<p>Can anyone give me an idea of the differences? Some say Amherst is the more preppy/athletic and some Williams, etc. I am just starting a new round of looking for yet another child and never did get to Williams or Amherst with the first one.</p>
<p>Williams and Amherst really are like siblings. People choosing between the school usually have a strong instinctive preference. Williams is more rural and in a much smaller town. Amherst, in addition to being in a larger town, shares its town with a big state U and is in the five college consortium. Williams is larger.</p>
<p>Amherst has an open curriculum, whereas Williams has distribution requirements.</p>
<p>Williams has additional resources in the arts: The Williamstown Theater Festival, The Clark Museum and the Berkshire Symphony.</p>
<p>My S went to big open houses the same day at both schools. He was much more drawn to Williams. It seemed quirkier and less pretentious.</p>
<p>He is in an Art History grad program right now. He discovered this passion from a paying job at the Clark.</p>
<p>Unique features of Williams include Winter Study, tutorial classes, Williams at Oxford, and the Entry Program. The Woolf Orientation Trips are pretty incredible too.</p>
<p>To be fair, some kids much prefer Amherst.</p>
<p>Swat has more has a co-Ed Quaker history. It is also in a consortium and is near enough to Philadelphia that the kids can really benefit from the city. The school has an admirable history of social and political activism and a slightly more forgiving climate. It is known as extremely academically intense.</p>
<p>Williams has exceptionally strong programs in art history, math and music.</p>
<p>Amherst has a law and jurisprudence major.</p>
<p>Swat has a linguistics program and an engineering major.</p>
<p>I will take a second to mention Wesleyan which has a good film major.</p>
<p>So are you just looking at US News and going with the top three? There are many other schools out there that are worth exploring.</p>
<p>arcadia, no not at all. My son is looking at a wide range of schools from those three, as well as Haverford, to a few ivies to some excellent schools that are slightly less “prestigious” such as Fordham and Lafayette and Rutgers. I asked about those three because they are always grouped together and I was wondering. He hasn’t narrowed down size, location, type, etc. He just wants a very intellectual atmosphere–and by that I mean a place where ideas are discussed with great interest and partying is not the prime focus. He is a non-athlete. He is forming ideas right now.</p>
<p>I meant forming ideas on what type of school he would like. His list is quite large at the moment and really needs to be pruned down.</p>
<p>I should also add that we have visited Swat and Haverford, are fairly familiar with Swat, and liked both those schools very much. I know very, very little about Amherst or Williams and have not yet had the chance to visit either. Travel is difficult for us due to work hours, etc.</p>
<p>I know you mentioned that his list is rather large, but I would strongly urge him to consider Middlebury and Bowdoin if he hasn’t already. I found them to be very similar to Williams and Amherst but I thought that Middlebury and Bowdoin’s location was better and more “unique.” The teaching style, feel, student type and academic rigor are all very similar at these four schools.</p>
<p>Students can find a raging party or intellectual discussion at all three schools. The settings are what sets them apart. Swarthmore has easy access to Philadelphia. Amherst has a cute town square but the area is more suburban sprawl than small town. Williams is more isolated than a map might suggest. That can foster a deep sense of community but may be too much for some students.
I suggest reading the student newspapers as you shop for schools. That can give a very nice picture of what is going on on campus, what matters to students, etc.</p>
<p>My S is very intellectual – majored in Classics and has read the Aeneid three times in Latin. He is currently in a grad Art History program. He is also a non-athlete and loved Williams. People will tell you that kids like that don’t exist at Williams, but they do. </p>
<p>He said they were watching the Simpsons or some show like that his first night and everyone got the Shroedinger’s Cat joke so he knew he was in the right place.</p>
<p>He preferred it to Haverford and Swat. If you want to know his reasons you can PM me. I don’t want to compare schools on an open forum except obvious particulars. </p>
<p>I am also very familiar with Fordham and some of the other schools on your list.</p>
<p>My son looked at all three. Because of his focus on studio art and art history Williams had a clear advantage for him. I believe the same could be said for math/sciences but that wasn’t his area of interest. </p>
<p>There are close similarities between the personality of Williams and Amherst – sport do play a major social role, but are not necessarily a given. Outdoorsy, nature-oriented activities are a big part of Williams culture. There’s a fair amount of overlap with Swarthmore, especially academic and intellectual, but the pervasive personality is perhaps more activist, political than it is at Amherst and Williams.</p>
<p>As noted the physical environment is subtly different. Amherst is a lively small town with several other colleges. Williamstown is an insular mountain village with great natural beauty. Swarthmore has a lovely campus with easy access to Philadelphia. Each of these attributes can be plus or a minus depending on the individual.</p>
<p>The level of academic standard and intellectual curiosity is high at all three.</p>
<p>Kids like your son will find kindred spirits at any of these schools. If you do a lot of reading and subscribe to generalities and stereotypes, you find some trends. </p>
