Drunk on the LAC Kool-Aid!

Parents Forum
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<p>To be fair:</p>

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<li> It’s misleading to compare graduation rates and middle-50 SAT ranges between the University of Iowa and Grinnell. Iowa has over 21,000 undergraduates, Grinnell fewer than 1,700. You could easily two colleges statistically identical to Grinnell out of Iowa’s top 25% (and have a couple of colleges not equivalent to Grinnell left over). And it’s a wild guess, but I’ll make it anyway: I bet the graduation rate (however you measure it), of those two Grinnell-equivalents buried within Iowa are not far off what you see at Grinnell.</li>
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<p>Iowa, and other public universities, especially state flagships, do pretty much everything that Grinnell does, and a whole lot more. They give a huge number of students with a wide variety of natural gifts, backgrounds, and secondary educations a real opportunity for an excellent college education. They don’t limit the entering class to those most likely to succeed from the get-go. So of course their overall numbers are not as good as Grinnell’s, but in large part that’s because Grinnell’s admissions department (and overall design) limited its risks to a very large extent. (And, yes, I know Grinnell does a great job with students from disadvantaged backgrounds, but I think that reflects, in large part, cherrypicking students in that population. I don’t know any such students at Grinnell, but I know some at other, similar LACs, and they are stone sure-bet winners. The riskier kids are at public universities.</p>

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<li> Carleton (like other top LACs) offers a wide range of majors. But when you look at the depth of offerings in each, there can be real issues. The Carleton Linguistics Department, for example, consists of three people. (Which is actually great for a LAC Linguistics Department.) Majoring in Linguistics there effectively means getting tutored by them. That’s not necessarily a terrible model for how to get educated.<br></li>
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<p>But contrast it with, say, Penn, generally regarded as a strong (but not the strongest) program: 19 full-time faculty, 3 emeriti, 8 associated faculty from other fields (psychology, anthropology, etc.). In a field where there are a lot of sub-fields that don’t overlap much, all of the sub-fields are covered at least a couple people deep. Plus, there are 30 grad students, some of whom know a heck of a lot, and a steady stream of people giving job talks, guest lectures, etc. </p>

<p>The two environments are really not comparable; Penn’s is so much richer. But when a linguistics major leaves Carleton, he or she will probably have sucked at least one of its faculty pretty much dry, and at Penn there’s no guarantee that any faculty member will take personal responsibility for making certain that a particular undergraduate really has a solid base of knowledge.</p>

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<p>You’re probably right. But, really, it’s perplexing why this should be the case. To butcher Frost, several paths diverge in a wood and each person has to choose one … at least to start. Does that mean the other paths are going the wrong way? Or that the people on the other paths are misguided losers? </p>

<p>In answer to cbug’s question about whether the prevailing attitude at his or her S’s high school is universal I would say this: The prevailing attitude in most places, IME, is that the vast majority of people don’t much care what other people do. There is always a small minority of people who are unburdened by data but have opinions in abundance. I wouldn’t be surprised to find this sort of person overrepresented among high school students. </p>

<p>Putting a more positive spin on it, I’ve observed that kids get very excited about their own choices. That’s great, but not if they have blinders on and can’t imagine how someone else could choose to go in a different direction. My D, for instance, has chosen a liberal arts college for her own good reasons but would never tell someone who chose a big school that his or her choice was goofy. A couple of her friends, though, were incredulous when they found out this school has no Greek life. That’s important to them; it’s not important to my D. So what? One could do this “so what?” exercise across a number of pairs of variables (LACs have this, but big unis have that!).</p>

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<p>I think the comparison of Grinnell versus University of Iowa is relevant, because the OP is comparing LACs versus state flagships and post #8 explicitly said “in general, most LACs attract a lower quality student than the flagships (just look at the ACT ranges at the LACs in iowa.” I was trying to show that it is almost irrelevant to talk about things “in general.” You need to be specific about which LAC and which flagship you are talking about. Are we talking about Grinnell versus University of Iowa (my comparison) or are we talking about Greensboro College versus UNC - Chapel Hill? The specifics make a world of difference.</p>

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<p>SteveMA - Your post saying a materials science major was available at many LAC peaked my interest because DS (HS junior) is looking into that as an option outside of engineering and I love the idea of having a LAC as an option in his search.</p>

<p>I used the college search feature on CC and searched for material science majors and schools under 7000, no LACs showed up, just hoping you could name a few. Not trying to jump into the debate - just didn’t think LACs where an option unless he was a Math or Physics major.</p>

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<p>Yes, but one has to pick carefully, as many specific LACs tend to have more limited selections of subjects, courses, and majors. For example, Harvey Mudd is only suitable for STEM majors, and some other LACs are not suitable for STEM majors. (Note that some schools, both LACs and non-LACs, offer majors in subjects that are very limited at those schools; computer science is a common one.)</p>

<p>For the OP, it mainly matters whether the schools in question are academically and otherwise appropriate for the student (including having reasonably strong departments in the student’s intended or possible majors), and are affordable.</p>

