Swarthmore, Brown, Pomona, or Amherst?

interesteddad
Sun, 19 Oct 2008 00:19:25 +0000

I think Brown is a fine school, but unless I loved something about it, I would rule it out in that group simply because it lacks the financial resources of the other three schools – all of which have per student endowments roughly three times that of Brown and all of is devoted to undergrad students.

The other three – Amherst, Swarthmore, and Pomona – are equal by any objective measure. I think they are the three best LACs in the country. So it really boils down to your priorities.

Pomona is in California. Do you want to travel to LA for college? Swarthmore is both the most academic and the most diverse of the three. Amherst has its charms.

A few small issues:

a) You are right to identify Swarthmore as the strongest of the three in the sciences. Swarthmore is third in the country in overall PhD production, fourth in science/engineering PhD production.

b) You better check on linguistics departments. Swarthmore’s is very well respected. Not all colleges have them.

c) Philadelphia being 25 minutes from campus is a huge plus. Some students go once a week. Some once a month. Some once a semester. The key is that you can go however many times you need to go. Every college on your list will feel too small at some point. Nothing like a city to get a breath of real-world air. It’s really important, IMO.

d) A point related to the location. Nobody (only 10% of the campus) has cars at Swarthmore. Swarthmore students have it made for both weekend travel – from Wash to NYC – and travel home for vacations. Bus, train, easy access to an airport with Southwest and Jet Blue cheapo fares. It’s great. My daughter did visits somewhere every semester: friends in New York City, friends at Vassar, friends at Ga Tech, spring break at roomate’s brother’s house and Cuban in-laws in Miami, party weekend with Swat grads in Washington, etc. She did another day trip – charter bus – to Washinton for a Darfur rally on Capitol Hill with a couple of Swatties speaking and then split up with everyone going to lobby their homestate Senators. Her going to lobby at John Kerry’s office was probably as educational as anything she did at Swarthmore. Did it all with easy, cheap transportation. No sweat. People don’t think about that, but unless they are loaded, they should. There are real perks to the location.

e) dchow might not be proud of the mall, but having a Target less than a mile from campus is a real plus. A college student can pretty much survive indefinitely on stuff from a big Target with a grocery section. BTW, the Target store is moving even closer to campus. It’s taken over the lease on one of the two major department store locations in the mall. Easy walking distance. I would also not shortchange the restaurant scene in Media – a couple of stops on the rail line out past Swarthmore. It’s become a hotspot for trendy, mostly ethnic, restaurants. Everything from Iron Horse brew pub to Thai/French, to really good Indian, to a high dollar Asian fusion restaurant opened up by Iron Chef Morimoto’s sous chef from downtown. These restaurants now do a lot of catering for Swarthmore department events (the golden rule: free food equals big student turnout!) Media has actually become a popular dinner out location for Swatties and their parents. Speaking of food…one special dinner at Morimotos in downtown Phila will make you want to go to either Swarthmore or directly to heaven.

f) The whole “do Swatties work too hard” thing has been beat to death. Check it ouf for yourself. Do an overnight. Talk to students. None of the Swattie parents here had kids who expressed those sentiments. I think most would say that Swarthmore’s undergrad education is the best in the country, that they worked hard, but didn’t kill themselves. It think the all are justifiable proud of their four years. If you think it’s going to be too much after you’ve checked it out, then Swarthmore’s probably not the right school. Wouldn’t make sense to go there if you’re already psyched out.

Good luck with your choice. You really can’t go wrong with any of those schools.