Carleton vs Macalester

[Anonymous]

Carleton has always been harder to get into and "more intellectual." We toured both last summer and couldn't wait to get off campus at Carleton though bc it just felt too remote and navel-gazing. Macalester is more scrappy which I think translates to them trying harder to give students a good experience. I would actually consider them pretty different schools (within the SLAC rubric). and Macalester's facilities were way better/ nicer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Carleton has always been harder to get into and "more intellectual." We toured both last summer and couldn't wait to get off campus at Carleton though bc it just felt too remote and navel-gazing. Macalester is more scrappy which I think translates to them trying harder to give students a good experience. I would actually consider them pretty different schools (within the SLAC rubric). and Macalester's facilities were way better/ nicer. [/quote

]FWIW, DH hated his experience at Carleton because of its insularity and SJW environment. He won't give a penny to the school, but YRMV

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Carleton has always been harder to get into and "more intellectual." We toured both last summer and couldn't wait to get off campus at Carleton though bc it just felt too remote and navel-gazing. Macalester is more scrappy which I think translates to them trying harder to give students a good experience. I would actually consider them pretty different schools (within the SLAC rubric). and Macalester's facilities were way better/ nicer. [/quote

]FWIW, DH hated his experience at Carleton because of its insularity and SJW environment. He won't give a penny to the school, but YRMV

It is YMMV for “your mileage might vary.” You’ve written it wrong twice so thought you might like to know.

[Anonymous]

My DC got into both and really liked them both. He chose Carleton because ultimately it just spoke to him in a way no other school did, but he had nothing bad to say about Mac.

[Anonymous]

Is Macalaster a Scotch and Carleton an Irish Whisky?

Asking for a friend who thinks both are a waste of DCUM money $$$.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is Macalaster a Scotch and Carleton an Irish Whisky?

Asking for a friend who thinks both are a waste of DCUM money $$$.

There is nothing I'd rather spend my money on than an excellent liberal arts education, but then I've got it to spend because I make a good living and don't blow my money on random crap.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Better alternatives:

Baby Yoda is my kindred spirit.
Pistachio ice cream is my raison d’être.
I’ve flipped over that movie; it is my new BFF.
That piano-playing cat is my daemon.

I know I’d feel I strange by someone making beautiful Torah and yarmulke dresses, but the problem with the war on cultural appropriation is that everything we do is appropriated.

“Kindred spirit” is Old English. I’m a non-English Jew, so I’m appropriating that, and all of English.

“Raison d’etre” is from French philosophers. I don’t even know how to type the right kind of E to spell it properly.

“BFF” would be me appropriating a phrase from people who are much you get than me but older than my son.

“Daemon” is an appropriation from the ancient Greek religion. Maybe that appropriation would be as offensive to a follower of Zeus as use if “spirit animal” is to a Native American.

And do all Native American religions have spirit animals, or just some? I’m trying to look into that question quickly, and people accusing users of the term of cultural appropriation seem to be lumping a lot of Native American religions together; failing to acknowledge that Western European people’s have old spirit animal traditions; and assuming as a given that the Celtic and Norse traditions are all white Americans’ standard traditions.

Maybe I’d draw the line at strange, poorly researched uses of objects that people think of as sacred. I don’t want to see crucifixes see as coat racks, for example. But I think we should be pretty forgiving about appropriations of, and transformations of, words and ideas. Otherwise, how can most of us justify using English? I have no cultural right to say “goodbye” or do things on Woden’s day, but no one living person in my family has used Yiddish as a living language. I have to culturally appropriate to communicate anything more complicated than hunger and thirst.

[Anonymous]

Mac has had big problems with attracting students recently. Not shutter why, but acceptance rate has climbed. And without their steady supply of foreign students, will be interesting to see how high the acceptance rate goes. We visited with DC last year and liked it, but seemed like a less safe investment than some other better known SLACs of similar quality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mac has had big problems with attracting students recently. Not shutter why, but acceptance rate has climbed. And without their steady supply of foreign students, will be interesting to see how high the acceptance rate goes. We visited with DC last year and liked it, but seemed like a less safe investment than some other better known SLACs of similar quality.

The above statement is factually inaccurate. The Mac rates have declined. In 2020, rates were approximately 32-33%. Rates slowly declined to about 27% overall (taking into account the early admission rate). According to our acceptance rate, there was a slightly smaller applicant pool for 2025 than in 2024, and Mac also accepted a slightly smaller group of kids, leaving the acceptance rate overall about a percentage point lower than the year before.

To the OP: what did your child decide?

We loved both schools.





What struck us about both schools (and perhaps should not have been a surprise) is that the people are decidedly not Northeast. When we visited NE schools, parents attended all sporting events, it was very country club culture (my kid's words). We felt like the midwestern skills would let our kid be a kid and find her own way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See how nice people are when discussing these schools? This is not typical of DCUM. This should tell you something about Midwesterners.

I’m a Midwesterner & my spirit animal is sticking my head out of the window of my F-150 and regurgitating an Egg McMuffin at the thought of a grown-ass adult asking me what my spirit animal is.

[Anonymous]

My DC is really happy at Carleton. It’s a rigorous school, as rigorous as U Chicago, not “U Chicago light” as a previous poster wrote, where students don’t take themselves too seriously and are more collaborative than cutthroat. The teaching is phenomenal—Carleton has been recognized as having the best undergraduate teaching for 14 years straight. Carleton is similar to Swarthmore whereas Macalester is similar to Bates or Hamilton if that makes sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mac has had big problems with attracting students recently. Not shutter why, but acceptance rate has climbed. And without their steady supply of foreign students, will be interesting to see how high the acceptance rate goes. We visited with DC last year and liked it, but seemed like a less safe investment than some other better known SLACs of similar quality.

The above statement is factually inaccurate. The Mac rates have declined. In 2020, rates were approximately 32-33%. Rates slowly declined to about 27% overall (taking into account the early admission rate). According to our acceptance rate, there was a slightly smaller applicant pool for 2025 than in 2024, and Mac also accepted a slightly smaller group of kids, leaving the acceptance rate overall about a percentage point lower than the year before.

To the OP: what did your child decide?

We loved both schools.





What struck us about both schools (and perhaps should not have been a surprise) is that the people are decidedly not Northeast. When we visited NE schools, parents attended all sporting events, it was very country club culture (my kid's words). We felt like the midwestern skills would let our kid be a kid and find her own way.

You are responding to a post that is five years old.

[Anonymous]

Between those two, I actually would pick St Olaf College.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Carleton is located in Northfield about 45min to an hour outside of MSP. Macalester is located in the city. In terms of FA, Carleton is need based only (at least it was in 2016 when we toured) so that put it out of the running for us. Hard to describe, but I found Mac to be 'nicer' the faculty and staff we interacted with were very nice and warm. My son found some of the Carleton stuff off-putting (introduce yourself as your spirit animal for example).

spirit animal lol!!

look, that aside -- they are both great schools -- it's a wonderful situation to be in

Okay, totally weird.

Completely weird and oddly juvenile. These people are looking for a college, right? Not a kindergarten class?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Carleton has always been harder to get into and "more intellectual." We toured both last summer and couldn't wait to get off campus at Carleton though bc it just felt too remote and navel-gazing. Macalester is more scrappy which I think translates to them trying harder to give students a good experience. I would actually consider them pretty different schools (within the SLAC rubric). and Macalester's facilities were way better/ nicer.

What does "intellectual" mean exactly?