Swarthmore senior will take questions

Colleges and Universities A-Z Swarthmore College
21

<p>leeduh:</p>

<p>I can’t speak to the day to day exerience, but I can tell you that the gay Swarthmore students I’ve met and have heard from (recent and from the past decade or so) all absolutely rave about the College being gay-friendly. I don’t want to go into particulars, because the place is too small and it’s not fair to my D’s friends, but suffice to say that the administration gets it, the faculty gets it, and the students get it – at a very sophisticated level. </p>

<p>The discussions that take place – about the annual Sager Symposium, about the coming out week chalkings, about whether a dean candidate should talk about respecting “alternative” lifestyles – are beyond the level of the “fighting for gay rights” discourse you see at many schools (such as the recent sit-in at Williams). Swarthmore was one of the first colleges in the country to provide benefits to same-sex faculty and staff, like 17 years ago. I don’t thing there has been a reported homophobic incident at the school in the last decade.</p>

<p>Lauren Stokes wrote an outstanding article covering the history of LGBT issues at Swarthmore in last year’s Gazette:</p>

<p>[Queer</a> history of Swarthmore :: The Daily Gazette](<a href=“daily.swarthmore.edu domain has changed”>daily.swarthmore.edu domain has changed)</p>

22

<p>One of the most interesting things the tour guide said when my son and I were looking at Swat was about the Honors program. She said one of the things that is hardest for a Swarthmore student is to NOT do the Honors program. Most Swarthmore students have always done honors or accellerated or whatever. The honors program isn’t seen as “better”. It is another path a student can choose to take.</p>

23

<p>About 1/3 of each class participates in the Honors Program.</p>

24

<p>Dear Interesteddad:</p>

<p>Are you a Swarthmore graduate? You seem to know an awful lot about the college, yet I don’t get the sense you actually attended the school.</p>

25

<p>I’m a Williams graduate. If you would prefer that I not post information about Swarthmore here, just say the word.</p>

<p>Do you think I gave bad advice sending a prospective student asking about gay life at Swat to Lauren’s superb article? Do you think my GPA info was off the mark? I know for a fact that a 3.7 did not make Phi Beta Kappa in 2008.</p>

26

<p>SwatGrad - ID is the father of one of your fellow Swat alums and himself a graduate of a competitor LAC (somewhere in the purple mountains of Massachusetts). To my knowledge–and I’ve noticed his substantive, useful posts for a long time–he has never claimed to have attended Swarthmore.</p>

27

<p>I agree with Keilexandra. I have read many posts from Interesteddad and have always found them extremely helpful. The information he provided for me was useful.</p>

<p>Of course I welcome any other information from past and current students.</p>

28

<p>lol sorry guys, I’ve been in paper writing mode this week and havent had a chance to check back. glad to see the conversation and advice continues regardless :)</p>

<p>~Gay life on campus?</p>

<p>well from what I can tell the dating pool is a lot more incestuous, which you’ll probably find at any small school just because of that - small schools have smaller populations of queer folks (sorry in advance if the term offends btw, it’s what we use at Swat and what I’m used to). that said, SQU (swarthmore queer union) is a really important group for a lot of queer ppl on campus, both as a social venue and and as a support system. once I had a spec ask me if people were “out and flamboyant” or “pretty low key” about their sexuality, I said I think you’ll find a really solid, even mix here - a range of people who are really political about being queer, really involved in SQU and SQU activities, to people who are not closeted but are less public about their sexuality (and, I’m sure, a substantial number of questioning or unsure or in the closet folks as well). In addition to SQU there’s small group for people who are questioning, persuasian for queer asian students, COLORS for queer people of color, and others that I’m forgetting. queer students are definitely present on campus… sorry I can’t give you more than that :-/</p>

<p>~1. Several people have told me that if you’re not at the honors program at Swarthmore, it’s very difficult to get into a good law school. This is a big concern for me since I’d eventually like to get a JD. How much harder is it to get into a good (U.S. News top 10) law school if you’re not in the honors program</p>

<p>I unfortunately have no valid perspective on this since I am in honors, and only have one friend applying to law schools who isn’t and she hasn’t heard back (and afaik didn’t do well enough on the LSAT to be applying to T10 anyway). Sorry! I can’t imagine they care though. Law school applications is FAR, FAR, FAR more focused on GPA/LSAT than on “community involvement” and “how interesting you are” than undergrad admissions (barring extremely good stuff like fulbright fellowships, peace corps, curing cancer, etc). I would rather take a 3.7+ with no honors program than a 3.6 or less with honors, and adcomms likely would too. (not that the two are mutually exclusive by any means)</p>

<ol>
<li>More on the honors program. How hard is it to get into, and how much harder are its classes than normal classes?</li>
</ol>

<p>Not hard, just have a respectable gpa (IIRC the cutoffs range from 3.3-3.5 for the majors that even have cutoffs). Classes aren’t harder really. They’re more reading, but that’s because they’re double credit seminars - you’re getting credit for 2 classes worth of work, so obviously it’s more work than a single credit class. The substance of the work itself isn’t noticeably more difficult though. And if you’re taking two honors seminars, you’re in class 2 days per week so you should have more than enough time outside of class to get the work done.</p>

<p>~3. Most people tell me Swarthmore is challenging. I’ve had people tell me it’s like the U Chicago, and that graduating with even a 3.5 or 3.6 GPA is very rare. Just how hard is Swarthmore? More specifically, since I’m a humanities/social sciences guy, how hard are those areas?</p>