<p>Swarthmore is more like Wesleyan, Haverford, Brown, Vassar: quirky, less emphasis on sports, intellectual, politically active, more alternative student bodies. </p>
<p>Williams and Amherst are more like Dartmouth, Middlebury, Bowdoin: outdoorsy, smart, somewhat preppy, athletic, social.</p>
<p>Acadia, I find difficulty with those divisions, though I understand why you separate schools in the way you do.</p>
<p>For example, Wesleyan has frats as Dartmouth does. Williams does not.</p>
<p>The arts, music, theater and fine arts, are very strong at Williams which give it kinship with Vassar.</p>
<p>Amherst and Brown share an open curriculum.</p>
<p>There are many ways to parse these schools.</p>
<p>I’m speaking in generalities. In my experience, the kids who would be happiest at Vassar might not be as happy at Dartmouth or Williams. Is that to say that there is no overlap? Of course not! There are plenty of artsy and quirky kids at Williams. But Williams has a decidedly “jockier” feel than Vassar or Swarthmore. At Williams, 40% of students are varsity athletes (and that figure doesn’t include those who play on intramural teams). Compare those numbers to Swarthmore (22.5%), Wesleyan (21.3%), Vassar (17.4%), or even Amherst (31%).</p>
<p>OP and his/her son should of course visit and judge for themselves.</p>
<p>about that often-cited varsity athlete stat. Amherst has, if not higher, at least the same percentage of team-sport players as Williams. Amherst has in recent years placed more emphasis on recruiting (e.g., more admissions concessions) on the highest-profile team sports (basketball, football, soccer, ice hockey, lacrosse) than Williams, and the results speak for themselves as Amherst has dramatically improved in all of those sports over the past decade. Williams has absolutely ENORMOUS crew, cross country, and track and field teams (the rosters are simply gigantic for these sports). The majority of these athletes were not recruited at all. And the people on these teams tend not to be “jocks” in the sense most people would think, but rather more of people who are generally fit and outdoorsy. For example, the cross country teams combine to have over 70 people on the rosters, only ten of whom whose performance “counts” in competition … or well over five percent of the student body from that team alone. So while there is a big culture of people who are outdoorsy / casually athletic / into hiking and frisbee and such at Williams, there are definitely NOT more traditional “jocks” than at any of its NESCAC peers, save for arguably Conn College. </p>
<p>As for the original question, I’d agree that he can find a great intellectual atmosphere at any of those schools. I’d say just visit them all (Amherst/Williams/Midd are very easy to see together in a single weekend) and get a sense of where he feels most at home. And it also depends on where his academic interests lie, as others have noted (for example, if primarily focused on science, I’d be a little hesitant to pick Amherst right now considering the mess its badly-needed big science project has turned into). To me, the academic features which most distinguish Williams from those peers are the tutorial program, the emphasis on science and math research both during the school year and the summer, and Winter Study. An Amherst or Swarthmore person would be better suited to share their unique advantages.</p>
<p>Williams works well for some people, but it is an unforgiving school to others.</p>
<p>I wrote about my opinion about Williams on the thread below. I firmly believe in everything I wrote on that thread.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/williams-college/1490983-hard-decisions-what-do-you-think.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/williams-college/1490983-hard-decisions-what-do-you-think.html</a></p>
<p>Isn’t that axe sharp enough yet? The grinder’s starting to wear down… ;)</p>
<p>"Isn’t that axe sharp enough yet? The grinder’s starting to wear down… "</p>
<p>From my standpoint, all of these are true:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>I do have an axe to grind against Williams, that comes from my strong dissatisfaction with Williams.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams is a high-risk place for those interested in careers that are GPA dependent.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams does state that they recruit impressive, highly talented students. Still, in some areas they prefer to support the weeder course approach that the we support your goals approach. Consequently, many students are forced to change their intended majors. </p></li>
<li><p>Williams does prefer to stick with the old ways, even though the world and the laws are changing. The “we are a top school” is used to defend decisions that go against current US Higher education law.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams does have faculty serving in their committees who are not fully informed about current US Higher Education law.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams does find it easier to recruit students than faculty, thus if a conflict arises they are in dubio pro faculty.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams has horrible advising, and advisors can mislead students to make wrong decisions. </p></li>
<li><p>Williams does not give any reprieve if a student ends in a difficult situation due to a direct recommendation by an advisor. Again, the “we are a top school” is a justification for not granting any reprieve.</p></li>
<li><p>Williams Adcoms do like to state that they support students so that students “do not fall through the cracks”. If they do have measures to prevent students falling through the cracks, I do not see much of it. </p></li>
<li><p>Williams clearly state in their Students Handbook that students are subjects to all Federal, State, and Local laws, while Faculty is subject to Anti-Discrimination laws (shouldn’t Faculty also be subject to all Federal, State, and Local laws?)</p></li>
