<p>Share what you know about the distinctive features of a college. And I mean truly distinctive, not just “fine weather” or “rigorous curriculum” or “Intelligent Students”. That feature should not be present in other colleges. Please write in this format</p>
<p>“The College”</p>
<p>“Features”</p>
<p>Bryn Mawr
The people @ BMC</p>
<p>XYZ college
The people @ XYZ college</p>
<p>I don’t think any one college is truly unique (unless you are talking about Deep Springs maybe). Whatever it is that you value in one college, I guarantee that you can find it somewhere else, too. What differentiates one college from another one in my opinion are the people there - the students, faculty and staff. Without them, you are just left with a bunch of dreary buildings.</p>
<p>For the reasons b@r!um explained, I don’t know how effective a list in this style will be. However, for every unusual feature I point out, I’ll try to list schools that also have that somewhat unusual feature.</p>
<p>The College: University of Chicago</p>
<p>Features:
– bizarre application questions
–Neo-gothic campus with buildings by I.M. Pei, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Mies Van Der Rohe peppered in the immediate neighborhood (similar to Yale, Princeton, part of Duke)
– a close-knit residential house system-- all students are assigned to a house within a dorm, houses range from 30 to 100 students, students stay with that house all four years if they choose to, houses have their own table in the dining hall, play intramural sports together, have their own house lounge, have their own house advisors (grad students) and RA’s. The schools I know that have a house system like ours is Smith and Rice-- Yale, Harvard, Cornell, Princeton, and Penn all have “house” systems to some effect or another).
– core curriculum with emphasis on “Great Books” (similar to Columbia’s, but where Columbia students have mandatory courses, we have five or six options. St. John’s College is 100% core, Reed has a bit of core in Humanities 110, some schools call their cores core even though they are not Great Books-esque)
– campus is in a small neighborhood in a big city
– trimester/quarter system (shared with Dartmouth, Caltech, UC’s, UWashington, Carleton, Northwestern, Stanford, Knox, Union)
–4500 undergraduates (~ undergraduate size of Dartmouth, Tufts)
– self-consciously designed as a German-style research U with a large grad school (~9000 grads) on top of a smaller undergraduate college… the only other school I know that was designed specifically in this fashion is Hopkins
– single rooms available for first-years… dorming options are incredibly, incredibly diverse, alcohol/party policies are incredibly lax (we’re of the “it’s all fun and games until somebody gets hurt” philosophy)
– Doc Films film society-- a different movie every night, themed throughout the quarter, oldest film society in the nation
– Top Model UN, Quiz Bowl, Debate teams.
– Lots of self-deprecating t-shirts.</p>
<p>That about does it for the features I can point out… the rest of it, I’m afraid to say, probably comes down to a “feeling” here.</p>
<p>OP:</p>
<p>You are not asking for distinctive features. You are asking for unique ones. There’s a difference.</p>
<p>Berkeley</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The best public university in the world.</p></li>
<li><p>Berkelium…only school with an element named for it. (Other elements associated with the school).</p></li>
<li><p>Football stadium straddles a known major fault line.</p></li>
<li><p>Lawrence Berkeley National Lab in foothills above campus.</p></li>
<li><p>Plutonium first produced and isolated at a lab in Gilman Hall.</p></li>
<li><p>The Eucalyptus Grove, which is both the tallest stand of such trees in the world and the tallest stand of hardwood trees in North America.</p></li>
<li><p>According to the National Research Council, Berkeley ranks first nationally in the number of graduate programs in the top ten in their fields (97%, 35 of 36 programs) and first nationally in the number of “distinguished” programs for the scholarship of the faculty (32 programs).</p></li>
<li><p>Berkeley is the only university in the nation to achieve top 5 rankings for all of its PhD programs in those disciplines covered by the US News and World Report graduate school survey.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Carleton College</p>
<ul>
<li>Trimester system</li>
<li>Strong academics/strong faculty</li>
<li>Students who are engaged in/passionate about learning</li>
<li>Lack of corrosive competition among students</li>
<li>Students who have fun in unique, offbeat ways</li>
<li>Current National Quiz Bowl champions</li>
<li>Consistently high-ranked (former national champions) in mens’ and womens’ ultimate</li>
<li>Students who get into a frenzy upon spotting a bust of Schiller</li>
<li>Great student-run radio station</li>
<li>A college administration that “gets” the students</li>
<li>Friday flowers</li>
<li>Broomball and ice croquet</li>
<li>Big producer of graduates who go on to obtain their PhD</li>
</ul>
<p>Carleton College
<p>MIT:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Has its own nuclear reactor which is operated by students</p></li>
