<p>Interesting thread. I think my initial reaction was why should Wesleyan be linked to Amherst, Williams, etc. in the first place? </p>
<p>Every school is different from every other, to varying degrees. For some students Wesleyan obviously occupies just the ‘niche’ they are looking for. To each his/her own.</p>
<p>I know this is an uncomfortable thread for some people who are die-hard Wesleyan boosters, but I think the original poster did a service here. Wesleyan is a great school – nobody can deny that. Anyone would be lucky to go there. I’m sure the faculty is great. My daughter ended up going to another LAC – a peer institution – but I would have been happy to see her at Weslayan. Nevertheless, we had roughly the same reaction to Wesleyan when we visited. It was on my daughter’s short list before we visited and we were disappointed after seeing the place. The school is in a drab town and looks run down compared to its peer institutions. Evidently, the administration hasn’t done a great job with campus planning over the years and so there are a hodge podge of buildings in various styles – many of them lacking distinction. Rather than resist the feedback, the school should find a way to take it on directly and use it as a way to envigorate the alums to get behind a “rethinking the Wesleyan campus” campaign of some kind. It would be a healthy response to legitimate criticism coming from the “customers” who are doing comparison shopping and I think would show how a healthy community should respond.</p>
<p>We’re not resisting feedback. We just respectfully disagree. And we’re not the only ones: Life Magazine must have liked those hodge-podge of buildings enough to do a photo shoot fifty years ago and the funny thing is they could come back today and shoot the very same pictures:</p>
<p>[LIFE:</a> View of football game between Amherst Co… - Hosted by Google](<a href=“http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?imgurl=f7a94bf1c420353c&q=wesleyan%20source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwesleyan%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den]LIFE:”>http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?imgurl=f7a94bf1c420353c&q=wesleyan%20source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwesleyan%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den)</p>
<p>[LIFE:</a> View of football game between Amherst Co… - Hosted by Google](<a href=“http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=wesleyan+source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwesleyan%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den&imgurl=b0c28e008aa3e32e]LIFE:”>http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=wesleyan+source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwesleyan%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den&imgurl=b0c28e008aa3e32e)</p>
<p>In essence, you are acknowledging in a back-handed sort of way the very fact that Wesleyan respects its past enough to preserve it and that in answer to the OP’s question: very little has changed about Wesleyan except that it’s bigger, more diverse and better known today than it was fifty years ago.</p>
<p>THis popped up in my email so figured I reply. </p>
<p>We have visited Wesleyan several times over the years. I think it stands out as being a pretty unique place. Of my older three, one liked it, one LOVES it (though sadly it’s probably too far a reach), and and one didn’t care for it. State of campus buildings and impression of Middletown weren’t much of a factor. Everyone has different priorities, which is as it should be.</p>
<p>I’m also not sure that I’d rank Wesleyan as a peer institution to Amherst and Williams, because I don’t think that just being a small, highly competitive New England LAC is enough to link them too closely. They may have been called “the little three” many years ago, but just look at the diversity among the schools of the Ivy league. Does Wesleyan’s administration want it to be like Amherst and Williams? If Wesleyan had peers, I’d tend to think more along the lines of Brown, Reed, Swarthmore, etc. And I hate to use labels, but there are a lot of kids who dislike like the preppy vibe at some of the other New England LACs. If they’re good enough students to be considering ANY of these schools, hopefully they’ll be fortunate enough to have some great choices at admissions time, and pick and choose the one that they’ll love best.</p>
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<p>I think it’s fair to say that if Wesleyan’s administration had wanted to be more like Amherst and Williams over the years, they would not have been the first of the Little Three to build an academic building dedicated to the teaching of science (1868); they would not have been the first of the Little Three to institute a system of electives into its curriculum (1872); it would not have been the first of the Little Three to eliminate its core curriculum (1968); it would not have been the first of the Little Three to recruit heavily among inner-city public high schools; it would not have been the first of the Little Three to admit women(in 1870 AND in 1969); it would not have been the first of the Little Three to establish departments in Sociology (1968), and Film Studies (1974).</p>
