<p>I’ve seen so many threads in which a students refuses to apply to a LAC, yet applies to Harvard. Is there a reason why people do this or is this just because of lack of research? If I’m not mistaken, Harvard students receive an undergraduate degree from Harvard COLLEGE, a Liberal Arts College, and grad students attend Harvard UNIVERSITY. So where is the discrepancy? </p>
<p>Also, when you look at rankings, why isn’t Harvard on the list of top LACs? Is it because of it’s graduate program?</p>
<p>Harvard is considered a research university, not an LAC because of the way its curriculum is focused.</p>
<p>@guineagirl96 Harvard College’s curriculum is research based? I’m talking specifically about the undergraduate school.</p>
<p>But the undergraduate college is a minority of harvard’s students- just one school among its large research focused graduates. Thats like calling a college of arts and sciences within a <em>insert state</em> tech an LAC.</p>
<p>“Why don’t people consider Harvard a LAC?”</p>
<p>Because it’s a research university. </p>
<p>The faculty who perform research also teach undergraduate courses. The graduate students who perform research with the faculty often serve as Teaching Fellows, assisting in the teaching of undergraduate courses. Not uncommonly, especially in higher-level courses, undergraduates and graduate students attend the same classes. Many, many undergraduate students work in facilities involved in the university’s research activities, whether paid or unpaid.</p>
<p>Undergraduate students often eat, live, and socialize with tenured faculty and graduate students engaged in research.</p>
<p>The demarcation between the undergraduate college and the research university isn’t quite as crisp and clean as one might imagine.</p>
<p>@guineagirl96 I’m talking about when high school students are applying to Harvard. If they apply and are accepted, they ARE in fact that minority, no? </p>
<p>@notjoe Thanks for your response. Very detailed. Also, I do understand that Harvard University is a research Univeristy. I was just wondering why so many students blur the line between the uni and college. Thanks for answering 
</p>
<p>(Although I doubt most high school students know all of that information when applying there :))</p>
<p>There’s a huge difference in culture between LACs and research universities. Even if the coursework is nominally the same, the factors that notjoe elaborated mean that, in practice, there’s a huge difference in the undergrad experience. If high school students aren’t aware of this when applying, that’s a real shame – they should be! </p>
<p>A few years ago, I was at a party with a former department chair at Swarthmore (a prototypical LAC) and several people my age (50s) who were Swarthmore alums. Several of them asked about a young professor they had liked when they were students, who did not receive tenure. The former department chair said that the teacher in question was probably the most brilliant scholar to have passed through the department during the chair’s tenure, but his teaching evaluations were too mixed for him to get tenure at Swarthmore.</p>
<p>That is a story that simply could never be told at Harvard, or at any similar university. It just wouldn’t compute. No one thought to be “most brilliant” would be denied tenure because of consistent negative teaching evaluations, much less mixed ones. It’s a very different mindset. LAC faculties believe it is their principal job to teach you. If someone does not agree with that, he probably doesn’t last long. University faculties don’t have a monolithic opinion about teaching, but things are set up so it is their principal job to produce published scholarship, and secondarily to make themselves available to you on some regular basis so you can learn from them if you want.</p>
<p>Significant graduate programs also make a huge difference. They double or triple the number of people in the scholarly community around any subject matter at a college, they provide a bridge between undergraduates and senior faculty, and they compete – very successfully – with undergraduates for faculty attention. At research universities, they are an important part of the overall community and an undergraduate’s academic experience. At LACs, they are not there.</p>
<p>In practice, the differences are nowhere near as sharp as that. Scholarship is very important at top LACs, and there are plenty of great, conscientious teachers at Harvard and other great research universities. Faculty are more important than graduate students, and if you want a relationship with them you will get it.</p>
<p>It’s a good insight that Harvard College is not that different from an LAC. The (relatively) small, elite research universities are closer in size to larger LACs than they are to major public research universities like any of the UCs, or Michigan, and they all do a lot of things to capture some of the cultural benefits of an LAC-like community.</p>
<p>I was just at Harvard move-in day on Monday and Harvard describes itself as a “liberal arts and sciences college embedded in a research university.” Interesting description. I also have a son at Swarthmore so I am curious to see the differences and similarities of their “college” experiences. The course requirements are similar as are the freshman seminar opportunities. But, there is a definitely a very different feel on the campuses. @JHS identifies numerous key points.</p>
<p>@lacgrad - I was there too and that comment (I forget whether it came from Dean Khurana or Dean Dingman) really stood out. The whole process of adjustment to the Harvard environment seems like it must be quite overwhelming for many of the new students - I imagine it would be a lot simpler at a liberal arts college.</p>
<p>AnnieBeats, I went to a LAC for undergrad and then Harvard for law school, and while I was at Harvard, I did cross-register for an undergrad class. The actual undergrad class was comparable to ones I had taken at the LAC, but a large university and a small LAC are just completely different experiences; they’re apples and oranges. A LAC focuses on teaching undergraduates; Harvard’s teaching was fine (and the “big name” professors there can’t be beat), but undergraduates are just one of many communities there. </p>
<p>Based on my experiences, while I wouldn’t turn down Harvard for anything, in general, I’d recommend a LAC for someone who wants a small, cohesive and supportive place and plans to go to graduate school immediately after college; I’d recommend a large university for someone who can fend for himself/herself and might or might not go to graduate school immediately after college. But again, I wouldn’t turn down Harvard for anything.</p>
<p>@guineagirl96 I was talking SOLELY about undergraduate students. It’s not like calling a state CAS a LAC. Students don’t have the option of switching colleges in Harvard for undergrad because that is the only place they can be.</p>
<p>@AnnieBeats I know what you’re talking about, you don’t seem to be understanding me. Schools have the atmosphere of the majority, in this case the graduate program. Because the undergrads are such a minority, they are affected greatly by the atmosphere of the majority, the grad program.</p>