<p>However, the preference for LACs that you are seeing is far from universal – most students go to state universities and community colleges. LACs, being small, have nowhere near the aggregate capacity to serve the number of students that would be trying to get into them if the preference for LACs were universal.</p>

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<p>LACs are often considered to be self-selecting grad school prep colleges, with little thought to BA employment.</p>

<p>“most students go to state universities and community colleges”</p>

<p>The small number of available LAC seats might have something to do with that! If the same number of LAC seats were available, then maybe more than a few college applicants would be aware of LACs.</p>

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<p>I strongly disagree with the argument that the environment at UPenn is richer even if it is broader. I have run into several folks whose kids have left Penn because the education was so shallow. I went to a uni, but two people became my mentors and took as many courses with them as I could.</p>

<p>Is a ten foot painting necessarily richer than a ten inch tapestry? I think not.</p>

<p>Of course, the argument could go the opposite way if the painting were one of Monet’s water lily paintings that take up an entire room at MOMA and the “tapesty” was a sampler that said, “There’s No Place Like Home” or some such.</p>

<p>Richness can be found in breadth, not depth, or in depth in a dizzying set of possibilities.</p>

<p>I don’t think the Penn/Carleton linguistics argument holds across the board.</p>

<p>I think in both LAC’s and uni’s departments would need to be scrutinized for the best results, provided a young student knew exactly what s/he wanted to study.</p>

<p>If a LAC has Chomskey, I’d want to go there. I wouldn’t care if Chicago had Milton Friedman if Columbia had Joseph Stieglitz, even though Chicago’s economics department had the bigger name. And then I’d be in trouble if I wanted to study linguistics because Columbia’s linguistics department has pretty much fallen apart.</p>

<p>I know JHS has a particular bias against Williams, but for my S it really was the best option, and serendipitously he worked at the Clark Museum and late in the game discovered a passion and extreme aptitude for Art History. He turned down U of C and Brown to attend. Perhaps it was psychic prescience. I don’t know. I can guarantee that his experience did not lack in “richness.” He composed music for a comp lit course on Greek theater; he did architectural drawings of tombs for an Ancient History course…It was a very rich education.</p>

<p>In contract, DD’s BF studied “Neurolinguistics, Psychology and Philosophy” at a Wash U and found he couldn’t get into any psychology grad programs. Not a surprise to me with that major, but why didn’t anyone tell him? I think it’s good that most LAC’s wouldn’t offer it. I found the sad part the fact that he didn’t learn anything more than what I, a layman, know of these fields because the field was so broad. His education was not “rich”, even with the greater resources available to him.</p>

<p>Do I think this a condemnation of uni’s? Of course not. It’s just a case of bad advising and lack of due diligence on his part.</p>

<p>But I really do think it’s painting with too broad a brush to say the Penn is experience is automatically richer. It maybe for some students. Not for all and not in all majors.</p>

<p>Oh, and DS is getting a Masters right now at the same lackluster uni I attended, and sadly, he knows more than his profs about everything but the narrow subject matter they teach. I think it’s because his Williams’ education was so thorough. In many cases, the don’t even know how to pronounce things.</p>

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<p>Swarthmore has an engineering major. Bucknell, Lafayette and Lehigh do, too. I’ve often noticed that they’re all in PA. I think Union (in NY) does, too.</p>

<p>For women, Smith has an engineering major.</p>

<p>I am sure there are many others, but this is not my family’s area of interest so I am less informed than other posters might be. But this is a start.</p>

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<p>The state university is probably both significantly less selective and significantly less expensive at list price. Higher selectivity tends to avoid many less capable students (including those needing remedial courses) who would have trouble passing a full course load to graduate on time, and higher price gives a stronger incentive to avoid delaying graduation (especially if financial aid and scholarships run out after eight semesters).</p>

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<p>That attitude is at odds with those prevalent at my NYC STEM-centered urban magnet where there most students tended to lean much more towards universities back when I attended in the early-mid '90s or is still the case from talking with recent alums. </p>

<p>However, that didn’t mean that all LAC students were automatically considered “second-class”. Those admitted to LACs like SWA or Reed got comparable/equivalent respect to those entering elite universities like UChicago or even HYPSMC. </p>

<p>Moreover, there was also a tendency to compare LACs to their equivalent ranked/perceived university counterparts…wasn’t as simple as saying Unis are better than LACs or vice-versa. </p>

<p>For instance, no one I knew would have felt a universities like NYU or BC would be comparable to LACs like Middlebury, Vassar, Pomona, or Grinnell back in the mid’90s. </p>

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<p>Depends on the LAC and the university it is being compared with and their respective departments. Some LACs do offer pre-professional programs like some previous commenters have posted. </p>

<p>Also, there’s a failure to account for the possibility that what constitutes a graduate-level course…even at a university of a similar ranking/range may be the equivalent or in some cases…actually lower in material coverage/rigor than some respectable LAC’s upper-level or sometimes even mid-level undergrad courses. </p>

<p>Several LAC classmates who have gone on to grad school at places like Harvard, Columbia, NYU, etc have found that to be the case in their fields…even in STEM fields. </p>

