<p>So I'm in love with Swarthmore, but my mom is concerned that the workload may be high, due to the rumors she's heard. Now I juggle 4 APs (junior and senior yr) with very little stress/problems, so mentally I can handle decent stress, but can anyone confirm/dispell these rumors? I visited saturday and didn't feel like the students were stressed, but I only heard reports from the tour guide...any comments?</p>
<p>There is quite a bit of work. It isn't overwhelming (at least, not for the people I know here). Swat's 'intensity' reputation comes, imo, as much from the student's interest in their classes as from the amount of HW profs assign.</p>
<p>I suspect that the parents of all future Swatties worry about the workload.</p>
<p>The reality seems to be that any reasonably intelligent student who does most of the assignments, contributes in class, and makes an effort on the papers is going to do just fine.</p>
<p>My daughter says that there are just two kinds of students who shouldn't go to Swarthmore:</p>
<p>a) Grade-obsessed students who are so motivated by grade expectations that they are going to give themselves a nervous breakdown is they don't get an A in every course. A healthier approach is to accept the fact that you probably aren't going to be the most brilliant student at a place like Swarthmore, enjoy the courses, and let the grades take care of themselves. She has one friend who claims to have never looked at his grades for the entire four years until semester of his senior year last spring.</p>
<p>b) Slackers who really don't want to do any academic work in college. It is possible for a really smart slacker to make it through Swarthmore, but what's the point? The thing that makes the place fun is that a high percentage of the students really enjoy many of their courses and the stuff they learn. My experience in college many years ago was that, once I started taking courses I really enjoyed, the workload (and getting decent enough grades) were non-issues. I mean, there are worse things than sitting around reading interesting books and talking about them for three hours a week.</p>
<p>Otherwise, she says it's really not that bad. Normal stress during midterms and finals, when all of the papers are due, but otherwise just figure out what you can and cannot let slide and keep up with the reading accordingly. She does say it's a good idea to "balance" the courses each semester. Like don't take three reading seminars or three writing courses at the same time. If you've got a couple of those, then take a math course or an art history lecture course which will have a completely different type of work.</p>
<p>arador, how many hrs/week would you say people you know study? how many pg/week is typical for reading classes? how much do you write? </p>
<p>oh, and could you describe a discussion class? does the teacher lead socratic style? does it vary?</p>
<p>Thanks Arador, ID, I hope she'll calm down after reading this.</p>
<p>I have the impression that the work load varies significantly by your chosen major, ie, hard sciences being the most demanding. Do the swarth<br>
parents agree? PS glad to hear its not so overwhelming, I had the same reservation as Pitcher's mom.</p>
<p>This lj site contains many questions by specs and answers by current students, including workload issues.</p>
<p>I believe Swarthmore experiences such a high degree of self selection due in large part to its reputation. Swarthmore is known primarily for 2 things, the Honors Program and for being about as challenging as colleges come. I suspect both the college and its professors are proud of both reps. They set Swarthmore apart. These reps in turn attract students who tend to relish the challenge. The challenging work load at Swat then ends up being self fulfilling. Professors blessed with strong students who expect to be challenged oblige them with more demanding workloads than they might encounter elsewhere and the reputation lives on. It's all good.</p>
<p>NJPitcher,
Gladad has "hit the nail on the head" about self-selection and Swat. My S is an Honors Major and does have an enormous amount of reading and paper writing. But, thats OK with him. He craves learning. He has learned that sometimes it is just not possible to finish all the reading he is assigned to do in a week, plus all the suggested "supplemental" reading. He is still able to make a valuable contribution in class. I suspect that all Swatties figure out over time how to do this delicate tightrope act.</p>
<p>I agree with momof3sons and gladdad. There is also a certain amount of pride in the student body in being part of a rigorous school and having no grade inflation and having to really work for your grades....</p>
<p>
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He craves learning. He has learned that sometimes it is just not possible to finish all the reading he is assigned to do in a week, plus all the suggested "supplemental" reading.
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</p>
<p>The irony is that the profs don't expect students to read everything they offer up. Prof. Tim Burke has an essay on his blog that begins with exactly that premise before continuing with a step-by-step instruction manual for skimming college reading to productively find the important morsels.</p>
<p>I think that most Swatties figure out early on to prioritize the work for the week across the slate of classes. Then, within each class, they identify the obvious top-priority reading for discussion in class followed in descending order, knowing that the odds of getting to the third reading in class discussion are slim and none.</p>
<p>This gets back to the value of housing freshmen students in rooms next to upperclass students. I know that my daughter learned the ropes from her senior friends last year: the insider's view of various departments, which professors to seek or avoid, how to manage the assigned work, and so on and so forth.</p>
<p>On the first semester at Swarthmore, D took a hard schedule (two lab classes) and got really burned. Then she took a lighter schedule the second semester and had no problems. Now, the third semester, she is taking 5 classes (usual number is 4). She was planing to drop one class and later decided that all 5 are interesting. So far she is having no problems. Last Sunday she called me from Philly, yesterday she called us at home and was joking and chatting for more than an hour. So, I think, they get better at time management when they are there.</p>
<p>"arador, how many hrs/week would you say people you know study? how many pg/week is typical for reading classes? how much do you write? "</p>
<p>It varies dramatically based on the subjects. At least among freshmen, math, science, and language classes seem to give more work. Amount of work also varies by year - juniors/seniors work a LOT more than freshmen. That said, people on my hall (all '09) probably work 3-5 solid hours a day. In International Politics, I get assigned around 100-200 pages of reading for each class (taught Tuesday and Thursday), and around 30 pages (which I read 3-4 times over) for philosophy (MWF class). I haven't written a ton this year (first essay is due two weeks from today) but that is probably because I am not taking any writing courses nor any English classes.</p>
<p>"oh, and could you describe a discussion class? does the teacher lead socratic style? does it vary?"</p>
<p>I'm taking a first year seminar which, so far, has basically only been about Plato (Gorgias, Phaedo, Meno) so far. It is an 8:30 class, and most of the class chooses to arrive around 20 minutes early. We sit around, discussing the reading until the prof (Schuldenfrei [sp?]) arrives. Usually he does lead the class in a socratic style, unless we get really off track and he has a point he needs to get to something for the next reading. He has never lectured. He probably talks something like 10% of an average class, if that.</p>