What would you all say are the merits for each of these? I’ve been trying to find graduate outcomes for these in terms of phd placement, but haven’t been able to find much info. I feel like Pomona is currently my first choice among these, and I would like to EDII, but I don’t know if restricting my options would be smart, as much as it would help with admissions.
https://career.berkeley.edu/Survey/2017Majors is the UCB career survey by major.
Pomona produced this year’s 2018’s baccalaureate Apker recipient (https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201808/apker.cfm), an indication of the strength of its physics program. Williams has produced winners in recent years as well. Really, from either of these two LACs your prospects could be unlimited (which is not to discount the excellent universities you have listed).
These are all great colleges. You can’t go wrong! You should consider other aspects as well as your majors- small vs. large, rural vs. urban, four seasons including cold winters vs. warm weather all year. There is so much more to the college experience than just the major. You could get a fantastic education and go on to get your PhD and do great things in your field from either Williams or Berkeley (just to pick two off your list- this point would apply to any two), but the experience would be rather different in many ways.
I can comment about Williams, which I know best.
According to their viewbook last year, “Over the past 20 years, no other college’s alumni have won more Apker Awards from the American Physical Society, the highest honor for undergraduate physics research in the U.S.”
Also, the math department is well-regarded and is also famous for being a really fun group.
Here is a link I found (thanks to Swarthmore) listing the undergraduate programs from which the highest percentage of people go on to receive PhDs in each of several fields. Scan down for math and physical sciences:
This might not directly address things that are important to you in choosing a college, but I came across this article a few months ago that touches on math and Pomona and this is the first chance that I’ve seen on CC to share it!
https://blogs.ams.org/inclusionexclusion/2017/09/15/why-im-leaving-a-research-i-university-for-a-liberal-arts-college/
Re the above link,
I think the number of current and prospective math majors at Pomona falls in about the 110-115 range.
Other than that minor thing (though I wish various sites had more attentive editors), I appreciated the article, @otisp.
FWIW, Pomona graduated 182 math majors over the past 4 years. But yeah, definitely not close to 400 (it’s just the American Mathematical Society site - so who really cares about numbers anyway).
Lol. For the record, I based my estimate on IPEDS (28 × 4 = 112 = ~110-115).
https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?q=Pomona&s=all&id=121345#programs