Why is DCUM so obsessed with small liberal arts colleges?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SLAC:

Stupid Lighting Ablaze of Cash

That’s just dumb. Try again

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SLAC:

Stupid Lighting Ablaze of Cash

Good thing I have an obscene amount of it then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SLAC:

Stupid Lighting Ablaze of Cash

What is your problem? Did a SLAC destroy your family's village centuries ago?

More like burned the bridge it was living under.

[Anonymous]

I find the opposite to be true. DCUM has a hatred of small liberal arts colleges. I don’t know why people care where other people’s kids to go to college. But as a household where my DH and I went to very good state schools, not the same one, we both would have preferred the SLAC education and experience our DD had. We both felt like #s in our respective universities and it was rare to have a professor who showed any interest in us. Many were more interested in their latest book or research. Our DD had engaged and interested professors, fabulous internship and leadership opportunities, and multiple job offers upon graduation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I find the opposite to be true. DCUM has a hatred of small liberal arts colleges. I don’t know why people care where other people’s kids to go to college. But as a household where my DH and I went to very good state schools, not the same one, we both would have preferred the SLAC education and experience our DD had. We both felt like #s in our respective universities and it was rare to have a professor who showed any interest in us. Many were more interested in their latest book or research. Our DD had engaged and interested professors, fabulous internship and leadership opportunities, and multiple job offers upon graduation.

Seems like the anti SLAC people are the ones who are obsessed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The earnings in that link don't look dismal. What are you seeing?

OP here, Grinnell’s average salary ten years out from graduation is around $77K which is quite concerning. Same thing with Skidmore and other selective, but not too selective, LACs.

Uh... how many of those alumni are living and working in the Midwest? $77,000 in the Iowa or Missouri is about the same as $143,000 in DC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My private school kid, who has worked hard but not done well, will likely only have SLACs as his choice. Already deferred at one state university and will likely get rejected from the other three he's applying to. Our local pressure cooker privates have a direct line to the SLACs for the bottom of the class kids who can't get into the large universities. For my kid with a severe executive function disorder, he would have a difficult time navigating a large state university anyway. Though I have no stress about him navigating life once he graduates. He's smarter than 99% of the world.

Do SLAC’s really provide that level of coddling? I mean what specifically are SLAC’s doing that make it so much easier for students to navigate the system?

Not sure if this is coddling but a friend of mine who went to Wisconsin had stories of having to camp out overnight in the middle of winter to keep her place in line for class registration. It was the only way she could be assured to get into the classes she wanted/needed. At my SLAC you lined up 10 minutes ahead of registration and rarely were you shut out of a class.
Another example: my senior year I got sick and had to miss two sessions of a class. I forgot to tell my prof so he thought I was being negligent about attendance. We chatted for a while and cleared it up. I doubt that would happen at a big state school.

At our SLAC a group of four of us met with the head of the department and submitted a proposal for a course we wanted them to offer that wasn't in the catalog. They created the course for us.

Yeah, you can do that at a large school too.

OP here, these opportunities occur at state schools as well. My daughter did something similar with a friend at Berkeley. It’s actually pretty common there for students to design their own courses (google DCAL if you’re curious). Just goes to show SLACs don’t have a monopoly on these sorts of things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My private school kid, who has worked hard but not done well, will likely only have SLACs as his choice. Already deferred at one state university and will likely get rejected from the other three he's applying to. Our local pressure cooker privates have a direct line to the SLACs for the bottom of the class kids who can't get into the large universities. For my kid with a severe executive function disorder, he would have a difficult time navigating a large state university anyway. Though I have no stress about him navigating life once he graduates. He's smarter than 99% of the world.

Do SLAC’s really provide that level of coddling? I mean what specifically are SLAC’s doing that make it so much easier for students to navigate the system?

Agree. This coddling sounds like middle school. How do these kids make it in real life?

OP here, that’s exactly what baffles me about the response on this thread. Individual this, personalized attention that; you can find these at state schools too if you seek them out, but no one serves them to you on a silver spoon. You have to be a go-getter. And being a go-getter is much more emotionally healthy for kids in the long run than coddling them from 18-22. How do these graduates even function in companies? No wonder so many of them are shoehorned into the ivory tower as adjunct lecturers are what not. Honestly sad that their parents would *encourage* that sort of decision. Listen up SLAC parents: if your kids don’t have the executive function skills to cut it at a state school or a large/medium-sized private (like an Ivy), they’re probably not ready for college at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My private school kid, who has worked hard but not done well, will likely only have SLACs as his choice. Already deferred at one state university and will likely get rejected from the other three he's applying to. Our local pressure cooker privates have a direct line to the SLACs for the bottom of the class kids who can't get into the large universities. For my kid with a severe executive function disorder, he would have a difficult time navigating a large state university anyway. Though I have no stress about him navigating life once he graduates. He's smarter than 99% of the world.

Do SLAC’s really provide that level of coddling? I mean what specifically are SLAC’s doing that make it so much easier for students to navigate the system?

