Telling between LAC and University Science
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Anonymous
| DC is very interested in neuroscience and is hoping to go to grad school for computational neuroscience, but we really aren't sure how to weigh one neuroscience department over another one. She has a preference for "liberal arts colleges," but I have been underwhelmed and have not found one that has a robust neuroscience department, nor has faculty with the resource she might want compared to a university. I was wondering if anyone knew what the best LACs for neuro are. She's looking at colleges like Pomona, Amherst, and Bryn mawr. Any experience with Liberal arts college neuro? |
Anonymous
| Wesleyan |
Anonymous
| Johns Hopkins is phenomenal for neuro. |
Anonymous
| Amherst has the oldest neuroscience department in the country and a pretty well-established program. I would recommend that she attempt to figure out how to get ahold of some upperclassmen who are studying neuroscience at each school—they can give helpful pointers. Maybe the admissions departments can help? |
Anonymous
| Niece does Neuro at Bates and had an exceptional experience. Highly recommend their dept. |
Anonymous
| Liberal arts colleges are for the liberal arts...it's in the name. She should attend a respectable university if she doesn't want to read about "Poetry of the Brain" for four years. |
Anonymous
You clearly know nothing about liberal arts colleges and should just keep your mouth shut. Many LACs are top producers, per capita, of science PhDs. |
Anonymous
DP, Looking through their faculty page and they hardly have any faculty in neuro. For fall 2024, there's only 5 courses in Neuro, hardly a good department for a budding researcher. Also, very psych based. |
Anonymous
| Like PP said, Amherst neuro is historic and good! I also think your daughter's interest in Pomona is a good idea, since she will get the Consortium faculty and resources (Scripps-Pitzer have their own science center with 11 affiliated faculty and they're hiring for their new expansion, CMC has a separate pysch department and the new science department they are building has 6 faculty that can add to Neuro courses and they're hiring a new one!). You should also consider adding Carleton and Swarthmore, who are known for their rigorous, high quality Biology departments. |
Anonymous
None of the LACs are top producers of science PhDs, you must be joking?! |
Anonymous
DP: Per capita, LACs produce high numbers of students who go on to STEM PhDs. As for neuroscience--if your DD is going on to grad school I would do biology-psych double major or biology major/psych minor with a focus on the neuroscience courses. There's often more respect for biology undergrad than neuroscience undergrad in a lot of programs. |
Anonymous
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From the National Science Foundation, the top 50 PhD-producing schools for science and engineering (per 100 undergrad degrees granted), in order
Cal Tech Harvey Mudd College MIT Reed College Swarthmore College Carleton College University of Chicago Grinnell College Rice University Princeton University Harvard University Bryn Mawr College Haverford College Pomona College New Mexico Institute of Mining & Technology Williams College Yale Univeristy Oberlin College Stanford University Johns Hopkins University Kalamazoo College Cornell University Case Western Reserve Washington College Brown University Wesleyan University Carnegie Mellon University Macalester College Amherst College Duke University Beloit College Bowdoin Collge Wellesley College Ressenlaer Polytechnic Institute Earlham College Franklin and Marshall College Lawrence University University of Rochester University of California-Berkeley Dartmouth College Occidental College Hendrix College Vassar College Trinity University College of William and Mary St. John College Bates College Whitman College Brandeis University Hampshire College |
Anonymous
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There are almost no jobs in neuroscience.
Lots of kids want to study it but the pay is awful and there are few jobs. |
Anonymous
| If she wants to study neuroscience in graduate school, understand that neuroscience grad students come from many undergraduate majors. Some of the most common are psychology, chemistry and biology. She doesn't have to attend a school that offers a "neuroscience" undergrad degree to pursue it in graduate school. |
Anonymous
Thanks for this. There are so many blowhards on this board who don't understand what liberal arts colleges are — or that the liberal arts include life science (biology, neuroscience) and physical science (physics, astronomy, chemistry, and earth science). |