“Colleges That Change Lives”
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Anonymous
. Again the average for private is over 50. Not 33. Many CTCL schools are no better than average private schools. Not special. Not life changing |
Anonymous
USNWR college ranking was a marketing ploy when it came out and is really the only thing that has kept the shell of USNWR going. |
Anonymous
So trolly PP pointed out that 33% is the average 4 year rate for public schools, so, sure, fair. For private schools it’s 53%. All but 5 of the private schools on this list are above it, and One of those five has a major continuing Ed program so isn’t even targeting students who you’d expect to graduate in 4 years anyway. And the remaining ‘below 50%’ school has 195 total students. So, even among private schools: impressive. And yes, UVA’s grad rates are high. I don’t think anyone here is knocking UVA or Harvard or Michigan or whatever. These are not peer schools for the CTCL. |
Anonymous
| I’m the “troll” who thinks that CTCL is baloney. The list above is not of every CTCL school and their graduation rate, it’s just a sample. I’m sure others are equally or almost as low. The point is that the schools are just not great. Collectively they are just a subset of average private schools that are marketing themselves together because they’re desperate. That’s it. It’s annoying that you people insist that they are special simply because they’re in some book. |
Anonymous
This idea that schools are better or worse than each other, rather than better or worse for a particular kid, is a problem. My kid struggled greatly in high school, it took him 5 years and he graduated by the skin of his teeth. A CTCL school is better for him, because it has a track record for helping kids like him turn their path around. Do they hit 100%, no, but I can guarantee that if I had a few spare millions and bought my kid's way onto the Harvard Z list his chances of graduating in 4 years would be zero. So, I'll take the sixty-something percent. |
Anonymous
The thing is, some schools ARE better than other schools. That’s the reality, snowflake. These schools are not among the best. |
Anonymous
They're a group of schools with things in common like small classes, forgiving admissions committees, and support for struggling kids, who have decided to join together to use their limited marketing budgets. They've come up with a label that describes their goal, which is to change trajectories for students. If your kid is already on a perfect trajectory, then these schools aren't for them, because they don't need this kind of change. But for kids who do need it, they are special places. Not more special or less special, but special. If that's not what you or your kid needs, great. I'm happy for you. But I have no idea why you think it's annoying when schools market themselves by describing themselves accurately, or when people who do benefit from this model recommend their schools to other people in similar situations. |
Anonymous
Benefit from what “model”? The model of small schools that no one’s ever heard of that are having trouble getting students to apply, enroll, and graduate? That a pretty common model. Not a special one. |
Anonymous
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New College of Florida is an honors college. There are no grades; instead, students receive lengthy and detailed reports and pass/fail. “Fails” do not show up on transcripts—a wonderful thing—because it frees up students to try courses they might otherwise be afraid to try. Students are required to write a Master’s level thesis and to orally defend it. When I went, kids were a bit like The Land of Misfit Toys. An odd, intellectually curious, interesting lot. We didn’t want to be at a “normal” college because New College spoke to us. Lots of people chose to take longer than 4 years to finish because they wanted to take more classes or wished to do more research for their thesis papers. Many people, like myself, have since gotten PhDs.
How did it change my life? Their evaluation system got me out of the straight-A frenzy I’d experienced in HS. Finally i could learn for the sake of learning and not some letter someone slapped on a piece of paper. I could take any class I was interested in without fear of failure and messing up a GPA. I got out of my comfort zone. It pushed my research skills, which led me to be extremely well-prepared for grad school. I’m not smart enough to win awards, but plenty of New College students and grads have. I won’t look up the stats and include them here, but if you’re interested you can easily find them. It’s not insignificant. I noticed that they recently received a grant from the Mellon Foundation. New College also has, I believe, a rather sizable endowment. It FOR SURE was not (and probably still is not) for everyone. It can be intense, socially as well as academically. It’s not small; it’s a tiny student body. There is no rah-rah college spirit in the traditional sense: no sports teams to cheer for, no Greek life, etc. When people ask where I went to college, I start with: “You haven’t heard of it, it’s called...” It most certainly is NOT for people who want instant school name recognition. This didn’t and does not mean anything to me. All of the quirks and oddities suited me just fine. It’s far from a perfect school, but it did change my life in significant ways. Other colleges would have as well, but not in these unique ways. |
Anonymous
+1. A lot of these schools have specialized, unique programs that don't appeal to many. But, by benefiting from the positive press generated from being on such a list, they're able to attract students, many of whom really benefit from their programs. It's win-win. There are thousands of colleges nationwide, and no one is arguing that these are top 25 USNWR schools, but they have some common positive features and there's really not much else to it. One of those features, not previously mentioned, is that some of these programs rank in the top 20 of all schools producing future PhDs. https://www.collegetransitions.com/infographics/top-feeders-phd-programs Reed, Allegheny, and Kalamazoo are all in the top 20 for all disciplines, and many of the other schools make appearances on the list for certain disciplines, including Earlham, St. Johns, Knox, Beloit, OWU, Whitman, Centre, Juniata, and Rhodes. Not bad for a bunch of schools targeting B students. The troll poster has really commandeered this thread, replying to every single post as if he/she has nothing better to do with his/her time than bother people talking about a group of 40 mostly small LACs targeting students who clearly are not his/her own children. I don't get it. |
Anonymous
| Public Ivies. Now that’s real. |
Anonymous
Exactly. |
Anonymous
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Doing a PhD is a terrible career decision that can easily run your life, particularly in the humanities and social sciences. The fact that LACs are PhD feeders is an anti-selling point in my book.
- Signed, humanities PhD |
Anonymous
Through all this back and forth and the attempts to try to make excuses for the average to poor performances of many CTCL schools, this is the main point. They’re not that special and many are especially poor no matter how you slice it. I am not arguing that all the schools are bad as there are some that are really doing well. But the whole idea of lumping them all together as so special when there are schools included with under 50% 6 year graduation rates is ridiculous. And there are SO many other similar non-CTCL schools with better results. If so many of these schools are struggling with finances, retention, graduation, and recruitment even WITH the benefit of the CTCL promotion, that should be a huge red flag to anyone considering one of the weaker schools. |
Anonymous
None of these types of comments speak to the OP’s question, though. S/he asked for personal experiences. I’m glad some were given here, but I’d love to see more. |