Not sure if this is coddling but a friend of mine who went to Wisconsin had stories of having to camp out overnight in the middle of winter to keep her place in line for class registration. It was the only way she could be assured to get into the classes she wanted/needed. At my SLAC you lined up 10 minutes ahead of registration and rarely were you shut out of a class.
Another example: my senior year I got sick and had to miss two sessions of a class. I forgot to tell my prof so he thought I was being negligent about attendance. We chatted for a while and cleared it up. I doubt that would happen at a big state school.

At our SLAC a group of four of us met with the head of the department and submitted a proposal for a course we wanted them to offer that wasn't in the catalog. They created the course for us.

Yeah, you can do that at a large school too.

OP here, these opportunities occur at state schools as well. My daughter did something similar with a friend at Berkeley. It’s actually pretty common there for students to design their own courses (google DCAL if you’re curious). Just goes to show SLACs don’t have a monopoly on these sorts of things.

No snark intended OP, but seriously, why do you care so much? Not all kids want a big school. Not all kids want a state school. Not all kids want urban or rural, etc. There is a school out there for everyone. People make different choices in every aspect of life. No one choice is right for everyone. Life would be boring if everyone chose the same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who wants to pay to have their kid be a number in giant lecture halls?

It takes a somewhat smart & mature kid to make it through large lecture halls. You are not doing your young adult any favors by trying to shelter them. They will fail in real life if you do.

Because sitting in a lecture hall and not asking questions or venturing your opinion is good preparation for the work world? Hmmm . . .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not everyone wants to go to a large state school.

Well then go to a small state school. There’s plenty of those as well

Why do you care if a person chooses to go to a small private college? What’s it to you?

If we all just accepted the different strokes for different folks rule of living a good life, 90% of the threads on DCUM would disappear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who wants to pay to have their kid be a number in giant lecture halls?

It takes a somewhat smart & mature kid to make it through large lecture halls. You are not doing your young adult any favors by trying to shelter them. They will fail in real life if you do.

Because sitting in a lecture hall and not asking questions or venturing your opinion is good preparation for the work world? Hmmm . . .

Because being in a ridiculously coddled environment with everything handed to you is good preparation for the work world? Hmmm....

[Anonymous]

It’s the private school/ public school debate revisited. If you can’t afford it it must be awful. Such children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My private school kid, who has worked hard but not done well, will likely only have SLACs as his choice. Already deferred at one state university and will likely get rejected from the other three he's applying to. Our local pressure cooker privates have a direct line to the SLACs for the bottom of the class kids who can't get into the large universities. For my kid with a severe executive function disorder, he would have a difficult time navigating a large state university anyway. Though I have no stress about him navigating life once he graduates. He's smarter than 99% of the world.

Do SLAC’s really provide that level of coddling? I mean what specifically are SLAC’s doing that make it so much easier for students to navigate the system?

Agree. This coddling sounds like middle school. How do these kids make it in real life?

OP here, that’s exactly what baffles me about the response on this thread. Individual this, personalized attention that; you can find these at state schools too if you seek them out, but no one serves them to you on a silver spoon. You have to be a go-getter. And being a go-getter is much more emotionally healthy for kids in the long run than coddling them from 18-22. How do these graduates even function in companies? No wonder so many of them are shoehorned into the ivory tower as adjunct lecturers are what not. Honestly sad that their parents would *encourage* that sort of decision. Listen up SLAC parents: if your kids don’t have the executive function skills to cut it at a state school or a large/medium-sized private (like an Ivy), they’re probably not ready for college at all.

How are you an authority on this?
I'm a professor at an R1 university, and there are many, many kids who do not manage to graduate from larger universities. They don't make it. They don't get the help they need, and they never manage to stick around long enough to find out if they could "cut it." And, frankly, there are a lot of kids who skate through larger universities who can't cut it in the real world because they've only had to show up for a final exam.
Also, check out the average graduation rates at large state schools vs SLACs, which even out perform private universities. There's a lot of growth that happens between the 18 year old that arrives on campus for the first time and the 22 year old who leaves.
I find the animosity towards SLACs so odd. There are a ton of people on these boards who are just so incredibly insecure when they learn about SLACs as an option for college, and then feel the need to lecture parents about why SLACs coddle students or why state schools are better. This despite the fact that study after study shows that SLACs offer superior outcomes for their graduates in terms of continuing onto graduate school, long-term earning potential, and winners of major prizes. I can only guess the disdain for SLACs is an extension of feeling left behind or having grown up in a community that was excluded from the socio-economic circles that consider sending their children to SLACs. Instead of feeling so bitter and trying desperately (embarrassingly) to put down SLACs, why don't you just accept them? DCUM offers a plethora of information and insight into the circles that do send their children to SLACs. No need to lash out. No one is forcing you to send your kid to a SLAC, but now that you know about them and their benefits, why not feel glad that you know about them and can consider them as an option?

[Anonymous]

For those who think SLACs are a waste of money and do not prepare students for the real world, I would encourage you to encourage your children not to attend a SLAC. If you think the SLAC graduates are unable to function in high-income jobs, I would think you'd be thrilled that there's less competition for your children when they're job hunting or being recruited. As so many of posters have said, why do you care how other people choose to spend their money?!