<p>All in all, I’d say the movement has been in Wesleyan’s direction rather than the other way around.</p>
<p>^ johnwesley</p>
<p>“All in all, I’d say the movement has been in Wesleyan’s direction rather than the other way around.”</p>
<p>What about the “movement” in a negative direction with respect to Williams and Amherst on every ranking or rating? Are each and every one of them absolutely wrong?</p>
<p>As I had mentioned on this forum, we liked Wesleyan but it was not Williams or Amherst. That was fine since the differences were useful. Having said that, the consistently defensive tone on this thread is not improving my view of the school at all.</p>
<p>It’s interesting how merely supplying a little data and/or a little historical perspective is consistently equated withh “being defensive” when the poster supplying it differs with the OP, but, are calm, rational and “objective” when they agree with him. I would say, if your yardstick for “negative” and positive movements begins and ends with the USNews rankings that there probably isn’t a whole lot of reason for you to attend any LAC, let alone, Wesleyan.</p>
<p>johnwesley</p>
<p>You are right (aren’t you always?). If I assume you are in any way representative of Wesleyan or a Wesleyan education, there is no reason to consider it. Thanks for clarifying that for me.</p>
<p>^^Always a pleasure engaging in a civil conversation.</p>
<p>johnwesley, when I asked if Wesleayans’s admin wanted it to be more like Williams and Amherst, I was being a bit facetious… </p>
<p>I think Wesleyan probably has carved a bit of a niche over the years, and it works very well for them and their students. The academic world would be pretty dull if all colleges strived to be alike. Everyone’s preferences are valid, just different.</p>
<p>Oh, I agree. And, I realized you might have been a bit facetious and that your question was mostly a rhetorical one. I was just using it to make a point: that contrary to this thread’s subject heading, the playing field hasn’t changed that much in the past one hundred and fifty years. Only the players are different. :D</p>
<p>You got that right, Mr. Wesley, sir…</p>
<p>My S is a junior at Wes and absolutely loves the place precisely due to its “uniqueness” – one thing that struck us the most when visiting the school (near the end of the visit process) was the lack of a “dominant” clique on campus. A fairly eclectic place with lots of exciting “goings on” every weekend on campus. He is actively involved in many things, maintains his deans list grades and is double majoring (and would triple if he could!!!)
BTW HockeyKid, my S was a hockeykid too! The “best fit” means everything… if Wes is not for you, so be it…</p>
<p>unrelated, but is it pronounced “Wesleyan,” or “Wezleyan?”</p>
<p>S like a snake. People even often refer to it as just ‘Wes’, which would be weird if pronounced ‘Wez’.</p>
<p>When I was a student there back in the 1970s, everyone pronounced it as “Wes-leyan”, not “Wez-leyan”. However, when I was at some Arrival Day meetings two months ago, half of the faculty and staff speakers pronounced it with the “s” sound and half with the “z”. But President Roth, who ought to know best, says “Wes-leyan”. The student announcers of Wesleyan football this year are split, “s” vs. “z”. Since it is named after John Wesley, I think it ought to be pronounced with the “s” sound. But walk down to Main Street in Middletown, and you are going to hear shopkeepers (and the general public in Connecticut for that matter), say “Wez-leyan”. For me, to hear someone say “Wez-leyan” is like hearing the sound of fingernails on a chalk board.</p>
<p>haha thanks for the information. I’ll stick with Wes-leyan</p>
<p>FWIW, Morganhil, on one of several occasions when Norman Mailer visited (one of his sons graduated in the 90s I believe), he gave a talk at Mocon and used the word 'Wesleyan" as an adjective (which it is, really). In doing so, not only did he pronounce the “s” as a “z” but put the stress on the second syllable (the “ley”) and pronounced it Wez-LAY-en (as in, “In keeping with the tradition of this Wez-LAY-en institution”.) I’d never heard anyone give it that twist before, nor have I since.</p>
<p>I think the whole the “s” as a "z’’ thing may be a case of New England lock-jaw replacing mainstream pronounciation. Thus, Wellesley, comes out mostly as “Well-zlee” – not Whellslee (although come to think of it, I’ve heard the latter pronunciation, too) :p</p>
<p>haha wait, is it Wes-LAY-an or Wes-LEE-an? or, Wez-LAY-an or Wez-LEE-an?</p>
<p>it’s WES-lee-an</p>