Yale vs. Swat?

fhimas88888888
Sat, 30 Mar 2013 18:32:58 +0000

We might be able to help if you’re more clear about what you expect to do in the future. I give a few examples of post-college scenarios, and address the relative strengths of Yale, Swarthmore in achieving these goals. I assume that outcome is all that matters to you, and, indeed, you don’t have strong preference for one school’s “vibe” over the other. I’m a recent Swat alumnus.

I. Get a job in finance/consulting. It’s very difficult (though not impossible –– I have friends who did it) to place into top finance/consulting firms from Swat. This is mostly for two reasons, it seems. First, no one in non-nerdy finance/consulting has heard of Swat so the “Swarthmore name” doesn’t carry much weight at the usual “not-nerdy” finance/consulting firms (though Google seems to really like Swatties). Second, no one at Swat really wants to go work in industry, so it’s hard to find student mentors (or friends with connections) for guidance.

II. Get a PhD in Math or Economics. Swat hasn’t been placing very well into math programs. Other posters know more about this than I do. Important might be that Swat doesn’t offer graduate math courses, and these days math departments want to see these courses on applicants’ transcripts. However, you should carefully note that this observation is only relevant to you if you are already very good at math. This is important because while Swat’s math department is really good in helping “novice mathematicians” develop, friends from Yale have told me that Yale doesn’t serve the “novice mathematician” very well.

Similarly, in economics Swarthmore hasn’t been placing students consistently into the top 5-7 (we’ve instead been placing more consistently into the top 15 ––*a big difference in economics) for a number of reasons, but perhaps simply because (i) Swat honors courses aren’t viewed by admissions committees as graduate level courses, and (ii) Swat econ professors are not so well known. In economics, “who you know” seems to matter, so Yale for the aspiring economist seems like the better choice.

III. PhD in Computer Science, Physics, Chemistry, Biology. Swarthmore places extraordinarily well in these disciplines (seriously, it’s kind of crazy how well we place in these disciplines). If you’re interested in these areas and like the Swarthmore vibe, you’ll have a wonderful time at Swat, and may get to do more interesting work in the lab as you won’t have to deal with grad students who might make you go do boring stuff.

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To answer your question, if you are nearly certain that you will pursue PhD, and you think you’ll end up getting PhD in areas enumerated in III, then you can forget about “prestige, reputation, resources, faculty, and, most importantly, post-graduation success” because Swat probably “beats” (indeed, this is very “approximate”) Yale in these areas, mostly because they don’t matter in these disciplines, it seems. [For instance, in my year CMU accepted FOUR Swatties to do CS PhD in a class that has maybe 20 students. Yale doesn’t do that.]

However, if you’re not sure that you want to do PhD, and think that working at JPMorgan, Goldman, BCG, is something you might want to do after college, doing that is much easier coming from Yale than it is from Swarthmore. Yalies have the advantage that the Yale name will usually get them an interview that the Swarthmore name just won’t. Also these firms actively recruit at Yale, whereas they don’t at Swarthmore (which is just fine for Swatties, because very few students want to work there).

Bottom line, perhaps, for disciplines in category III, you should choose whichever school you like better and forget about prestige (seriously), because you’ll probably have a more interesting time at Swarthmore (liberal arts college, especially Swarthmore, is more socially & intellectually “interesting” than University, in general, I think) than at Yale. Swat is a big name in academia, and you can hold your head high coming from Swat in PhD. If you’re in category II, you should probably go to Yale. If you’re in category I, Yale prestige actually matters and you should go to Yale.