Which colleges for genuine intellectuals?

Weskid
Thu, 14 Jun 2007 17:12:36 +0000

As people have said, UChicago, Reed and St. Johns come to mind right away, as super intellectual schools. Other schools that might attract the kind of student you are talking about are Sarah Lawrence, Bard, Hampshire and Evergreen state. All aren’t as selective as top schools, and have quirky academic programs that appeal to a certain type of (liberal, for the most part) intellectual.

That said I also wouldn’t discount some of the top schools in the nation — esp. LACs. You might really like Swarthmore, for instance. From everything I know (from visiting and other sources) it’s a school that attracts top students who are top students because they love learning, not because they are grade grubbers.

Also, there are quite a few schools that aren’t quite like what BIGTWIX has As people have said, UChicago, Reed and St. Johns come to mind right away, as super intellectual schools. Other schools that might attract the kind of student you are talking about are Sarah Lawrence, Bard, Hampshire and Evergreen state. All aren’t as selective as top schools, and have quirky academic programs that appeal to a certain type of (liberal, for the most part) intellectual.

That said I also wouldn’t discount some of the top schools in the nation — esp. LACs. You might really like Swarthmore, for instance, from everything I know (from visiting and other sources) that’s a very intellectual school.

Also, there are quite a few schools that aren’t quite like what BIGTWIX has described, but are still pretty intellectual. These are schools where maybe not EVERYONE is “intellectual,” but many if not most are. They normally aren’t stereotypical UChicago style hard-core about it (ie. many like to put the books down sometimes, esp. on the weekends), but the atmosphere of loving learning for learning’s sake definitely exists. For instance at my school, Wesleyan, most of my friends really love what they’re doing, and even though we aren’t always thrilled to be working all the time, we’ve been known to stand around in the hall talking about Nietzsche for two hours as a form of procrastination.

Other schools that I believe are similar are Carleton, Haverford, Oberlin, Vassar, Grinnell, Brown, Yale and many others that I never checked out and therefore don’t know much about (ie. probably a lot of other top–and not “top” LACs, as well as some Unis).