
New York University (Stern)
Northwestern University (Kellogg)
Stanford University
University of California-Berkeley (Haas)
University of California-Los Angeles (Anderson)
University of Chicago
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor (Ross)
University of Pennsyvania (Wharton)
University of Virginia (Darden)</p>

<p>ENGINEERING:
California Institute of Technology
Carnegie Mellon University
Cornell University
Georgia Institute of Technology
Johns Hopkins University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Northwestern University
Princeton University
Purdue University-West Lafayette
Stanford University
University of California-Berkeley
University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Texas-Austin
University of Wisconsin-Madison</p>

<p>LAW:
Columbia University
Cornell University
Duke University
Georgetown University
Harvard University
New York University
Northwestern University
Stanford University
University of California-Berkeley
Unibersity of California-Los Angeles
University of Chicago
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Pennsylvania
University of Texas-Austin
University of Virginia
Yale University</p>

<p>MEDICAL:
Baylor University
Columbia University
Cornell University
Duke University
Harvard University
Johns Hopkins University
Stanford University
University of California-Los Angeles
University of California-San Francisco
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Pennsylvania
University of Washington-Seattle
Vanderbilt University
Washington University-St. Louis
Yale University</p>

<p>Also, I think they should separate LACs from research universities. LACs are so tiny that they are not threatening and very discreet. By that I mean they are not overwhelming. For example, take Texas-Austin and Amherst. Each year, probably 20 Amherst students apply to Harvard Law. Roughly 200 UTA students apply to Harvard Law. Even if all 220 students in the example above were of equal caliber, Harvard would probably not mind accepted 5 from Amherst, but they cannot afford accepting more than 20 non Ivy League students, even if they are qualified. So, roughly 25% of Amherst students will get into Harvard Law because Amherst flies under the proverbial radar, whereas UTA's "in-your-face" numbers will probably limit its undergrads to roughly 10% acceptance rates. Of course, I am taking two extremes, but the point is obvious. LACs and research universities should be kept separate.</p>

<p>What you are suggesting is that LAC students are advantaged in admission to top professional programs vs. students from large universities, simply due to the comparative size of the applicant bodies. This is an advantage accrued solely due to the type of school attended, distinct from the merits of the applicants themselves.</p>

<p>I don't know if this assertion is correct, but if so it would seem to indicate a particular advantage to attending an LAC, which may be significant to students intent on attending a leading professional school.</p>

<p>Didn't realize you felt that way, from your other posts. I like LACs too, though for other reasons.</p>

<p>Monydad, there is no evidence to support what I am suggesting. However, I can imagine that a graduate school adcom is more likely to look favorably on a candidate from a school that is underrepresented than on a school that is overrepresented...assuming the candidates are equal in most other respects.</p>

<p>It’s always interesting to see the daggers come out whenever anyone sites some ranking system to add objective observations to their personal ones. If you spent a lifetime looking through the treads, on CC, you would not find one mention of any ranking known to man wherein the daggers will not come out and see said ranking cut to pieces.</p>

<p>The reason is, clearly, that every ranking will gore somebody’s favorite OX (school or style of school).</p>

<p>Preferred Preference
USNEWS
Times International
WSJ
Princeton Review</p>

<hr>

<hr>

<p>Student Reviews
Etc.</p>

<p>Every ranking is raised as an objective criteria by an excited senior in an effort to rationalize their preferred school choice only to have it shot down by some know-it-all curmudgeon who knows-it-all (you know who you are).</p>

<p>Of course, everything that is made—that is, art—has a built in weakness: people. But looking at some of these critiques (not necessarily the ones in this thread—but not excluding them either) you would think the “experts” involved in these ranking systems were a combination of the “Keystone Cops” and Jack the Ripper.</p>

<p>I’m pretty sure most of them are generally accurate, for what they're for, even when they seem to diverge from each other in their content.</p>

<p>If You have a desire to go to anyone of the grads schools in the WSJ survey, it’s a pretty sure bet that you will have a better shot—given your capabilities—if you attend one of the schools ranked high up in the survey.</p>

<p>Reading some of these posts you would think that WSJ was involved in some conspiracy to defraud naïve students who do not have the ability to look at how the survey was done—well, for them, I say thank god for the know-it-alls who are looking out for them (and me too).</p>

<p>More knives?</p>

<p>I doubt that your comments were directed to me, since I don't regularly respond to these lists. But FWIW I completely disagree. I think it's completely appropriate on this board to point out shortcomings of particular lists, not inappropriate. That way people don't take things as being dispositive when they aren't.</p>

<p>With respect to WSJ, I think it does provide a useful information snippet. But IMO it would have more integrity if it were a multi-year survey. The relative ordering of these school might turn out to be different, and some schools that don't appear on this single year's data may actually displace some school that happened to have a "bumper crop" in that particular year. Plus the regional bias produces some distortions.</p>

<p>Many people have made these observations regarding WSJ, not just a few. In my case, it's not for ox-goring purposes; actually my alma mater does quite well here. It's so possibly misleading information will not be taken as gospel. I think most others do it for this reason as well. </p>