<li><p>Students get to pick their own dorms/halls during Orientation, after a period to explore them and meet the people in person</p></li>
<li><p>Hacking culture: [IHTFP</a> Hack Gallery: Welcome to the IHTFP Gallery!](<a href=“http://hacks.mit.edu/]IHTFP”>http://hacks.mit.edu/)</p></li>
<li><p>One of the highest IM/club sports participation rates in the country, and students can walk on to most varsity sports as novices</p></li>
<li><p>National champion pistol team</p></li>
<li><p>~80% of undergraduates participate in MIT research, and ~20% publish while still undergrads</p></li>
<li><p>Liquid nitrogen ice cream! (I bet that’s not entirely unique to MIT, but it’s a nice feature :))</p></li>
</ul>
<p>I might add more later…</p>
<p>well … features that sets a college apart but may not be entirely unprecedented are also welcome</p>
<p>Haverford has the only varsity cricket team in the country. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Rice has Beer Bike, and I’ve never heard of anything else like it.</p>
<p>OK. Here are a few.</p>
<p>University of Virginia:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Only school where part of the campus (or “Grounds” if you prefer) is a World Heritage site</p></li>
<li><p>Only place where Thomas Jefferson is referred to as if still alive and called “Mr. Jefferson”</p></li>
</ol>
<p>University of Washington</p>
<ol>
<li> Only school with a breathtaking view of Mt. Rainier looming over Lake Washington</li>
</ol>
<p>William and Mary</p>
<ol>
<li>Only school that part of Colonial Williamsburg</li>
</ol>
<p>VMI</p>
<ol>
<li> Only school whose cadets fought as a unit in a major battle (I think)</li>
</ol>
<p>University of Chicago</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The only member of the Big 10 ever to drop out of the Big 10</p></li>
<li><p>Built the first atomic pile with a fission reaction below the old football stadium</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Whitman College</p>
<ol>
<li> The only school (to my knowledge) originally founded on the site of a massacre</li>
</ol>
<p>Harvard University</p>
<ol>
<li> The oldest college in the US</li>
</ol>
<p>Deep Springs</p>
<ol>
<li> The only college to actively ranch about 100,000 acres</li>
<li> The only college (to my knowledge) where one of the work study jobs is “cowboy”</li>
<li> The only college where the students butcher their own meat</li>
</ol>
<p>UNC Chapel Hill</p>
<ol>
<li> One of the few colleges that thinks it’s a good idea to dress its football team in powder blue</li>
</ol>
<p>^ True for UNC, since UCLA went to “True Blue”.</p>
<p>“8. Berkeley is the only university in the nation to achieve top 5 rankings for all of its PhD programs in those disciplines covered by the US News and World Report graduate school survey.”</p>
<p>Finally someone that appreciates Cal Grad school. Im tired of all the “Harvard is best” BS. Yeah Harvard is great, probably even one of the best schools for grad school, but as a whole, Berkeley is easily tired for 1st place best grad experience overall.</p>
<p>Berkeley has every program as one of the best (business, law, all of it’s humanities, sciences, engineering), and harvard doesnt have specialized schools like engineering. sooooo…</p>
<p>Trinity College
<p>William & Mary</p>
<p>Sense of history:</p>
<p>First Honor Code
Founding of Phi Beta Kappa
Oldest academic buildng still in use-Wren Bulding
Relationship with Britain-Margaret Thatcher-former Chancellor/Visit from Queen(Monarch not band)last spring.
Ghosts of Jefferson/Washington/Monroe/Tyler/Marshall/Clay</p>
<p>Come on HYPS ;)</p>
<p>Oberlin College</p>
<ul>
<li>Only top-ranked LAC that also houses a top-ranked conservatory - over 400 performances on campus each year, and the opportunity to pursue a double degree</li>
<li>More graduates have earned PhDs than any other American college</li>
<li>Art rental program allows students to “rent”, for $5 per semester, paintings by artists such as Picasso, Rembrandt, and Warhol</li>
<li>Contains the first entirely solar-powered academic building in the U.S., and the largest photovoltaic array in Ohio</li>
<li>The student-run Oberlin Student Cooperative Assocation is the largest eating/dining co-op program in the country</li>
<li>The first college to institute gender- and race-blind admissions</li>
<li>Served as a stop on the Underground Railroad</li>
<li>One of the largest undergraduate library systems in the country, and one of the best college art museums</li>
<li>Experimental College allows students to teach their own classes on any topic for college credit</li>
<li>Pioneered the idea of a Winter Term</li>
</ul>
<p>Quaere, your statement that Oberlin has “more graduates to have earned PhDs than any other American College is incorrect.” I think Oberlin ranks 7th in that regard. Still impressive, but not top. Swarthmore and Reed are further up, ranking 3rd and 4th respectively.</p>
<p>VASSAR COLLEGE
-Beautiful campus.
-Nationally certified arboretum.
-Tea is served to students every afternoon in the Rose Parlor.
-Shakespeare Gardens
-Completely undergraduate institution, with no true course requirements.</p>
<p>come on USC</p>