<p>
Meryl Streep of Vassar pwns Wes’ Academy Award nominees or Tony winners anyday.
tier 1: WASP
tier 2: Wellesley, Middlebury, Carleton
tier 3: Haverford, Davidson, Bowdoin
tier 4: Vassar, Grinnell, Wesleyan.
Wes is a few notch down from WA and I don’t really see it going up in the near future. Again, blame Michael Bay.
Sure, a kid here and there might pick Wesleyan over WA, but anecdotal evidence does not make statistic.</p>
<p>The top LACs are very difficult on the admissions end. I have known kids in this area rejected by WWAS, and accepted to ivies. Part of the problem with LACs is because they are such small schools so they cannot pick that many kids, and yet they have a large number of sports teams and other activities that need a specific talent. By the time they get their teams, music groups, diversity, alums, variety in majors, geographics, etc in place, there simply are not very many places left for everyone else. It seems to me that geographics play a bigger role in the LACs as I know very strong candidates here in the NE rejected by these schools, and kids without such profiles accepted from the midwest where I used to live. Here it seems that kids have to have a hook of some sort to get into these top LACs.<br>
Our GC told us that it is particularly important for the adcoms at LACs to know you, and that you show good interest and reason for wanting to go to these smaller schools, even those that are not as selective as the top ones. They simply do not have the number of spots to waste some on kids who are just applying to fill the list.</p>
<p>Middsmith- What makes you put Bowdoin at tier three? Its easily as competitive as middlebury, and moreso than Carleton.Check your admission stats.</p>
<p>middsmith - Oh, I’ll give you Meryl Streep. The irony, is that you would probably have to attend Wesleyan (or, read a book written by a Wesleyan professor) to appreciate the work of Jean Arthur, another Vassar graduate, who exceeds Streep in stature, IMO. </p>
<p>And, I am second to no one in my admiration of my Little Three mates, WA and what they’ve contributed to the LAC genre, but give me a break – we’re talking about the real world not USNews mimicry. Can you name one thing Amherst is known for by the general public? Be honest. Not really, right? When WA earn their own Bloomberg News profile, we’ll talk:
[Bloomberg.com:</a> U.S.](<a href=“Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg”>Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg)</p>
<p>Bowdoin is SAT optional.</p>
<p>A family friend who’s working for Sun said his CEO went there when I told them I got accepted to Wellesley. That is as real world as you can get and this guy got both BS and MS from Stanford.<br>
I’m almost certain none of the LACs are known by the general public, Wesleyan included.</p>
<p>^I didn’t know Stanford had sunk that low.</p>
<p>And no matter how low Stanford gets, there is still Wesleyan at the bottom as a cushion.</p>
<p>Really? What college do you go to?</p>
<p>This is getting a little catty!!</p>
<p>Middsmith, overtiering things, aren’t we?
You should merge tiers 2-4.
Haverford is certainly worthy of tier 2, at least.
cf. Forbes rankings and Ph.D. pursual rate.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure Middsmith goes to UC Berkeley.</p>
<p>Wesleyan does rank 21 overall among universities and liberal arts colleges in the percentage of students who go on to get PhDs. That says something about the school, especially when Williams and Amherst are only 17 and 18. It is leading the LACs in scientific research and publishings, and has one of the leading art departments at an LAC (amazing film program). In the Wesleyan news:</p>
<p>Wesleyan Well Represented at Tony Awards
Wesleyan University was widely represented at the annual Tony Awards on June 15th in New York City, with three productions involving alumni garnering awards.</p>
<p>Tops among all award winners was “August: Osage County,” a drama about a troubled family in Oklahoma. The play was produced by Jeffrey Richards '69, had already won a Pulitzer prize earlier this year and received five Tonys, including “Best Play.”</p>
<p>“In the Heights,” a musical that was first performed as a student play at Wesleyan and written by and starring Lin-Manuel Miranda '02, directed by Tommy Kail '99 and with music arranged and orchestrated by Bill Sherman '02, won four Tonys. These include “Best Musical,” “Best Original Score” (music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda), “Best Choreography,” and “Best Orchestrations” (Bill Sherman and Alex Lacamoire).</p>
<p>“Boeing-Boeing” a revival comedy featuring Bradley Whitford '81, won two awards, including “Best Revival.”</p>
<p>I don’t see what the other LACs have on Wesleyan other than selectivity and USNews rankings. Wesleyan has been ranked as high as 2 on the USNews in the past, according to its wikipedia.</p>
<p>^I think you’re right, mlevine07. obviously, ppl are entitled to their opinions and we all like to take the occasional victory lap. but, in general I try not to rank LACs, if I can help it. It’s like trying to rank a small town’s churches; they’re all lovely in their own way; some families have deeper ties to one than the other. But, in the end, they’re the only institutions doing what they do, the way they do it. If you hate one, you’re pretty much hatin’ on all of them.</p>
<p>
I’m almost certain I do not go to UC Berkeley.
In the past being the operative words. =)</p>
<p>Because liberal arts schools tend to be so small, they emphasize personal characteristics more, since each individual will contribute more, on average, to the life of the school than he would at, say, UC Berkeley. So essays, recommendation letters, interviews will be more important at liberal arts schools than at super-large schools.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure Middsmith goes to either Middlebury or Smith :3</p>
<p>Since dchow08 is heading to Swat, I might as well comment on it.
It’s one of the LACs that actually has a lengthily “Why Swat?” essay, throughout which you have to explain… well, “why swat?”</p>
<p>Two of my friends, with extraordinarily high GPAs and SATs, and who will be attending Columbia and MIT respectively, were waitlisted by Swat. I would imagine that they were not able to genuinely express an interest in Swarthmore through their essay (both have told me that Swarthmore to them was just another college they applied to). So, I’d have to say that interest IS important, very important.</p>
<p>^^ I’m pretty sure I might run into you next year.</p>
<p>Ahhh. Middsmith is going to Amherst. But you did get into UC Berkeley, and you sure do talk about it a whole lot!</p>
<p>No wonder you are so hard on Wesleyan when we compare to Amherst…</p>