<p>Why did NY Times do it? To sell newspapers. They didn't care if their information was comprehensive, or shouldn't be extrapolated very far. They are not college advisers.</p>

<p>The only knives I've seen here are coming from you.</p>

<p>Kalidescope, if rankings were absolute, we (this forum) would be obsolete! LOL Seriously, most rankings are either beauty contests or designed to create controversy to sell as many copies as possible. That is not to say that rankings are incorrect, but they can always be improved.</p>

<p>I don’t think when I say that if you are in the USA and you want to see the tallest mountains, you should go to see the Rocky Mountains, that it would be appropriate for someone to say they’re not the tallest, the Himalayas are, or the Alps are.
If I further stated that I am only including the Mountains in the contiguous USA in the 21st cent. It would not be just inappropriate to bring up the Alborz or the Alps or the Himalayas but wrong as I had already specified that I’m talking about the mountains in the USA in the 21st century.</p>

<p>To the best of my knowledge, the WSJ survey specifies its limitations; that is, which schools it considers elite (people can disagree with what they think “elite” means but not what WSJ means when they say elite). People can say there is a regional bias; but WSJ is clear in saying that they are only considering the 15 schools in their survey and moreover they note some of the irregularities in the placement at its “elite” pro-grad schools.
1) WSJ does not seem to claim that this is a multi-year survey but that it is a snap-shot of one year.
2) WSJ is quite specific about what schools it considered and where they are located.
3) Students aren’t incapable of seeing all these factors when look at this survey or any other ranking, and if they are incapable they’ll probably ask.
4) I’m not thinking of anyone in particular; but, I’d say anyone can see that the one thing that always “brings out the daggers” (not against other posters—against the rankings themselves) is a professional ranking done by experts in the field of ranking (to say nothing of the merits of such a profession, lol).
5) The WSJ is not a bible, no ranking survey is, but it is objective information. It then ranks that information. To not like the conclusion is fine, but to impugn it for being what it says it is seems ideological and partisan.
6) As a senior myself, who will attend college next year, I’m always a bit amused by the urgency in some of the parents post about what type of education is better than another.
7) If there are multi-year surveys, they would indeed be better, for now, we only have the WSJ.
8) I absolutely did not direct my last post at Alexandre. I don't always agree with his views, but they are always well stated.</p>

<p>Kalidescope, we are not saying the WSJ is bad. Most of us actually think it is a good reference point. We were just commenting on how it could become a really valuable tool with the addition of a few more programs. And I did not feel like you were pointing the finger at me when you talked about the proverbial daggers.</p>

<p>I'll step forward and claim the mantle of "know-it-all curmudgeon" etc., etc.</p>

<p>My "ox" would Williams College, where my daughter attends, and it was clearly not gored by this study. Quite the contrary. </p>

<p>As Collegehelp pointed out, the article is billed as "a comprehensive ranking of America's most successful feeder schools," which it clearly is not. A correct title would be along these lines: "A selective ranking of schools that successfully feed to a small, specific group of top professional graduate programs that we happened to choose." I'll go back once again to the example of Stanford University as the most egregious example of this study's manifold problems: </p>

<p>As Alexandre points out, Harvard is the #1 feeder school, and all three of its professional schools are included in the study. Yale is #2 feeder, and two of its professional schools (law and medicine) are included in the study. Stanford is #4 feeder, despite having all three of its ultra-famous, prestigious, superb graduate professional schools excluded from this study. Anyone who thinks that Stanford's pro schools are not at the very pinnacle of excellence and prestige in the US--particularly law and business--hasn't done enough research to conduct a study of this type. Stanford might jump to the #2 feeder school, if its own undergrads who attend its professional schools were counted. How many brilliant Swarthmore or Amherst students or Pomona students go to Stanford b-school or L-school? We don't know. And this goes on and on. The logical response to this article is "what is the point of this study?" It's a self-confirming factoid, and not even a good one, at that.</p>

<p>To get back to imiracle's OP and post #21:
The opportunities at LACs in science and math are fabulous. There are too many terrific options to name. If you were to be more specific as to what else you want from college--possible majors, location, outside interests, admissions selectivity--you will be inundated with excellent advice from folks here on CC.</p>

<p>stambliark: Williams, along with all the other top LACs has excellent placement in all the top grad and professional schools. It's impossible to compare any of the "feeder" schools in a "ranking" sense based on this WSJ study, though.</p>

<p>i want to double-major in history or political science and chemistry or environmental science. i don't really mind if it's urban or rural, but i am used to public transportation. I want to write in the school newspaper, also do internships in the summer. I don't really care about the selectivity at this moment since i'm just getting acquainted with the colleges.</p>

<p>The selectivity is important just to figure out where you can realistically matriculate. No point in talking about Swarthmore, for example, if you don't have the grades/scores to get in there. But there are lots of other wonderful options. Winnowing the field is a huge part of this college selection process, and selectivity is one of the issues.</p>