<p>Many of them who were allowed to skipped the intro/intermediate-level grad course offerings without any negative consequences. Those that weren’t complained they were “wasting time” repeating what they covered in undergrad. </p>

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<p>Funny you mentioned Penn. At a recent HS alum event, met 3 UPenn alums…including a Wharton grad who said their undergrad experience left much to be desired because the Profs didn’t give much attention to undergrads and the TAs were hit/miss. One even described it as epitomizing some of the worst stereotypes of a large state university. </p>

<p>Granted, they graduated Penn in the late '80s-late '90s so hopefully Penn has improved their act since then.</p>

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<p>I don’t want to get into the LAC-uni debate as I think each has their strengths and weaknesses, that they are better or worse depending on the needs of the student, etc.</p>

<p>But I do take issue with this type reasoning that LACs are superior to universities:</p>

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<p>Universities don’t teach sociology, psychology, genetics & biochem? Universities don’t have distributional requirements? Universities don’t have majors in all of the ‘liberal arts’ fields that LACs do? Students at universities don’t have adequate opportunities to take these types of classes? </p>

<p>Better to stick to LAC strengths, then to grasp at straws about what universities aren’t.</p>

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<p>Mom24boys–use that search feature with a grain of salt. According to that search feature, none of the schools my son is considering have his major, yet every single one of them does…</p>

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<p>entomom, that’s a good point. Universities offer liberal arts majors as well as pre-professional ones. The atmosphere and teaching style may be different, but I don’t know of any university where you couldn’t prepare for the MCAT.</p>

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<p>Whoa!! All this comparison between an LAC with a LARGE public university makes my head spin. To me, those are apples and oranges. Can’t someone here compare a private university, like Northwestern, WashU, or JHU to a private LAC like Trinity College in Hartford, Wesleyan, or Tufts?</p>

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<p>Northwestern most closely resembles a state flagship (UNC, Mich, WI) than it does any LAC like Wes or Carleton.</p>

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<p>All of this debate makes me wonder why more people aren’t singing the praises of the “Sweet Spot” small Jesuit universites like Villanova, Marquette, Creighton, Santa Clara, Trinity (non-Jesuit), etc. They seem to provide the best of both worlds . . . LAC style learning with pre-professional options and in some cases big time athletics.</p>

<p>We’d love to consider them but afraid the financials will not work out for us.</p>

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<p>My post did include comments about Wash U. </p>

<p>But why do we need to compare.</p>

<p>I like a small purse in which everything is organized. D likes the big slouch, dump purse. I am starting to get some arthritis in my neck. She gets cold and likes to carry around sweaters in her purse. She carries big books. I carry my slim kindle.</p>

<p>Why would we need to disparage each other’s needs.</p>

<p>This is silly.</p>

<p>If the OP is in Amherst, UMass Amherst will never have the reputation of Amherst. I am sure UMass is stronger in some fields, engineering for example. And prestige may not be important at all. </p>

<p>My D just discovered she can only do well in classes smaller than 100. Good thing she didn’t attend UMass. I ran into a mom whose daughter adored UMass Amherst and really thrived there.</p>

<p>Is someone wrong? I don’t think so.</p>

<p>Good thing we don’t all want to marry the same person or there would be a lot of single folk.</p>

<p>These are very personal decisions.</p>

<p>Boths uni’s and LAC’s provide educations. Much more rests on the shoulders of the particular kids getting those educations.</p>

<p>A strong, well-organized kid can get through a state u in 4 years whatever the overall statistics say. And a good LAC in my opinion <em>will</em> provide a rich education, too.</p>

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  1. Sorry, I’m going to call you out on that one. Please name some LACs offering a bachelors degree in materials science or MSE.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>You’re missing the point regarding acceptance stats. Because the data may be drawn from different pools (some already weeded out, some not) we can’t conclude anything about the differential effects of the education on any individual premed’s chances. It seems plausible that the same premeds who successfully avoiding weeding out at one school and are later accepted to med school would have been just as successful at the other school where some of their peers are allowed to apply unprepared.</p></li>
<li><p>If the purpose of a Liberal Arts College is not to teach the liberal arts, what exactly is its distinction from a university? What is the origin of the term LAC?
(BTW, math and science are also considered part of the liberal arts…)</p></li>
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<p>I will add a LAC personal experience (while noting at the outset that I basically agree with mythmom; it’s impossible to meaningfully generalize about whether LACs or big unis are better).</p>

<p>I am a LAC grad. I had wanted to double-major. One of my intended majors was philosophy. By the second or third semester, having taken a course or two in the department and ready to declare, I found that the head of the philosophy department didn’t want anyone to major. They didn’t want to have to actually teach all the courses I would need, and there wouldn’t be many people in them.</p>

<p>Long story short – when you go to a small restaurant with a long menu, order the cheeseburger. Or find out how often they really serve scallops.</p>

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<p>It’s interesting that some LACs are now offering more pre-professional programs.
As many LACs seem to be located in admittedly tiny towns, is that a move to attract more students since they can’t move the school?</p>