Hampshire or Bennington?

educated
Sun, 25 Feb 2007 07:46:04 +0000

Both really good schools. You will have a lot of freedom to design your own education and explore those disciplines that you are most interested in at either one. There is a pretty similar student body at both schools, a mixture of creative, smart, independent kids. The kids who don’t make it at these schools are often the ones that are disorganized, the ones who can’t really get things done without being told exactly what they should be doing and when. It takes a lot of internal organization to succeed, because there will not be as much external structure as there is at many other schools. That said, I think the differences are these:

Hampshire-
Pros: Larger (@1300, I believe)
Part of the 5 college consortium (incredible value, you have access to the quality of Amherst and the quantity of UMass)
Great college town(s) both Amherst and Northampton are charming and have a lot to offer.
Excellent transportation within the area and to points beyond

Cons: Ugly (to many) campus
People often think you either go to school somewhere in New Hampshire or to a Saturday Night Live joke (though the schools reputation is definitely growing in a positive way)

Bennington-
Pros: Field Work Term (great experiences + a resume to graduate with)
Beautiful campus and dorms
Name recognition (reputation of high quality and many famous alumni)
Friendly, supportive, close atmosphere due to small size

Cons: Close atmosphere due to small size
Relatively small number of classes offered
Pretty far from big city civilization