<p>S is looking at all 4 of the above schools. Obviously, some similarities but more differences...wanting to hear Pros or Cons of choosing each school.</p>
<p>Looking at possible pre-law preparation with possible majors in Poli Sci, Econ, or Psych. May major in one with minor in another.</p>
<p>Also, plans to play soccer.</p>
<p>Obviously, the major difference is mid-sized research university with many graduate students and huge faculty vs. relatively tiny LACs. There are threads and threads hashing all that out. In some sense, Chicago and Swarthmore/Haverford represent the absolute best of each world. </p>
<p>Chicago vs. Swarthmore is a common decision; there used to be several threads about that every April, although I haven’t seen one lately. Swarthmore really seems to have the same sort of students that Chicago has, a similar intellectual tone, but in an LAC context. Haverford is not that different, just a little smaller, and not quite as intellectually arrogant. Most people would have a lot of trouble telling the very subtle difference between Haverford and Swarthmore, other than their campuses. (Swat’s is much roomier, and it has its own gorge to hike in.)</p>
<p>Swarthmore and Haverford, however, will have less balance between liberal and conservative students (and faculty) than Chicago has. None of them has any appreciable number of cultural conservatives, but Chicago has lots of economic conservatives/libertarians. Swarthmore and Haverford, both Quaker schools, wear their leftish, collectivist ideology proudly. (And community service is a big deal at both.)</p>
<p>Swarthmore and Haverford are both situated in nice suburbs, walking distance from suburban retail stuff, and an easy train ride into the city. Haverford has better alternate public transportation access to the city at night; the trains stop running before college students feel like going home. Haverford also has more things happening within walking distance from campus. They aren’t much farther from Center City Philadelphia than the University of Chicago is from happening neighborhoods in Chicago where students want to go for fun. But transportation to and fro is much easier in Chicago. And of course Chicago feels urban. Its immediate neighborhood is leafy, sleepy, pretty and upscale, but it would never be confused with the sort of privileged suburb Swarthmore or Haverford is. Also – most students at Chicago live off campus (but in the University community) after a couple of years. Housing near Swat or Haverford is too expensive for that; I think everyone pretty much lives on campus, although sometimes in apartment-like dorms.</p>
<p>Dickinson is really completely different. Carlisle is a small town that is not near anyplace you would ever want to go, so Dickinson has to be pretty self-sufficient. In terms of its target market, it is a couple rungs on the ladder below Swarthmore and Haverford. In test scores, Dickinson’s 75th percentile is about Swarthmore’s 25th. I think most students with a legitimate chance to get into Swarthmore or Haverford would regard Dickinson as, at most, a possible safety, and maybe a source of merit aid, but it would probably be low on their list. It’s jockier, frattier, less diverse, more conservative, more mainstream. That’s not to say it’s not nice, or an excellent college, but the things that tend to draw most of their students to Swarthmore and Haverford (and Chicago, for that matter) will push them away from Dickinson, and vice versa. Swarthmore vs. Chicago is a choice for the same values in a different setting and system. Dickinson vs. Chicago is different solar systems, to some extent.</p>
<p>Many people go to law school from all of the schools. Students at Chicago whine about grade deflation a lot, and Chicago does seem to do somewhat less well with elite law school admissions than some of its Ivy rivals (lots of threads about that, too). I don’t hear the same noises out of Swat or Haverford, but I don’t listen as hard, either. I have no idea about Dickinson, but I would be surprised if it sends a lot of people to top law schools. (Again – not because there’s anything wrong with it, but because its students are less good at standardized tests, on average, and elite law school admission is very LSAT driven.)</p>
<p>Political Science, Economics, and Psychology are popular everywhere. It’s not hard to assemble a good faculty, and all of the colleges will have that. Chicago, of course, is a little special in the Economics world, what with all the Nobelists and public intellectuals, but it’s a very crowded major there – about 20% of each class. Economics is popular at the other schools, too, but not that popular. Everything at Chicago is a little mathier than at most other places, certainly including Economics and Poli Sci.</p>
<p>Chicago has a Core Curriculum, which means that students share a lot of academic culture but spend a lot of time in courses they wouldn’t necessarily choose for themselves. Sometimes they love those courses, but sometimes not. Swat and Haverford wouldn’t do that to students, whom they treat more like adults. I don’t know about Dickinson.</p>
<p>Sports are a bigger deal at Dickinson than at the other places. They are a low-medium deal at Chicago – some students care, but not all of them, and there is a fairly serious league of smarty-pants universities including WashU, NYU, Carnegie-Mellon, Emory. Swat and Haverford seem more ambivalent about sports – Quaker values aren’t big on things like winning games, or boasting that you are #1 – but because they are so small a high percentage of students is involved in some sport or another, and they support one another on a personal level. I think Swarthmore may try harder than Haverford to be athletically competitive. All three LACs are in the same league.</p>
<p>The soccer program at Swarthmore is currently very good. They’re ranked #20 currently on NCAA.com, and were ranked #1 last year in a different poll.</p>
<p>[NCAA</a> Division III Men’s Soccer Rankings - NCAA.com](<a href=“http://www.ncaa.com/rankings/soccer-men/d3]NCAA”>http://www.ncaa.com/rankings/soccer-men/d3)</p>
<p>[Swarthmore</a> College | News | Men’s Soccer Ranked No. 1 for First Time in Program History](<a href=“http://www.swarthmore.edu/x31338.xml]Swarthmore”>http://www.swarthmore.edu/x31338.xml)</p>
<p>And in regard to “safeties a bit less remote and fratty than the PA LACs,” I’m not sure about Dickinson, but Swarthmore and Haverford are certainly not safeties. Competition for admission is on par with UChicago. If the acceptance rate is higher, that’s simply because they are LACs, and don’t receive as many applications.</p>
<p>As far as Greek life goes, Swarthmore’s would be considered positively boring compared to a state school, and as far as I know, Haverford doesn’t even have a Greek system.</p>
<p>I don’t know much about Dickinson, though.</p>
<p>Thank you, JHS, for taking the time to write such a long, detailed, and informative post. DS is another student in this boat (though he’s looking for safeties a bit less remote and fratty then the PA LACs, but that’s a subject for another thread…)</p>
<p>I didn’t know Swarthmore had fraternities. Does it? Haverford doesn’t. Dickinson absolutely does.</p>
<p>I think by “PA LACs” Mutti may have meant schools like Dickinson, Franklin & Marshall, Bucknell, Lafayette, Muhlenberg, Ursinus. Actually, I don’t have the impression that Ursinus is super-fratty; nor is it quite as remote as some of the others. Maybe that’s because the kid I know best who went there recently was a complete non-frat hipster, and he was able to come into the city on a fairly regular basis.</p>
<p>You’ll find it if you look with a microscope. I know they don’t have any sororities, but I think there might be a couple of fraternities.</p>
<p>For the 3 LACs, here are the % of stduents for each that do not qualify for need-based financial aid</p>
<p>Haverford - 57%
Swarthmore - 51%
Dickinson - 47%</p>
<p>Each has about same % of students from private high schools:
Haverford - 39%
Swarthmore - 40%
Dickinson - 38%</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>JHS, yes those are the colleges I meant. I have to say Ursinus is not on my radar at all; I’ll have to check it out.</p>