Swarthmore's fortes

johnwesley
Wed, 22 Mar 2006 13:27:33 +0000

Hi y’all. This is a transcript of a recent thread on the Wesleyan CC board concerning some very similar issues. I hope it helps.
–JW



Re: Wes vs. Williams

To begin with, you have to realize that just about anything anyone says on the subject is going to be largely anecdotal. Whatever institutional data exists tends to suggest more overlap than people are willing to admit. The two have been linked athletically for the better part of the last 100 years and each has had to grapple with issues of diversity and changes in the way the general public perceives liberal arts colleges over the years.

Neither were particularly well known outside the closely-knit drawing rooms and board rooms of the eastern establishment until USNews began publishing its annual rankings nearly twenty years ago. Each has had to adjust to an influx of brighter, better prepared applicants from around the country looking for credible stand-ins for HYP, the lower ivies, Stanford and MIT. The strategies each have adopted are instructive.

Williams decided a long time ago that if you were going to beat the Ivies at their own game it meant literally to be a member of an athletic league, preferably one populated by sons and daughers of a similar elite group of colleges. They, along with Wesleyan, Amherst, Bowdoin, Middlebury and about a half-dozen other well esteemed New England colleges, established NESCAC (the New England Small College Athletic Conference) around the time coeducation had completed the rounds among its largely all-male, sister colleges.

It then decided that in order to stay on top of the pecking order that it would recruit as many “scholar-atheletes” as possible. Thirty years ago, it simply meant giving a slight advantage to those applicants with some experience in varsity sports on the high school level. By and large, these students were not all that different form the students that normally drifted north for skiing, hiking and other winter and outdoor activities. Many of them went out for two, sometimes three varsity sports a year (Bill Bellichick, Wesleyan, `78 went out for both football and lacrosse.) The Little Three championships (Wesleyan, Williams and Amherst) changed hands fairly often.

Today, that has changed somewhat. People start out as football players or soccer players (or wrestlers or lacrosse players) much earlier in high school, tend to specialize in that particular sport, and it tends to be their most important extracurricular. And because both Wesleyan and Williams are simialr sizes (2600 vs 2200 u/g) a coach’s “tip” becomes much more crucial in the admissions process. To field each and every one of thirty-odd teams takes a good chunk of each incoming class.

To be quite frank, I think Williams’ self image as a New England college is much more dependent on fielding winning teams than Wesleyan’s is. It’s not at all uncommon for a recruited athlete to arrive at Wesleyan, decide that academics is more important, and that he won’t play on a varsity team. At Wesleyan, there is absolutely no pressure on them to play.

Where I think Wesleyan’s self-image comes into play is around the whole idea of contributing to society. Some people misunderstand this to mean charity or being a “do-gooder”. But, I think there is so much more to it than that; it can also mean contributing to the marketplace of ideas, to culture and to science. A prolific number of Wesleyan graduates have become writers and journalists. Another large number wind up trying their hands at the performing arts. A Wesleyan grad was just appointed director of the Keck Observatory in Hawaii, one of the most prestigious research posts in the world. So, it isn’t all about lining up an interview with Goldman-Sachs (although, 80% of Wesleyan graduates are said to pursue graduate studies within five years of graduation.)

I hope this helps.

[SNIP]

03-16-2006, 01:46 AM #10
Corbett
Junior Member

Join Date: Jan 2006
Posts: 92 Football: Wesleyan vs. Williams, also Trinity

Wesleyan is not noted as a “football school.” The football team has rarely been outstanding in recent years; it went 0-8 last fall, and has not won the “Little 3” Championship (over Williams and Amherst) since 1970. Wesleyan is, of course, a great school in many other, more important respects. But if playing and winning at football is a priority for you, note that it may not be shared by much of the Wesleyan community.

Williams students are noted for their participation and success in sports (possibly because there is nothing else to do in Williamstown). The football team generally wins, and the Williams community is generally proud of it. Williams maintains similar academic standards, and is limited to the same number of athletic “tips”, as Wesleyan and Amherst, yet it seems to be more successful at attracting talented athletes.

However…the most “serious” football program in NESCAC (relatively speaking) is not at Williams, but at Trinity. Trinity’s admissions standards are lower than those at Wesleyan or Williams, and they allow more athletic tips. By leveraging these advantages, Trinity has dominated NESCAC competition in recent years, beating up on both Wesleyan and Williams. Trinity is also famed for its squash program; they regularly defeat much larger Ivy League universities for the national championship. Trinity’s aggressive recruitment of foreign squash players is legendary.

Last edited by Corbett : 03-16-2006 at 01:56 AM.



03-16-2006, 09:18 AM #11
johnwesley
Member

Join Date: Aug 2004
Posts: 501 Welcome, Corbett!

It’s a pleasure to welcome a Williams alum to this discussion group. We obviously have a lot in common (patience with having to repeat the name of our college several times before people recognize it, a talent for defending the liberal arts, and a mutual dislike of Amherst.) And some differences (Sears Cup envy on our part.) But, mostly questions. For example, there’s been a lot of discussion about drug use in this group and I’d love to compare your experience/knowlede of Williams. I’ve been to Williams, and it has some breath taking views; it’s hard to imagine that people don’t occasionally inhale more than the clear, cold, mountain air when the opportunity arises. Do they?



03-16-2006, 02:20 PM #12
Corbett
Junior Member

Join Date: Jan 2006
Posts: 92 Drugs at Williams

This question seems a bit off-topic, but I’ll address it anyway. My impression – which is no longer current – was that rates of drug use at Williams were relatively low, perhaps significantly lower than at Wesleyan. Not non-existent, but uncommon. Same for tobacco.

The most widely used (and abused) recreational substance at Williams was clearly alcohol. Williams probably matched or beat Wesleyan in this respect. Williamstown is small, remote, and largely shuts down in the evening, but drinking is one activity that is available.

On the other hand, Williams has no frats. So alcohol use at Williams is probably lower than it is at (for example) Dartmouth, which combines an isolated small town with an active Greek system.

If you want additional, more current opinions, you should post your question at the Williams forum.



03-17-2006, 08:42 AM #13
johnwesley
Member

Join Date: Aug 2004
Posts: 501 Thank you, Corbett. That jibes with my likewise outdated impression of drug use at the two schools. You also raise one point that I had not considered before and that is, the number of people who seem to smoke tobacco at Wesleyan. It’s actually kind of funny; people who are scrupulous about not smoking tobacco in their rooms – they’ll go outside in the freezing cold, or open a window to vent the smoke – but, think nothing of hosting a house party where a joint may stink up the room for days afterward. I wonder now whether one may be a gateway drug for the other?
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03-17-2006, 05:43 PM #14
Corbett
Junior Member

Join Date: Jan 2006
Posts: 92 At Williams: “the College prohibits smoking in all buildings, including student rooms, offices, and indoor facilities of the College or within 25 feet of a College building. The one exception is in College-owned faculty/staff rental housing.”

Apparently such policies are not unusual. For example, I understand that Amherst and Bowdoin now have similar bans, except that Bowdoin is even tougher: outside smokers are supposed to be at least 50 feet from the nearest college building.



03-17-2006, 09:11 PM #15
johnwesley
Member

Join Date: Aug 2004
Posts: 501 Brrrr



Bowdoin is even tougher: outside smokers are supposed to be at least 50 feet from the nearest college building.
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We may have stumbled upon a co-variable, here: pot smoking is directly proportionate to the number of tobacco smokers which may be inversely proportionate to the severity of a college’s winter!