<p>Can’t compare to UChicago since I’ve never been there. That said, I think most of my friends have 3.6+ GPAs…as far as I know at least. I mean, it all depends on what you think is hard. I probably spend around 40 hours per week in the library when it’s NOT finals period. Reading and writing papers isn’t <em>hard</em> for me per se, but it does take a long time and it requires time management. I took five credits last semester and that was certainly overwhelming, but also not the norm. That said, I’m a social sciences and humanities girl as well - when I took general chemistry, yes it was hard (for me). Microeconomics was also hard for me… statistics was hard but that was because I took too early of a class and never got enough sleep the night before, but when it came down to preparing for the final, the material wasn’t intrinsically difficult. It also depends on the professors. I have an A+ on my transcript for a class that had no graded assignments except for a final 20-page paper, which I researched and wrote in 2 days and which was riddled with typographical errors. Is that the exception? of course, but he does teach here and you could take a class with him and boost your gpa. On the other hand, the constitutional law class assigns over 300 pages of reading per week and you’re expected to have it done. that’s probably hard. i took a seminar for which I had to write a paper every other week. hard? depends. tiring? definitely. Starting a language from scratch was hard for me, but it’s gotten easier as I’ve become more proficient. And, I was fortunate enough to attend a high school that prepped me well for study skills and solid writing abilities (i know you can easily tell from my posting here…not haha). So I came in with a pretty strong background, which isn’t true for everyone. And, my workload has increased a lot since freshman year because of taking higher level classes, seminars. etc. I hope that’s helpful, I can keep going but I don’t want it to get too long.</p>

<p>~4. Finally, is Swarthmore’s difficulty the result of professors grading harshly, lots of work, or both?</p>

<p>Both. </p>

<p>The last thing I’ll say though is that as someone applying to law school and as someone who knows a lot of fellow pre-law ppl and recent grads in LS, while swarthmore students applying to law school MAY get a tiny bump for grade deflation, it isn’t much. do not bank on that! if you’re set on T10 or bust for law school, do your best at Swat, take classes you like and excel at, and gun for that 3.7+ because that will be your ticket. ace the LSAT and you’ll have T3 at your fingertips. </p>

<p>I hope that helps, though I feel my answers were insufficient this time around. let me know if anyone has followups or more questions! :)</p>

29

<p>@Interested Dad:</p>

<p>I don’t care if you attended or if you are a dad, a professor, admin or local cop.
I appreciate all the information you have provided, both on and off the public boards. I will take truth wherever I find it!</p>

30

<p>What kind of town/city and school did you come from before going to Swarthmore? I come from a small, middle class suburb and the only thing that bothered me about Swarthmore was that it seemed like it might be a little boring there (like my town). People have said that Swarthmore’s location is its weakest point - can you elaborate on that or refute it with your own experiences? Also, is every event at Swarthmore free? I’ve heard that there’s a small additional student fee that covers all on-campus activities (I guess minus the pub nites). Thank you!</p>

31

<p>I came from a state capitol of about 800,000, where I went to a private school where my graduating class was about 400. I lived in a residential suburb.</p>

<p>I think Swarthmore’s location is one of its strong points. True, there is not much going on in the ville (the town of Swarthmore), but there is usually lots going on on campus, and you can easily get to Philadelphia if you want on the regional rail, or even to NY or DC.</p>

<p>Although Swarthmore was a little smaller than my high school, it didn’t seem suffocatingly small to me. There were still people who I didn’t really know, even after 4 years. Like other small schools, though, it is hard to keep social secrets, and it is hard to avoid seeing the boyfriend or girlfriend you’ve broken up with.</p>

<p>It is a residential liberal arts college, and like most others, the intention is to have academic, social, extracurricular and cultural life revolve around what’s happening on campus, not on what’s available in the surrounding town or city. In my view, Swarthmore achieves the vision of a LAC particularly well. But it is not for everyone.</p>

<p>My understanding is that all events (concerts, lectures, plays, parties, etc.) are still free, paid for by the student activity fee. That doesn’t necessarily mean unlimited free beer, though.</p>

32

<p>

I’ve never heard that the location is a weakest point - to the contrary, Swarthmore is one of very few top LACs with an easy access to a major city. It is 20 min from Philadelphia, and the train station is on campus.</p>

<p>Yes all on-campus activities are free, and this probably is one of the reasons why many students choose to stay on campus despite the easy access to the city.</p>

33

<p>people here sometimes complain about how there’s nothing to do in the ville – they’re quite right. but as people already said, we’re close to philly. it’s just that we don’t have the cute college town that you find at princeton for example. also some people say that we get too much rain and not enough snow, but i don’t really mind. and yes, there’s an activity fee that comes with the bill, but when you get here you don’t have to pay separately for parties, lectures, etc.</p>

34

<p>okay, I know this isn’t nearly as interesting a question as others have asked, but I was wondering if the “big envelope-small envelope” myth applies to Swat? And also, do you know if they send out denials before acceptances? I have been counting down to the deadline for months, and with only nine days left, I’m going insane.
Thanks!
Rachel</p>

35

<p>I can’t remember the size of the envelope, but it had “This is a fat one” printed on it in red. This was a few years ago, so things might have changed.
I am pretty sure that all the decisions are mailed out at the same time.</p>

36

<p>I believe EDI acceptances this year were in small envelopes (according to one CC post). I only hope that the financial aid package comes soon after!</p>

37

<p>Thank you both! I’ll keep an eye out =)</p>

38

<p>Envelopes were thin and half sheet size last year. My son’s came a few days before the 15th for ED1. No markings on the outside. My husband didn’t realize what it was and opened it!</p>

39

<p>Nursekay, did your son get the “this is the fat envelope” letter later on in the spring? My daughter received her ironed-thin ED1 acceptance letter in December.</p>

40

<p>EDI acceptance letter was in a half-sheet envelope but thicker than I expected, with the FA booklet.</p>