<p>Why is Haverford unique from all the other top liberal arts colleges? I'm from the West Coast, so I would really appreciate comparisons between Haverford and other East Coast liberal arts colleges.</p>
<p>Thanks!!!!</p>
<p>Hi -- first off, good luck on your college search. My son has just applied early decision to Haverford, so we have just been through the process. You will hopefully get some input from others, but there is a wealth of information on old posts on the Haverford forum that I think you should look at. I recently posted regarding my son's impression of the school, and if you do a search on my ID you can see those. More helpful, though, would be to do a search on posts by HC Alum, who often posts very helpful information and offers a lot of insight into the school. Also try doing a search of "Haverford unique" and see what you come up with. I think some of the things that you will find that make it different than some other top LAC's are its small size combined with excellent resources, the honor code (which is not only ideological but also offers practical advantages such as the ability to self-schedule final exams, for example), the proximity to a large city, which many top LAC's do not offer, and the non-competitive environment. When my son was there for a recruiting weekend, he noticed that some of the recruits felt the need to talk about how well they had done on the SAT's or what their GPA's were, probably as a way to impress each other or the existing team members. My son said that some of these kids didn't seem to realize that those stats aren't typically the topic of discussion at Haverford. Coming from a grade-obsessed high school, the lack of that obsession at Haverford really appealed to my son. Good luck.</p>