Campus Life at Willamette

Colleges & Universities Willamette University
4

<p>My son is a Willamette freshman, and he’s very happy there. I can tell you his perspective of the difficulty of the coursework, but to do that, I need to put it in context.</p>

<p>When he was a high-school junior, we visited Pomona College in southern California. Pomona is one of the top-ten liberal arts colleges, reputed to be academically challenging. My son had a friend who was a freshman there. Since we visited in late spring, my son asked him how hard the coursework was, compared to their high school here in Silicon Valley. His friend’s high-school senior-year course load consisted of 2 regular and 4 AP classes, including AP Calc BC, AP Physics, AP Computer Science, and AP English. “It’s not any more difficult than high school,” was the answer. “It’s about the same.”</p>

<p>So, when I ask my son how hard the classes are at Willamette, I remember that earlier conversation. My son’s senior-year course load consisted of AP Statistics, AP Biology, AP English, Honors Japanese, and 2 regular classes. He says the same thing about Willamette that his friend said about Pomona: “It’s not any more difficult than high school. It’s about the same.” This leads me to believe that if you seek them out, you can find the same level of academic challenges at Willamette that you can find at Pomona. </p>

<p>Having said all that, I can believe that perhaps Lewis & Clark is not so challenging. My niece attended there on a full merit scholarship. She loved the opportunity to attend college with all expenses paid, but she never felt really challenged there.</p>

<p>You know, you can be challenged and still be really happy.</p>

<p>In fact, there’s some statistical evidence that Willamette students are happier than Lewis & Clark students. According to the Common Data Sets (which colleges are required to report each year), more Willamette freshmen choose to return the next year:</p>

<p>Freshman retention rate (percent of freshman who return the next year)
Willamette = 90%
Lewis & Clark = 83%</p>

<p>Sources:
<a href=“http://www.lclark.edu/livewhale/download/?id=4134[/url]”>http://www.lclark.edu/livewhale/download/?id=4134&lt;/a&gt;
<a href=“http://www.willamette.edu/dept/ir/cd...010/index.html[/url]”>http://www.willamette.edu/dept/ir/cd...010/index.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;