<p>I am unable to find a quality online tour of Swarthmore College. The "13 Students" tour is very two-dimensional. Are there any other tour available online?</p>
<p>If anyone could provide anecdotes about dorms, this would also be much appreciated. I can't find much information about them on the Swarthmore site.</p>
<p>Swarthmore</a> College :: Housing :: Dorm Profiles</p>
<p>There's some (official) info about dorms. </p>
<p>If you mean unofficial...ask about specific dorms, and we'll see what we can do.</p>
<p>I'll try to get lucky and hope my one post a week goes thru without database errors. This will cover several topics:</p>
<p>a) If you are looking for a video tour of Swarthmore (like Pomona's tour), there isn't one. I'll post a link to photos of all the buildings on campus if that's what you are looking for. IMO, the 13 Students Tour **and, even better, the **Admissions DVD, do a fabulous job of giving you a feel for Swarthmore. Much better, IMO, than a tour of buildings could do. The little student blurbs on the **13 Students Tour **contain the important stuff.</p>
<p>I would also spend some time exploring the videos here to get a sense of the College:</p>
<p>Swarthmore</a> College Video</p>
<p>Or check out a video of the First Year Seminar on Harry Potter at the MTV News website:</p>
<p>'Harry</a> Potter' Goes To College - Movie News Story | MTV Movie News</p>
<p>Or, my favorite, the video of the Bathtub Debates. This event, last year, probably captures the interaction among faculty and students better than anything I've seen. The premise is that due to some calamity that destroys civilization, there will only be room for one professor to travel to Antartica to re-establish society and human knowledge from scratch. Who should go? A science professor (Engineering)? A humanities professor (History)? Or a Social Science professor (Economics?). The good natured ribbing among the three faculty members debating and the give and take with the massive audience of students who turned out (maybe a quarter of the entire campus!) is Swarthmore.</p>
<p>Bathtub</a> Debates</p>
<p>The interactive campus map links to photos and descriptions of every building and some of the major gardens. Links on each page may take you to additional photos and details about what is in each building:</p>
<p>Swarthmore</a> College: Interactive Campus Map</p>
<p>There are many good campus photos at flickr, but this alum has one of the better sets:</p>
<p>afagen's</a> slideshow on Flickr</p>
<p>I think this photo looking down on Wharton and Dana/Hollowell (hidden in the woods) from the top of the belltower gives a good sense of how heavily landscaped and wooded the campus is. That's hard to full grasp until you walk around the place. You just don't see the buildings until you are right on top of them because of all the trees.</p>
<p>Flickr</a> Photo Download: DSCN3363.jpg</p>
<p>Or this one which shows two very large buildings, Lang Performing Arts Center on the left and Kohlberg Hall on the right just 50 feet apart, and yet both are barely noticeable from the walkway between them.</p>
<p>I'd be happy to talk about dorms, but each dorm has its own personality and stories that go with it. :]</p>
<p>Wow. What you guys have provided thus far is amazingly helpful. And yet, you're still offering to help more--how thoughtful.</p>
<p>I actually do have a couple of questions about dorms:</p>
<p>-Is air conditioning an issue? Are Augusts in PA ever warm enough to necessitate air conditioners? Do most dorms have them?</p>
<p>-Which dorms are the best dorms? What sets them apart? (If you could, what makes Swarthmore dorms better than those at other colleges?).</p>
<p>-How common are single-occupant rooms at Swarthmore? I'm speaking about singles for underclassmen.</p>
<p>(This is more of a question about dorms in general):
How are college bathrooms designed? The floor plans often make them look like large public toilets with shower heads on one wall. Is this a correct picture? Are there actual stalls for the showers? How many people are in these larger bathrooms at a given time? Where are supplies (shampoo, razor, toothbrush) stored? Are supplies shared?</p>
<p>The dorms aren't air conditioned (unless you need it, for a medical condition). It's often a bit unpleasant for the first few weeks, but if you bring a good fan it's really okay. </p>
<p>-"Best dorm" is going to vary based on what's important to you. Swarthmore students mostly rate their dorms based on location and niceness, with the former being more important for most. But it's really a matter of preference--some people would rather live someplace quiet in a big room with semi-private bathroom and breakfast served in the dorm, but a 15-minute walk to campus (ML); others would rather be in Willets, which is rowdy and social (and sometimes smelly) but much more centrally located. But I suppose the top two dorms in terms of desirability are Parrish and Wharton, with the New Dorms not far behind. </p>
<p>-Unless you have a documented medical condition requiring it, you won't have a single as a freshman or sophomore. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Having a roommate can be difficult, but often it works very well, and it's just considered part of the Swarthmore experience. </p>
