Students'/Alums' Take on Swarthmore

Colleges and Universities A-Z Swarthmore College
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<p>I acknowledge that we can't trust such a survey 100%. Perhaps some misery poker champion went on a spree and put in a bunch of bad reviews and skewed the results, but this is not the most likely scenario. The most likely scenario is that there has been a small amount of manipulation across many different entries and that the different results from the different schools give a ballpark approximation of student satisfaction. I don't think it can just be dismissed outright that Swarthmore is so far ahead of the average just because of the unlikely possibility that someone has gone to great lengths to corrupt the survey.</p>

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Swat's environment works for some and doesn't work for others- at least her/his efforts show that not everyone that can get in should go. It shows the importance of evaluating fit of any school.</p>

<p>BTW the "just transfer!" idea is sort of silly. It's hard to transfer, especially if money is an issue. And if the transfer student can't get into an equally good school (I personally wouldn't go from Swat to a huge public state school just to escape from Swat)- probably a lot of students would sacrifice happiness for a good education.

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I'm glad that you get what I'm doing here. I'm not here because I'm "paid to badmouth Swarthmore" or because I have "PDS." I'm here because I have an opinion about Swarthmore -- a valid opinion -- and people come to this forum to learn about Swarthmore. I think the overwhelmingly positive attitude about Swarthmore that is presented here is about as "Fair and Balanced" as some news networks, and I think it's misleading for potential students and parents to consistently only be given one side of the story, and it's only right that the dissatisfied minority (40% LOL) be given a voice. This has brought on a slew of personal attacks and juvenile argument tactics directed at me from other posters here, but that's okay.</p>

<p>I'm just here to remind people that there is always something more beneath the veneer, and that sometimes the hype isn't always justified. For the most part, this forum seems like a lot of hype.</p>

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<p>55 people out of an alum body of 19000 is not even mildly statistically significant. We get triple the responses to polls on what kind of mints people like @ the Gazette. </p>

<p>Not everyone loves Swarthmore. It is true.</p>

<p>To suggest that 40% of the student body wishes they never went is a bit ridiculous. I've been here for three years. I know maybe 3 students who really want to transfer, and a couple more who have seriously considered it. Stunningly, none of them have actually left.</p>

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<p>Arador:</p>

<p>My daughters biggest complaint with Swarthmore is that there are a few serial complainer types that she has to avoid....the kind of people who would find something to complain about if they woke up and found a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.</p>

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Please see the above comments about transfers. That's not really indicative of anything. Your personal experience is at least as insignificant as those 55 surveys, so it's funny to me that you'd dismiss those and then immediately follow it with your personal observations. To suggest that there are only five people at Swarthmore who are dissatisfied (and not even really dissatisfied because they didn't transfer) is even more ridiculous than it is to suggest 40% of the student body is dissatisfied. It would be nice if there were a scientific survey conducted about this topic, with hundreds or thousands of respondents, whose data were actually available to read, but, to my knowledge, no such entity exists. </p>

<p>As to your complaint about statistical significance, if 55 people out of a population of 20,000 (that survey is for current students and alumni) are asked a yes/no question with a 60/40 split in responses, how confident can you be that their responses represent that of the entire population? I'd like you to quantify your objection.</p>

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<p>The best known college rankings, by US News & World Report, include evaluations of the "graduation and retention" rate (which presumably has some relationship to student satisfaction) and the "alumni giving" rate (which presumably has some relationship to alumni satisfaction). These two factors collectively account for 25% of a school's total USN&WR ranking.</p>

<p>According to the 2008 edition, Swarthmore's "graduation and retention rank" is #4 among National LACs, while the "alumni giving rank" is #9. If there is widespread student or alumni dissatisfaction at Swat, it's not evident from the USN&WR numbers. </p>

<p>Swat's "alumni giving rate" was 51%, which means that most living alumni cared enough to send Swat a check last year. That alone puts Swarthmore in a pretty elite group; only about a dozen US schools -- mostly other top LACs, plus Princeton, Duke, and Dartmouth -- inspire a similar degree of alumni loyalty.</p>

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<p>
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The best known college rankings, by US News & World Report, include evaluations of the "graduation and retention" rate (which presumably has some relationship to student satisfaction) and the "alumni giving" rate (which presumably has some relationship to alumni satisfaction). These two factors collectively account for 25% of a school's total USN&WR ranking.</p>

<p>According to the 2008 edition, Swarthmore's "graduation and retention rank" is #4 among National LACs, while the "alumni giving rank" is #9. If there is widespread student or alumni dissatisfaction at Swat, it's not evident from the USN&WR numbers.

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There are a lot of reasons to go ahead and finish what you started when it comes to college, and plenty of people who found that Swarthmore did not live up to its reputation and hype have gone ahead and finished.</p>

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Swat's "alumni giving rate" was 51%, which means that most living alumni cared enough to send Swat a check last year. That alone puts Swarthmore in a pretty elite group; only about a dozen US schools -- mostly other top LACs, plus Princeton, Duke, and Dartmouth -- inspire a similar degree of alumni loyalty.

