<p>UPenn’s post leaves me scratching my head as if he had written, “there aren’t many Asian-American students at Swarthmore.” What he wrote is that far out of left field.</p>
<p>A couple of comments:</p>
<p>It is apparent that English is not UPenn’s native language, sometimes to the point where it is difficult to follow the the train of thought. It is possible that what we have here is a “failure to communicate”.</p>
<p>He also mentions working hard to “get an A”. I know there are some exceptionally brilliant students at Swarthmore for whom A’s are probably commonplace. But, I don’t think my daughter, or most sensible Swatties, go into every course with the expectation of an “A”. Do “A’s” happen? Sure. But, for the most part, students who set a standard, either internally or externally driven, of getting A’s in every course, every time, as routine matter, are students who should not go to Swarthmore because they’ll drive themselves crazy. My daughter lists this as one type of student who should NOT go to Swarthmore; instead, the approach that works better is to enjoy the course, put the effort in to do work and learn something, and let the grades take care of themselves. The other type she says shouldn’t go to to Swarthmore are students who don’t want to study as a routine part of their college lives. She has not found the work to be all-consuming, but she has found that she needs to keep up with it and that requires chipping away at it on a daily basis.</p>
<p>Here’s the only other rational explanation I can come up with for UPenn’s observation. There are some courses or mid-term exams at Swarthmore that are exceptionally difficult. I know that the first mid-term calc exam was an eye-opener for my daughter’s entire class, especially since basically every student had breezed into the course based on a 5 on the AP Calc test in high school. Some of the usual suspects in the sciences (organic chem) are very difficult courses. So, I can see a scenario where a particular mid-term is difficult and there is some anticipation of grades – not from a competitive standpoint, but more along the lines of “Wow. I hope I did OK.” That’s a pretty normal response to a difficult exam. Like anywhere, this is probably going to be concentrated most heavily among the pre-med or engineering students.</p>
<p>As far as cooperative. As near as I can tell from what my daughter has described, preparing for an exam typically involves students getting together beforehand to study as a group - usually just as an informal group of friends taking the same course.</p>