Could the Claremont Colleges eventually become one large research university?

[S2Stan]

<p>“The universities you mention (except MIT) have extraordinary breadth and depth in the humanities and social sciences that the Claremonts cannot and do not offer. For one, you are unlikely to find Assyriology, Inner Asian Studies, Celtic Studies, Folklore, Medieval Studies, or similarly obscure departments at a liberal arts college, and multiplying the number of colleges involved does not alter that.” </p>

<p>MIT has top notch humanities, for example MIT’s Sloan is pretty much as good as Penn’s Wharton. Also the economics department is first in the world and Psychology and PoliSci are ranked in the top 10. So yeah, MIT has great humanities, even though it is better known for their engineering. And, by the way, every student is coregistered in Harvard, therefore lots of humanities courses are available. At the same time Harvard students have lots of Science/Engineering courses available to them in MIT.</p>

<p>Also, since the new college would have much larger resources that each college alone, such courses could be added.</p>

<p>“To use a humanities example, the Claremonts combined offer 12 languages – again, dwarfed by universities like Harvard (80+) but on par with a more LAC-like university like Dartmouth.”</p>

<p>It is worth remembering that Harvard has 34 billion dollars and the new college would have only 4.5, closer to lower ivies like Dartmouth. Anyway, even if it will not be as good as HYPSM it could certainly compete with Dartmouth, Cornell, Duke, etc… And those schools have great humanities.</p>

<p>And, I think, that Pomona’s humanities are already WAY better than Caltech’s, If you add Scripps, Claremont McKenna and Pitzer to the mix you would get something amazing.</p>

[intparent]

<p>

Also, since the new college would have much larger resources that each college alone, such courses could be added.

</p>

<p>Why would you expect a combined college would have more resources? They would save some administrative costs, but I doubt it would be enough to make a huge difference in the course offerings. They won’t charge higher tuition, they won’t get more alumni donations, they won’t enroll a larger number of students. Where is this windfall you speak of going to come from? The Claremont colleges already have something amazing… I just don’t see how they benefit (or how the students benefit) significantly from a merger.</p>

[xiggi]

<p>

circuit, my post responded to the “top 10 programs” assertion. It is patently obvious I was referring to department rankings, not the usual riffraff of undergraduate rankings. Perhaps I should clarify that explicitly before someone runs to the hills and returns brandishing the PhD productivity rankings!</p>

<p>Name a departmental or program ranking - the NRC rankings, AWRU, THES, Philosophical Gourmet, what have you - and research output will almost certainly be a major component of the ranking. In some cases, like USNWR’s rankings based purely on peer assessment, they are almost entirely based on faculty quality and research output.

</p>

<p>Warblers, while I do not disagree with your statements, it is obvious that the department or programs rankings you cited are almost exclusively the domain of … graduate programs. Thousands of posts have been made (and wasted) on that subject right here on CC. The only area in dispute is how relevant those foreign rankings are and how tumely the domestic ones are. It is noi even worth of debating the accuracy and methodology of such rankings --which I happen to think is highly questionable. In the end, none of the rankings are able to resist a modicum of scrutiny. ALL of them are deliberately biased and have no other purpose than grab readership through dubious “findings.” And NONE have a modicum of integrity. But they represent the best we can get! </p>

<p>In the end, using irrelevant data points is simply misleading. Yet, it is the weapon of choice for anyone who wants to superimpose graduate (and horribly narrow) international rankings on an evaluation of an … undergraduate experience. </p>

<p>But enough of discussing the foreign rankings in THIS forum. The OP posed an interesting question. I believe that few people who are familiar with the inner workings of the Claremont Colleges will find anything positive in a propsal to morph into a type of institution that could not be more different than the one they learned to love. </p>

<p>Again, this is NOT to say that the model of the Claremont schools is a panacea. Being different from most schools, it is normal it does NOT appeal to the great majority of students. There is no overall BEST in college choices. There are colleges that provides the best FIT. </p>

<p>For some it is undeniable that a school dedicated to research or large enough to offer a breadth of obsure courses is the BEST FIT. Some might even like to be able to sit in the back of a 500 people arena and enjoy their electronic media, and later get the instruction from an assistant responsible for guidance, grading, and evaluation. For others a school that offers a narrower band of programs but does it extremely well is a … better choice. </p>

<p>Everything is a matter of compromise and self-determination. I happen to cherish that Claremont decided to offer an option different from most institutions in the world. </p>

[S2Stan]

<p>@intparent‌ They will stop being separate and interdependent and they will become a single entity. Instead of having multiple separate endowments of very different sizes, they would have just one. The advantage in this is, while the amount of money will be the same, that it could be spent in a better way, avoiding redundancy. If all the colleges stay separate from each other, the investments will be done only largely based on the single college needs, putting aside the need of the consortium as a whole. At least this is what I think.</p>

[kaarboer]

<p>The most that I can see is the claremonts entering into a more unified consortium, closer to the Oxford/Cambridge model, though even that’s unlikely.</p>

[S2Stan]

<p>@kaarboer‌ Yeah, that’s what I am proposing. </p>

[xiggi]

<p>Fwiw, take a look at this opinion on the issue:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/07/13/mergers#sthash.JyW67Z2X.HMAiEcEo.dpbs”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/07/13/mergers#sthash.JyW67Z2X.HMAiEcEo.dpbs&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>In so many words, mergers are mostly the final and desperate act of a crumbling school system. In almost all cases, the survivor is the richest and most powerful. In the case of Claremont, which is the school that fits the pattern of a desperate and crumbling school? Inasmuch as Pitzer’s endowment is a fraction of Pomona’s, the school is hardly in dire straits of folding and has become one of this decade darlings in terms of interest by applicants! What would be the benefit of Pitzer to be part of a system and reap more benefits that it currently does? Thinking that a merger would mean a bigger part of the joint resources is simply naive as endowments are rarely non-dedicated. Most of the time, you have to deal with a massive hodgepodge of defined funds. Donors who supported Pomona might have a say in seeing their funds merged with a … different institution. </p>

<p>Even it a merger might work in theory (and that is highly dountful) the question to answer is more … should they, if they could? I doubt you will find many who think or say … of course, they should. :)</p>

[intparent]

<p>@xiggi, good point. I doubt any loyal alumni donors would support such a merger. Pretty sure the Mudd alum (fiercely protective of their college culture) wouldn’t approve.</p>

[xiggi]

<p>Warblers, I continue to agree with your statements. Incidentally, I wonder how the self-anointed geniuses behind the international research universities rankings might have handled the contributions of Peter Drucker. </p>

[warblersrule]

<p>

@xiggi

Warblers, while I do not disagree with your statements, it is obvious that the department or programs rankings you cited are almost exclusively the domain of … graduate programs.

That’s mostly because no undergraduate rankings exist aside from business, engineering, and perhaps a couple of others. My posting of those rankings wasn’t intended to be an endorsement. I don’t think they’re useful for either undergrads or grad students.</p>

<p>My point was simply that LAC-like universities will never have “top 10” departments in such rankings because, as you point out, they are heavily focused on graduate studies and research. It doesn’t mean you won’t fare as well studying biology at Dartmouth as at Stanford – it just means it won’t be topping the rankings any time soon.</p>

<p>EDIT: Whoops, deleted and edited, so now the posts are out of order. The post above is a response to this one.</p>

[xiggi]

<p>Warblers, I continue to agree with your statements. Incidentally, I wonder how the self-anointed geniuses behind the international research universities rankings might have handled the contributions of Peter Drucker</p>

<p>------- Question of having the last word! ;)</p>