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Yes, that's right. But, you'll note that I only ever compared Swarthmore to other top liberal arts schools. How does it compare to those schools listed in the original post? I can see at the US News site that Amherst and Williams are both ahead of Swarthmore in this category, having giving rates of 58% and 61%, respectively.</p>

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<p>Not that AE would be interested in facts, but you should see the hoops that Williams jumps through to get that percentage up. My class agent calls me and calls me and calls me and calls me and calls me (every year) until I agree to give something. </p>

<p>This year I said "no" because I felt the College's response to the pro-Hitler posters placed on students' doors for Holocaust Rememberance Day last spring was weak. The Jewish students group held and open discussion forum. No President showed up. No Deans showed up. No member of the administration showed up. No member of the faculty showed up.</p>

<p>But, of course, AE wouldn't know about that kind of stunning anti-Semitism because "Swarthmore is the most cliquish college he's ever seen."</p>

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<p>AE. Either you didn't take any statistics courses at Swarthmore or you didn't pay attention. An anonymous internet survey is worthless. Odds are that most of the entries at the site you mention are high school students making up crap. I mean, good lord, read the Swarthmore reviews what are the odds that 12 of the reviewers got in with a 1320 SAT and rated the Academics at Swarthmore a "C-"?</p>

<p>But, don't let use interfere with your duly appointed rounds.</p>

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An anonymous internet survey is worthless.

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Yeah, I guess your links to surveys that don't actually show any data are far better. Even if you were to remove 11 of those surveys, then you would still be left with a 25% dissatisfaction rate, which would still be above average before you went and rooted out duplicates in the other schools' surveys.</p>

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Not that AE would be interested in facts, but you should see the hoops that Williams jumps through to get that percentage up. My class agent calls me and calls me and calls me and calls me and calls me (every year) until I agree to give something.

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I only get about a million letters a year asking me for money. In fact, I wish they would stop sending those letters. How many trees have died to supply them with all of this paper? What could they be doing with the money they're spending on trying to get me to give them money? I am categorically opposed to this type of waste. They stopped spamming my email, at least, but they won't stop sending me paper mail, no matter how many times I tell them to stop.</p>

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This year I said "no" because I felt the College's response to the pro-Hitler posters placed on students' doors for Holocaust Rememberance Day last spring was weak. The Jewish students group held and open discussion forum. No President showed up. No Deans showed up. No member of the administration showed up. No member of the faculty showed up.</p>

<p>But, of course, AE wouldn't know about that kind of stunning anti-Semitism because "Swarthmore is the most cliquish college he's ever seen."

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<p>Way to take a stand. I wouldn't know about that kind of stunning anti-Semitism because I didn't go to Williams and I don't follow the poster-vandalizing habits of its current students. I also don't know if Williams is more or less cliquish than Swarthmore or how Nazi propaganda factors into that at all, but I do know that you continue to press the EPIC FAIL button instead of Post Quick Reply every time you make one of your sloppy, presumptuous ad hominem attacks at me. Why must you consistently attack the person and not the argument, and why must you introduce tangential asides like Nazi vandalism at Williams?</p>

<p>Maybe if a lot more people take a stand like you did, Swarthmore will someday catch up to Williams in alumni giving rate. That, or if Swarthmore miraculously turns a corner and becomes more satisfying to its students. Either way, Amherst and Williams are currently clearly a cut above in terms of student satisfaction compared to Swarthmore (if alumni giving rate is any indicator of that, which seems to be the popular opinion), and I'd be curious to learn which other top LACs are as well.</p>

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<p>This is just a conjecture, but it seems likely to me that more Swarthmore students go into public policy and nonprofit service than Williams students. They just have less money. That doesn't really mean they got a worse education, does it?</p>

<p>I'd be careful before attributing alumni wealth to academic excellence...</p>

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This is just a conjecture, but it seems likely to me that more Swarthmore students go into public policy and nonprofit service than Williams students. They just have less money. That doesn't really mean they got a worse education, does it?</p>

<p>I'd be careful before attributing alumni wealth to academic excellence...

