<p>I think if one were to chose between Swarthmore and Princeton, ability to have close relationships with your professors isn’t a meaningful difference.
For the record, my daughter liked Swarthmore very much still feels that there are some things she likes about Swarthmore better than Princeton. But she has literally had long one-on-one sessions with each of her professors (except for 2 in her team-taught class), and some of these people are the top in the world at what they do.
Re: Saving a buck with TAs. Princeton has an endowment of $2.2 million per student, or, at 5%, $110,000 per year per student throw-off. Not even getting counting the annual fund drive. Does Swarthmore even spend $110,000 a year per student, in total!
Look, both these places are rich enough to provide anything a student could reasonably need. I just think the TA issue is a big red herring here. Now if you’re talking Berkeley…</p>