<p>Imiracle911 - please don't mind us, we have a tendency to take any simple question and turn it into a manifesto on affirmative action, selectivity, the villainous actions of adcoms, lack of Pell Grant students, or anything Lawrence Summers has ever said.</p>

<p>In an attempt to answer your last simple question - environmental science and writing for the newspaper should be good places to start. Environmental science as a major may not be as common as some others, so look for colleges with that major, and investigate the biology departments of other schools of interest. If you just want to write for the newspaper, because that is something you enjoy, a LAC might give you more opportunities than a larger university. If you are interested in journalism as a career, there have been some good threads recently about what it really takes, who is in demand and comparing Jschools. Williams, Dartmouth, Carleton, Sewanee and Bowdoin come to mind, but I'm partial to LACs.
I would look at history and chemistry last, because good departments in these areas will be easier to find than enviro - try that as a first filter. Good luck</p>

<p>"Williams, Dartmouth, Carleton, Sewanee and Bowdoin come to mind, but I'm partial to LACs." </p>

<p>Cangel has listed 4 of the most selective (i.e. difficult to get into) colleges in the country. My mention of selectivity was simply meant to suggest that students consider where they can reasonably expect to be accepted as one of the criteria used in compiling their college lists, not a means of evaluating the worth of specific colleges. Environmental science programs are nearly as common as biology and student papers, these days...and there are lots of great LACs beyond the super-selective ones. Sewanee, for example.</p>

<p>One more thing about the topic of PhD feeder schools. Here are the top 53 from the US Dept of Education's Weighted Baccalaureate Origins Study that was contributed by Mini. This study is not perfect either but it is better than the WSJ. It focuses on PhD programs, not professional schools. The numbers after each college are the ranks over a five year period based on a weighting system that takes college size into account. Of interest is the fluctuation in rank over these five years. This year, Harvard is 25, not 1. Reed is 4, not 50. When I have more time I will count how many schools are in both this list and the WSJ list. This list has a few unusual schools: seminarys, music schools, mining school...so I included 53. LACs fare pretty well in this list too. There are separate lists for each discipline. This is the overall rating. I think the original report is 300 or 400 pages including tables.</p>

<p>California Institute of Technology 1 2 1 1 1
Harvey Mudd College 2 3 2 3 2
Swarthmore College 6 6 4 5 3
Reed College 7 7 3 4 4
Massachusetts Institute of Technology 4 5 6 6 5
Carleton College 13 14 9 10 6
Bryn Mawr College 9 9 12 13 7
University of Chicago 3 4 7 8 8
Oberlin College 10 10 8 11 9
Yale University 24 23 21 17 10
Princeton University 20 19 15 15 11
Grinnell College 19 20 25 19 12
Haverford College 8 13 13 18 13
Curtis Institute of Music 22 64 23 7 14
St. John's College 16 37 31 24 15
Pomona College 11 11 10 16 16
Kalamazoo College 58 35 18 14 17
Rice University 18 28 50 33 18
Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins Univers 43 92 75 21 19
Juilliard School, The 50 32 45 30 20
Amherst College 15 22 35 32 21
Williams College 33 48 62 54 22
New England Conservatory of Music 212 196 186 73 23
Stanford University 32 26 34 39 24
Harvard University 12 17 16 28 25
Earlham College 40 36 26 26 26
Case Western Reserve University 45 25 22 20 27
Wesleyan University 27 34 44 50 28
Brown University 35 31 38 42 29
Johns Hopkins University 44 39 28 27 30
Beloit College 78 57 27 22 31
Wellesley College 21 18 17 29 32
Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary 53 8 11 45 33
Goddard College 713 792 383 58 34
Knox College 65 59 56 47 35
Lawrence University 51 45 40 35 36
Manhattan School of Music 231 198 125 77 37
College of Wooster, The 31 42 41 37 38
Macalester College 80 46 30 34 39
Cleveland Institute of Music 64 93 54 23 40
Barnard College 17 16 20 40 41
Occidental College 37 41 52 41 42
University of Rochester 46 29 24 31 43
Mount Holyoke College 62 38 36 51 44
New Mexico Institute of Mining and Techn 71 69 95 87 45
Saint Olaf College 122 105 85 60 46
Fisk University 141 77 66 44 47
Smith College 47 33 39 53 48
Columbia University in the City of New Yo 23 21 43 52 49
Duke University 73 63 57 68 50
University of California-Berkeley 77 78 67 57 51
Vassar College 48 40 49 61 52
Bowdoin College 41 65 83 76 53</p>

<p>Driver is exactly right about the selectivity, all of those except Sewanee are quite selective, and you need to look beyond those, unless you have very high stats, and even then you will need safeties. However, you said you weren't looking at selectivity yet, and I still think sorting on environmental science will narrow things down faster than looking at history or political science.
Most LACs have good chemistry and good history/political science departments, as those are the bread and butter of these schools, particularly history/poli sci, but there will be some schools that are more specialists.</p>