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I have no idea if you're correct about the divergent paths of Williams vs. Swarthmore graduates or whether that translates to anything at all when it comes to alumni giving. It seems greedy business types might even be less likely to give than generous non-profit types. But, that is all just conjecture, just the same as your point. I think comparing Swarthmore to its peers (the schools listed in the first post) is fair, and there is likely to be some correlation, even if not 100%, to what proportion of the schools' students were satisfied with their undergraduate experience. I am not in any way attributing alumni wealth to academic excellence, but I am agreeing with a previous poster's suggestion that alumni giving rate probably correlates to student satisfaction, in comparing a school to its peers.</p>

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Either way, Amherst and Williams are currently clearly a cut above in terms of student satisfaction compared to Swarthmore

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<p>Again, since you seem to be the only one who cares, why don't you call the Institution Research Office and see where Swarthmore ranks viz-a-viz the other 30 COFHE schools (which include Amherst and Williams). </p>

<p>Why do I get the sense that you'd rather stick with your internet survey of the ilk, "Who's hotter, Britney or Jessica?" I hear that 40% say Britney's hotter than Jessica.</p>

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Again, since you seem to be the only one who cares

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Then why are you still posting in this thread? You can leave; we'll be fine without you, your personal attacks, your surveys with no available data, your inability to actually produce an argument, and your tired jokes.</p>

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<p>Yikes, maybe you 2 could call a truce -- agree to disagree or something and let's move on. Wanted to reply to the comment above that Swat grads may be more into public service. My S (junior at Swat) has explained that Swat opens many doors, but also CLOSES many others for its students. The culture there discourages careers that are seen as 'capitalistic' (corporate, business, law), which leaves open grad school, teaching, and working for government or NGOs as 'acceptable.' Apparently, it's quite a strong pull when you're there over the course fo 4 years. I thought it was a very interesting perspective.</p>

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<p>Interesteddad, why the personal remarks? why the offended note? why not just let this thread flow and come to a natural conclusion? Every time you post a personal remark, you just bring this thread up.</p>

<p>Btw, I'm an Ed2 applicant and would very much like to go to Swarthmore. Yet, I'm interested in any negative perspective that the OP brings up. I DO NOT want to go to swarthmore expecting perfection.</p>

<p>Anyways, I dont really think these negative perspectives really discourage any prospectives. The no. of applicants just keeps increasing every year.:)</p>

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There are a lot of reasons to go ahead and finish what you started when it comes to college, and plenty of people who found that Swarthmore did not live up to its reputation and hype have gone ahead and finished.

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There are also a lot of reasons to switch colleges if you are dissatisfied -- especially if you go to a school like Swarthmore, which makes it convenient to explore possible alternatives through cross-registration at several other highly-ranked schools nearby (Penn, Haverford, Bryn Mawr). Yet Swat still has one of the highest "graduation and retention" ranks around. It's hard to put a negative spin on this fact (though you seem to be trying).</p>

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you'll note that I only ever compared Swarthmore to other top liberal arts schools. How does it compare to those schools listed in the original post? I can see at the US News site that Amherst and Williams are both ahead of Swarthmore in this category, having giving rates of 58% and 61%, respectively.

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Here are the "Top 10" USN&WR LACs (for 2008), ranked by alumni giving rate:</p>

<p>64 % Carleton
61 % Amherst
58 % Williams
57 % Middlebury
55 % Bowdoin
54 % Davidson
51 % Swarthmore
50 % Wellesley
47 % Pomona
47 % Haverford</p>

<p>Swat's rate is indeed slightly lower than those of Amherst or Williams, but it nonetheless appears to be within the overall "top LAC" range.</p>

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<p>Judging Amherst of Williams by Swarthmorean standards, (the overarching, intensely academic character of the school) seems to be a flawed comparison in the first place. Most of the students who go to Swarthmore realize that its primary focus is academics. However, to tip my hat to A.E., most students do not realize exactly what they are stepping into, but Swarthmore knows they can handle it. It's just a matter of discovery and preference from there.</p>

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<p>I do think that a lot of Swarthmore grads go into finance and that there is a lot of recruiting for financial institutions on campus. For what it's worth.</p>

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<p>I'm confused about those alum stats, since - as a student who works for the alumni office - the numbers we get are around 59% alumni donation rate from last year. This year it'll be closer to 61%, we hope. Swat's pretty well known for that. Maybe they're counting a different fiscal year? Hmm.</p>

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<p>
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There are also a lot of reasons to switch colleges if you are dissatisfied -- especially if you go to a school like Swarthmore, which makes it convenient to explore possible alternatives through cross-registration at several other highly-ranked schools nearby (Penn, Haverford, Bryn Mawr). Yet Swat still has one of the highest "graduation and retention" ranks around. It's hard to put a negative spin on this fact (though you seem to be trying).

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I'm not trying to put a negative spin on it; I'm trying to point out that it doesn't really mean anything regarding overall student satisfaction. The other statistic you brought up, however, more likely does:</p>

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64 % Carleton
61 % Amherst
58 % Williams
57 % Middlebury
55 % Bowdoin
54 % Davidson
51 % Swarthmore
50 % Wellesley
47 % Pomona
47 % Haverford

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<p>Again, Swarthmore comes in below the average. Furthermore, I don't know if it is fair to compare Wellesley, because women are still getting shortchanged in the American workplace, and that could lead to a diminished giving rate.</p>