<p>Go do Penn. Prestige of Penn > Prestige of Duke, and you’ll have better non-grad-school post-grad opportunities from Penn than you will from Swarthmore. I will say, however, that Swarthmore people are some of the nicest, smartest, and most passionate people I have ever met and I think the vibe at Swarthmore is legitimately better than the one at Penn or Duke –– students are genuinely interested in what they study, and there’s an academic vitality at Swarthmore that just doesn’t exist at Penn or Duke. </p>
<p>That said, you’ll probably develop better “life” skills (like balancing work and leisure) than you will at Swarthmore. So it kind of depends on what you want: if you want to prepare for a comfortable life where you’ll be making lots of money and doing normal people things, go to Penn; if you want to prepare for an interesting life, where you could choose (and will have to hustle perhaps harder than you would otherwise) to make lots of money (and where you’ll graduate with probably some of the most interesting friends) if you wanted to, but such a decision would actually require a bit of grief and work on your part, go to Swarthmore. </p>