</ul>
<p>So, still dull then, I guess.</p>
<p>clearly. Listen, as I’ve said before, there are going to be people who have bad experiences at any college or university in the country. The fact is, Williams has among the highest, if not the highest, first-year retention, four and six year graduation, and alumni satisfaction (measured, chiefly, by alumni giving percentage) rates of any college in the country, and Williams also does as well as any college in the country when it comes to graduate school placement. The average GPA at Williams is something around a 3.3-3.4. None of these FACTS supports the image of a school which, generally, is the sort of brutal, impersonal weeding-out factory that ARobot describes. </p>
<p>Is Williams a perfect place? No. Are there probably faculty or admins there who could be more student-friendly? I’m sure. Will some students, inevitably, not be well-served by Williams, and experience justifiable frustration with certain institutional priorities? As with every school, of course. It’s impossible to tailor any school to be everything for every person. But again, it’s all RELATIVE. Is there any place where the atmosphere is materially more hospitable and student-focused for high achieving students, while still being extremely academically rigorous? If there is, I’ve never heard of it. I mean, believe me, there are people (even people who have commented here in the past) who have the exact opposite claim, that Williams is not rigorous enough, grades are too inflated, students can cruise and are too coddled and get away with too much especially compared to how the school used to be, etc. I don’t agree with that, either, by the way. It’s hard to find that balance, certainly, but you don’t want to be a place which is so “self-empowering” or whatever that students are never pushed / challenged to the edge of their capabilities. </p>
<p>But I CAN say that neither I nor any of my closest friends at Williams were atypically prepared for college (I went to a barely-above-average large public school) and I didn’t experience ANY of the issues ARobot did. Whereas, later in life, I’ve certainly been in environments where I have. The one current student I know at Williams is absolutely thriving, earned a great fellowship, etc., and does about 50 different activities while having a social life, and again is a product of a non-elite public school. So these issues are far from overwhelming on campus, even if they may exist. If they were, again, Williams would not have graduation and alumni giving rates that equaled or exceeded its peers, and it would not consistently place students, in every conceivable field of study (yes, even many that ARobot considers “weed-out” fields), at the top graduate programs in the country. The fact is, not everyone can be an astrophysicist or a heart surgeon. I could not have been, I’m sure. And you know what? I’m cool with that. </p>
<p>Williams faculty members, as a whole, are incredibly accessible and overwhelmingly interested in student well-being, and are certainly not going to disregard whatever vague laws ARobot keeps referencing. IF they did, there would be a heck of a lot of lawsuits filed against the school, as opposed to the approximately zero that I’ve heard about. That’s why many of them chose to be at Williams, a school which, has as its model, the image of the log, and which has tutorials where faculty and students are simply unable to avoid close contact. </p>
<p>I don’t doubt that ARobot had a bad experience at Williams. Guess what – it happens anywhere. Sometimes, yes, even at Williams, the institution is to blame, and I know this is a crazy idea in this age when everything is the fault of everyone other than one’s self, but guess what – sometimes the individual student is (gasp) to blame. Sometimes, it’s a lot easier to point fingers rather than look in the mirror (again, this may or may not be true in ARobot’s case, but I’m always a BIT skeptical when someone is SO determined to blame other people or institutions for whatever disappointments they’ve experienced in life. Not really a healthy way to go through life, btw). Especially doing so anonymously on an anonymous message board, when there is no way to know what is motivating the claims and what the actual TRUTH behind them is. </p>
<p>Other times, no one is to blame, and it’s just a bad fit. But I do have a problem with ARobot making sweeping generalizations, based on his own experiences (and even perhaps based on the experiences of a few other disgruntled people he knows), which are belied by (1) everything I and all my close friends experienced at Williams, (2) everything I’ve heard from other students / recent alumni I’ve chatted with about their Williams experienced, and (3) all of the actual statistical evidence, which is flatly contrary to those generalizations.</p>
<p>So just to add current student experience as well as alumni perspective…and then I will shut up…
I graduated in the 80s from Williams and didn’t really return until my daughters were looking at schools. I was convinced that Williams would not be the right fit for either, and I was already booking my reservations at the Hanover Inn.</p>
<p>When my youngest daughter was accepted and she chose Williams over other great schools I realized that, although the college had changed in 35 years, it was still a wonderful place to call home for 4 years.</p>
<p>She is now a junior, chemistry major, thinking of medical school. She works her butt off, her GPA is about average but she has 2 amazing chemistry professors who are mentoring her and helping her with her future. Is she lucky to have this, compared to ARobots upsetting and disillusioning experience? absolutely. But I can truly state that I don’t think her experience is much differ from her other friends and there is truly a love, a pride and an allegiance to the Williams experience.</p>