<p>I was wondering if any other 2013ers, alumni, or current students could comment on Yale versus a liberal arts school. I was accepted early into Yale and also into Carleton and Swarthmore, though I like Carleton more than Swarthmore. I'll visit Carleton next week and unless I hate it my choice of school is going to come down to Yale vs. Carleton, university vs. LAC. The Yale's caliber and prestige is very attractive, but so is the intimate education of a LAC. </p>
<p>It sounds like you’re insinuating that he centraleagle illegally applied early to other schools while in the SCEA agreement. He could have gotten early writes to Carleton and Swarthmore – quite common in LACs – or just had some ambiguous grammar (“early to Yale and also into Carleton and Swarthmore” could mean that Carleton and Swarthmore were not early, though it is a slightly bad wording).</p>
<p>I worded that ambiguously. The only place I applied early was Yale. I just found out in the last week or so that I was accepted Regular Decision in Carleton and Swarthmore.</p>
<p>Go to Yale. Most classes are seminars that have 15-25 students in them. You’ll only be in slightly large classes if you’re a science major and for your intro classes (Intro to Psych is pretty massive).</p>
<p>It is always a personal decision but remember, a small, intimate LAC is very appealing when you start college, but could get a bit suffocating by the time you are a senior. The “caliber and prestige” of Yale is worth a little bit, but not a lot. Try to keep it out of the equation.</p>
<p>It’s not completely a big university vs. LAC choice here. Yale College is only a little more than twice the size of Carleton, not 10x, and the residential college system at Yale provides a lot of the intimacy that you would get at a LAC for social and advising purposes. If you are looking at the UNI-LAC tradeoffs, Yale is a very different proposition than, say Ohio State.</p>
<p>Notwithstanding, of course there will be some differences. Professors at Carleton can keep their jobs if they are not famous scholars, but not if they are mediocre teachers. At Yale, it’s the opposite. So there are more mediocre teachers at Yale (but not only, or mostly, mediocre teachers, and Carleton won’t be 100% mediocrity-free either). Yale also has graduate students, many of whom will soon be famous scholars themselves, but may not be quite ready for prime time yet. Yale, with more students, and grad students, is more likely to have a critical mass of people who are into what you are, but it’s a more competitive environment, too.</p>
<p>The more you are certain that you don’t need your hand held in order to learn, and that you are ready to do the work to get something out of cutting-edge scholars, the easier it will be to choose Yale. If you tend to crawl into a shell unless things feel totally safe, and you need your professors to reach out to you before you are willing to engage with them, then by all means choose Carleton.</p>
<p>For those who care about results, here are the top 25 academic undergrad schools as measured by future PhD production. As far as the quality of undergrad education goes, they’re all excellent. First posted by interesteddad.</p>
<p>Percentage of graduates getting a PhD
Academic field: ALL</p>
<p>PhDs and Doctoral Degrees:
ten years (1994 to 2003) from NSF database</p>
<p>Number of Undergraduates:
ten years (1989 to 1998) from IPEDS database</p>
<p>Note: Does not include colleges with less than 1000 graduates over the ten year period. Includes all NSF doctoral degrees inc. PhD, Divinity, etc., but not M.D. or Law. </p>
<p>Code:
1 35.8% California Institute of Technology
2 24.7% Harvey Mudd College
3 21.1% Swarthmore College
4 19.9% Reed College
5 18.3% Massachusetts Institute of Technology
6 16.8% Carleton College
7 15.8% Bryn Mawr College
8 15.7% Oberlin College
9 15.3% University of Chicago
10 14.5% Yale University
11 14.3% Princeton University
12 14.3% Harvard University
13 14.1% Grinnell College
14 13.8% Haverford College
15 13.8% Pomona College
16 13.1% Rice University
17 12.7% Williams College
18 12.4% Amherst College
19 11.4% Stanford University
20 11.3% Kalamazoo College
21 11.0% Wesleyan University
22 10.6% St John’s College (both campus)
23 10.6% Brown University
24 10.4% Wellesley College
25 10.0% Earlham College</p>
<p>That list is pretty nonsensical if you omit law and medicine, in my opinion.<br>
I think JHS gave you good advice. Yale has many of the benefits of an LAC, and some additional benefits besides. I also think there’s a pretty big difference between going to school in Minnesota and Connecticut, but how that cuts will differ from person to person.</p>
<p>I had a similar decision as CentralEagle when I decided between Amherst and Yale. I visited both schools and felt that I prefered the more intimate learning experience and community of Amherst. I also liked the 5 College/Pioneer Valley environs more than urban New Haven. Carleton is a great school and I think it is good for you to visit. I also would stay overnight at Yale. Hopefully, you will get a more realistic picture of where you would like to spend the next four years. You will also be able to look back and say to yourself that you made an informed decision.</p>
<p>I am really weary of these “percentage going on to a doctoral degree” lists. I think those lists are nonsensical even if you include law and medicine. </p>
<p>What I’d like is a “percentage ending up as miserable failures” list.</p>
<p>How about, “percentage still going on endlessly, even after thirty years, about how great their college experience was?” Yale does quite well by that measure.</p>
<p>The doctoral degree tracking is valuable to the extent it identifies meaningful differences between institutions in the academic orientation and intellectualism of the students they attract. It shows that Swarthmore, Carleton, and Yale are pretty much all at the top of the heap as far as liberal arts institutions are concerned in that regard. There may be a meaningful difference between Swarthmore and Yale, barely, but the difference between Yale and Carleton is not so meaningful. (In both cases, I believe the difference has something to do with the fact that Yale undergraduates have a much more accurate, nuanced idea of what it’s like to be a graduate student and PhD candidate than students at any LAC do.) The chart (which is pretty outdated) does not help much in distinguishing among these particular three colleges.</p>
<p>“It shows that Swarthmore, Carleton, and Yale are pretty much all at the top of the heap as far as liberal arts institutions are concerned in that regard.”</p>
<p>Thanks, that was precisely my point!</p>
<p>“As far as the quality of undergrad education goes, they’re all excellent.”</p>