Which LAC's Are Best in the Sciences?

[coureur]

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<p>Everyone at Wesleyan considers themselves to be attending a liberal arts college,<<</p>
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<p>Same can be said for Dartmouth. In fact Dartmouth insists it’s an LAC, but that doesn’t change the reality of its status as a university. </p>

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<p>Do you consider Trinity College (CT) to be a university as well?<<</p>
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<p>Does it offer doctorate or professional degrees? If so it meets one of the key defining characteristics of a university. </p>

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<p>I think that it’s not the presence of grad programs that distinguishes an LAC from a university, its the ratio.<<</p>
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<p>Interesting. Well, I guess everyone has their own classification system. What ratio is the cut-off between LAC and university in your system?</p>

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<p>you have to ask, how does the school represent itself? Wesleyan considers itself a liberal arts college, so it should be considered as such by others.<<</p>
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<p>As I said, Dartmouth also represents itself as a a liberal arts college. In fact they are sometimes quite fierce about it, but that doesn’t change the reality of its status as a university.</p>

[johnwesley]

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>>I think that it’s not the presence of grad programs that distinguishes an LAC from a university, its the ratio.<<</p>

<p>Interesting. Well, I guess everyone has their own classification system. What ratio is the cut-off between LAC and university in your system?</p>

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Baccalaureate Colleges. Includes institutions where baccalaureate degrees represent at least 10 percent of all undergraduate degrees and where fewer than 50 master’s degrees or 20 doctoral degrees were awarded during the update year. (Some institutions above the master’s degree threshold are also included; see Methodology.) Excludes Special Focus Institutions and Tribal Colleges.</p>

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[Carnegie</a> Classifications | Basic Classification](<a href=“Carnegie Foundation Classifications”>Carnegie Foundation Classifications)</p>

[Corbett]

<p>

>>Do you consider Trinity College (CT) to be a university as well?<<</p>

<p>Does it offer doctorate or professional degrees? If so it meets one of the key defining characteristics of a university.

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<p>In fact, Trinity College offers professional (ABET-accredited) degrees in engineering. So according to the theory above, one could question its LAC status on those grounds.</p>

<p>But then one would also be forced to question the LAC status of schools like Swarthmore College and Smith College, which also have small ABET engineering programs. </p>

<p>The reality is that all three schools are accepted as LACs, even though they issue some 15-25 professional degrees annually. For most people, a handful of engineering degrees does not make Swarthmore a fundamentally different kind of institution than Haverford, nor does it make Smith a fundamentally different kind of institution from Mount Holyoke. </p>

<p>And for most people, a handful of doctorates (10 in 2009-10, according to College Navigator) does not make Wesleyan a fundamentally different kind of institution from other NESCAC schools, like Amherst, Williams, Trinity, etc. It’s a difference, but the difference is greatly outweighed by the similarities.</p>