<p>-Yes, there are stalls for the showers! There are typically cubbies against the walls to store shampoo, toothpaste, etc. And people don't share, generally. It's really not bad.</p>
<p>Cool beans. Thanks, etselec.</p>
<p>laser:</p>
<p>a) If I'm not mistaken, both the New Dorm (Alice Paul) and the New New Dorm (David Kemp) are air-conditioned.</p>
<p>b) As a general rule, freshmen and sophmores live in doubles. Juniors and Seniors live in singles. There are occasional exceptions to that.</p>
<p>c) All of the dorms have their pluses and minuses. Hard to say which are the best. Kinda depends what you like.</p>
<p>d) With very few exceptions, Swarthmore dorms have two bathrooms on each hall -- one for men, one for women. There are floorplans here:</p>
<p>Swarthmore</a> College :: Housing :: Dorm Profiles</p>
<p>e) Most unique thing? No theme housing. The housing lottery is designed to shuffle the student body every year. Swatties move from dorm to dorm. And the nature of each dorm tends to change a bit from year to year, sometimes dictated by RA assignments. The lottery is designed to equalize the four year total living exerience among all students based on a lottery point system. If you have a bad lottery pick as a sophmore you are more or less guaranteed a great pick in either your junior or senior years. You can usually live with a few close friends, but you will almost certainly meet new people in your dorm every year.</p>
<p>f) Other unique thing: Freshmen are mixed into regular dorms with upperclass students instead of being stuck in freshmen ghetto dorms. It is hard to overstate how much this policy contributes to Swarthmore's campus culture.</p>
<p>Bates and Colby among many other schools also integrate freshman, as does Smith.</p>
<p>Williams has no themed housing either.</p>
<p>There are pros and cons to all these policies.</p>
<p>Most students have a fan (or several) - out of all the nights so far, only a handful have been really bad, most are very doable with the right fan pointed at you! :) As ID has said, DK and AP both have air conditioning, but you'd really only need air conditioning in September and May anyway.</p>
<p>I think most students would place Wharton at the top of the list for best dorms, but it really depends on the individual. Willets is probably the loudest/most social, Parrish is quiet/central and single-sex, Wharton is beautiful and pretty social and central, AP/DK are new, many off campus rooms in PPR (especially Roberts, which has suites, yay!) or ML are huge and amazing..you can find something awesome anyplace.</p>
<p>And yeah, unless you have a medical condition, no singles for you! But most people really like having a roommate their first year, I'm living with my freshman roommate again this year as well as two of my quint-mates doing the same thing. :D</p>
<p>Most bathrooms are single-gendered, all have stalls or curtains for individual people. And there are cubbies for your shower stuff/toothbrush and stuff. Last year in Wharton there were never more than 2 showers full (out of 4) and never a wait or anything. Supplies are definitely not shared. This year in Roberts we have a private bathroom, which is nice in many ways but also creates some scheduling issues...so both have their upsides.</p>
<p>I can't speak for others, but my room in Kemp is definitely NOT air-conditioned, as far as I can tell (though a hallmate with asthma does seem to have air conditioning for her room). It is capable of being so, but I don't think they turned it on.</p>
<p>I am not sure where I heard this, but it is my understanding that although some dorms have A/C, it is not turned on, except for medical reasons, in order to avoid inequality. </p>
<p>D is used to A/C year round (Florida), but has not complained. She has said that nights with the fans are fine.</p>
<p>Your comments are very helpful. Thanks to all.</p>
<p>i think there's really no consensus about the "best dorm".</p>
<p>personally, i'm aiming for david kemp next year. it's super-clean, smells like nothing, and some of the singles are really large. a few of my friends want wharton or the lodges. one wants to be in strath haven. one (strangely, to me, but whatever) enjoys the dungeon-esque feel of his basement single in hallowell and may like to return next year. i know several who adore the character of ML. i don't know, it all depends on what you think is desirable in a dorm. get here your first year, visit them all, and decide what you like best. unless you have a medical necessity, you won't get to pick where you live freshman year anyway.</p>
<p>During his four years at Swat, my S had several experiences. As a freshman he was placed in a double in Willets, allegedly the most "social" of dorms. He then received a "poor" lottery number for the housing draw for sophomore year and ended up in a basement single in Mary Lyon. (My understanding is that they no longer use those rooms to house students.) The upside of the poor lottery number for sophomore year was that he received a good number for junior year and drew into a single in Wharton. He also had a single in Wharton senior year. Wharton is close to the dining hall and many campus buildings and is generally considered among the "best" of the dorms. It has character and location.</p>