<p>I think it will depend on what kind of “popular” your D or any other prospective Swarthmore student has been in high school. High school popularity can often come from being part of the “right” crowd or participating in the “right” activities. Being a star athlete or having high socio-economic status are often keys to popularity in high school. Those attributes will have little relevance at a college like Swarthmore. I have a friend who was a cheerleader in high school. She loved Swarthmore, but the cheerleader aspect of high school was something she left behind.</p>
<p>I think it is probably accurate to some extent that Swarthmore students generally spent less time on socializing in high school than many of their high school classmates. To get in to Swarthmore most students have to both spend a lot of time on academics, but then also spend time on some extracurricular passion. In my experience there is often not much time left over.</p>
<p>On the other hand, my S said that the biggest surprise for him after he got to Swarthmore was that there were about 5 times as many social opportunities as he had expected.</p>