My D was waitlisted at Wesleyan, which was her first choice. She has since gotten into Wesleyan, but after committing to and falling in love with Smith, she doesn’t know which school to pick.
Co-ed versus single sex environment.
They are both great schools and there’s so much more defining them beyond co-ed vs single sex.
Smith offers
- being in one of the cutest and most energetic small college towns in the Northeast.
- Access to the Five Colleges – allowing her to expand as she changes and grows, both as a person and as a scholar. She can go as deeply into a field as she wishes and when campus seems too small, she can venture to other top-notch schools.
- Access through the FCs to various additional student groups
- A free bus system to take her to other locations in the Pioneer Valley
- A single-sex education predominantly but also she would have access to men when she wishes, as the dorms at most women’s colleges allow men to stay over and as Smith is part of the Five College system. Smith also has a few graduate programs that will include some men, probably.
- Smith’s unique dorm system–so gorgeous and really hard to beat
- No Greek influence – for my family avoiding Greek life or Greek-like life is a positive thing.
- The networking of the Seven Sister schools and the legacy of following in the footsteps of some truly remarkable women.
- Women who attend women’s colleges tend to do better in their professional lives across all sectors and are disproportionately represented in STEM fields.
Wesleyan offers
- Some of the best arts environment that I know of. If she’s arty (music, theater, writing, etc) she might want to look a second time at Wesleyan. To my mind this is the single biggest reason to consider Wesleyan. They have educated many outstanding artists and the breadth of their music offerings is pretty outrageous.
- Men on campus and in classes
- Some Greek life-- some people want this as part of their experience and for teh networking.
Oh, I can think of a few more things to recommend about Wesleyan. Wesleyan and Smith both have excellent access to tax-supported STEM research - among the highest in the national LAC category. Wesleyan has the added bonus of being able to award graduating seniors with masters degrees in two semesters - for free.
The Wesleyan alumni network isn’t limited to the arts: former FDA director, Scott Gottlieb, Colorado Senator Michael Bennet, Senate hopeful, John Hickenlooper, PBS reporter John Yang, one Federal Reserve Board member Lael Brainard, the founder of Southwest Airlines, a freshman representative from Staten Island, authors Robin Cook, Robert Ludlum and Sebastian Junger - all graduated from Wesleyan.
But, the bottom line here is: Go where your heart tells you to go.
1 Like
Interesting dilemma, as our D21 has both on her “list,” such as it is, given that the virus cancelled our visits. So, I don’t have much to offer here, except that, anecdotally, one of the strongest and most successful women I know went to Smith. I started suggesting women’s colleges to our D because of her.
Our D is very politically aware, involved in school government, etc., but often feels the boys talk over her in class and senate (and she’s not a shrinking violet). I felt this way as a lawyer and my Smith friend did not. It could be our natures, environment, who knows? But, when our D heard the mission of a woman’s college close to us, it resonated.
So, I think maybe your D’s decision should come down to that. Does she want a school designed especially to empower women (with the 7 sisters network) or not. Both are great, but only one has that mission.
1 Like
Hi, not sure if this thread is still running. I ended up transferring from Wesleyan to Smith. As a POC, both schools are VERY ethnically ( and politically) homogenous. Smith champions its “diversity” but that comes from the Asian Int’l Students. I joined multiple different racial student unions ( at both Wesleyan and Smith) and there was barely enough students to constitute a group in many cases :(. I am a Poly Sci major and while the academics at both Wesleyan and Smith are fantastic, I’m deciding whether or not to transfer back to my local state school.
Both schools create this campus “bubble” which I initially found appealing, but after hearing many of my classmates pooh pooh the local residents, etc, I have found both schools to be elitist and somewhat exclusionary.
To explain the “elitist” attitude, I agree that specifically Smith does empower women, but sometimes I feel as if certain careers/ are dismissed and looked down upon at Smith because they are not “prestigious” ( well paying, high social status) enough.
I am a little bit sick of this whole prestige game in admissions/ attitudes of students at certain schools and in light of the BLM movement, finding out that both of these schools have little to no Black students, I would personally pick Wesleyan (Smith students can be a bit uppity, imo)
What happened to UPS (reply #123 below)? Did you decide not to go there?
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/21511825#Comment_21511825
This is an old thread and perhaps it is unwise of me to jump in, but I’ll say I’m somewhat uniquely familiar with each school.
One of my daughters graduated from Wes and then did the well known and well funded Smith 5th year post bacc in math. I chuckle here as I do in other threads at any notion that the quality of education is going to vary among schools in this class … recognizing the OP didn’t ask that particular question but it always pops into my head in these comparison discussions. It should go without saying that a kid would be beautifully educated at either school.
My D (and I) loved them both. This kiddo was the one who I thought profiled well for the someone who would thrive at all-women’s college, but it turned out that it wasn’t what she wanted at that point in her life. Discovered this on her recruiting (athletic) visit to Wellesley, and coincidentally it was on a side-trip during that swing back east that she fell in love with Wesleyan on the first visit. Smith never had a chance to get into the running; after that trip to Wesleyan it became a foregone conclusion.
The main thing is the obvious thing. Having men on campus matters … it changes almost everything, and while there are men in Northampton and other nearby schools/towns, male students are not a routine sighting on the Smith campus and your D won’t have a lot of normal day-to-day exposure to them at Smith. That was my D’s experience and consistent with what we saw on our many visits. For better or worse, depending on what you want, they’re just not really around.
Both schools have money and are lovely places to spend 4 years. As a young woman I could have seen myself at Smith. It has such a pro-student vibe … hard to describe. Whereas students love to hate their president at many colleges (and certainly at Wes), they love Kathleen and I can hardly blame them. She’s approachable and cool.
Wesleyan on the other hand is good at so many things and has the distinction of the vaunted film school and is hard to beat in the LAC sciences.
Anyway, I thought I’d plug them both. Great schools.
Wesleyan doesn’t do a good enough job selling themselves on this point IMO. I suppose the film program creates its own buzz because of the very nature of what it produces. CSS seems to have always had a strong national rep among people who care about that area, and I think people know about its writing programs probably because of having produced some famous authors. But Wes’ prowess in the natural sciences just isn’t a leading edge aspect of its reputation. I read on this forum and others over and over again that Wesleyan is “arty”. Sure, it’s a campus that embraces and has a history with the performing arts. But on many measures, I struggle to identify a better LAC in the natural sciences, with perhaps the exception of Harvey Mudd, which is a specialist. And that’s with older facilities which are soon going to be replaced. Wesleyan’s TWO Apker victories in the research university division represent exceptional achievements. But nobody talks about it.
I’d like to add that Wesleyan does a great job of developing and promoting opportunities for women in the sciences.
1 Like
I have a junior at Wes and a first year at Smith. Both colleges are fantastic, yet quite different. I do think there is “something in the sauce” at an historically women’s college that is incredibly empowering for my daughter. Both of my kids are thriving at their chosen college. If possible, visits to both will help a student decide which is the better fit. Can’t really go wrong with either option.
2 Likes
Please do not reopen such old threads.
Closing.