Changes in LACs

[Anonymous]

I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

Both mudd and swarthmore hardly have that many engineering majors compared to cs or math.

At Swarthmore, Engineering was the most popular major last year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

Wesleyan is way too left compared to the 5Cs? People with no real connection to the school regurgitate this stereotype but this hasn’t been my family’s experience. I don’t find it to be far to the left of many of its NESCAC peers, save maybe Williams. And the presence of CMC does not turn the 5Cs into U Chicago. Many of the other schools are just as if not more left leaning than Wes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

Way too behind. Starting a school in engineering right now is completely useless- you can never have enough faculty for specialities nor get the research funding/grants that top universities and state schools have. Both mudd and swarthmore hardly have that many engineering majors compared to cs or math. LACs have a niche, and that niche is served well. For every lac, you run the issue that there a finite amount of lab space and research funding you can spend on STEM.

I don’t get people on dcum. They’re hellbent on every lac just becoming a research university. It’s okay to decide against an LAC and go on with life.

It’s funny. I was going to say that I don’t get the people on DCUM who jump on threads about LACs to tell people the LACs are inferior. Not everyone wants to go to Purdue or whatever, and kids do choose LACs to pursue stem fields. To your point it is their choice and there’s no need to “well actually” them. Feel free to start another thread about how awesome R1 engineering programs are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

Wes also quietly has far more applicants per year than basically all of the other schools named so it doesn’t seem to have a problem with interest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

-1
CS is dying and prospective engineers have many tech schools from which to choose. No need to water down the LAC experience to appeal to them.

[Anonymous]

Davidson has a ton of money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

-1
CS is dying and prospective engineers have many tech schools from which to choose. No need to water down the LAC experience to appeal to them.

Great recent Goldman Sachs podcast on CS jobs dying and students needing to pivot to “liberal arts” backgrounds.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pomona
Claremont McKenna
Wesleyan
Vassar
Haverford
are the schools I see on the rise right now. Wesleyan has invested a ton into new campus resources that go understated on DCUM. Vassar's rank has shot up, and it has improved its financial aid. Haverford will hopefully reel in since its days when its rigor was seen as on the level or even harder than Swarthmore.

Wesleyan's endowment will be subject to tax.

It has a total of 3,253 students, including undergraduate and graduate students. Specifically, there are 3,069 undergraduate students and 184 graduate students.

It's for 3000+ tuition paying students. If Wes gives more students aid or admits more Pell grant students, they'll fall below the 3000 threshold and not pay the extra tax. Better they use it on needy students, and not just give to government.

It's silly. Wesleyan is a LAC. They need to give more aid to needy students but Williams and Amherst do not? The Williams endowment per student is three times that of Wesleyan. It's over 1.4 million per student. Talk about ability to help needy students.

This tax is just some kind of arbitrary garbage.

Why should Williams pay the tax?

They're hoarding wealth.

In what way? They use a significant endowment withdraw to support the institution. Many sources point to it having the best financial aid program in the country.

Williams does great financial aid. As to many of the institutions that are on that endowment tax list. Most of them are all in the top rated lists in terms of generosity of financial aid. Yet some are singled out for a big tax raise and some are not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

Both mudd and swarthmore hardly have that many engineering majors compared to cs or math.

At Swarthmore, Engineering was the most popular major last year.

I seriously doubt this when just 3 years ago economics had 3 times the amount of grads as engineering: https://www.swarthmore.edu/sites/default/files/assets/documents/institutional-research/Swarthmore%20Gradstats%202022.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

Wes also quietly has far more applicants per year than basically all of the other schools named so it doesn’t seem to have a problem with interest.

Wes is a much bigger university.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more LACs need to strengthen in engineering and CS in order to rise in popularity.

Harvey Mudd is well positioned to rise. And other STEM-oriented LACs like Carleton. Swarthmore too. Wes is also strong in STEM.

Way too behind. Starting a school in engineering right now is completely useless- you can never have enough faculty for specialities nor get the research funding/grants that top universities and state schools have. Both mudd and swarthmore hardly have that many engineering majors compared to cs or math. LACs have a niche, and that niche is served well. For every lac, you run the issue that there a finite amount of lab space and research funding you can spend on STEM.

I don’t get people on dcum. They’re hellbent on every lac just becoming a research university. It’s okay to decide against an LAC and go on with life.

It’s funny. I was going to say that I don’t get the people on DCUM who jump on threads about LACs to tell people the LACs are inferior. Not everyone wants to go to Purdue or whatever, and kids do choose LACs to pursue stem fields. To your point it is their choice and there’s no need to “well actually” them. Feel free to start another thread about how awesome R1 engineering programs are.

+1.
R1 engineering programs are so packed that getting a hands-on opportunity for a new student is really hard. There is a very big hierarchy to cross to get a seat at the table. At Mudd, my freshman DC was able to work on building a hybrid-electric car from scratch alongside his upperclassmen. He chose Mudd over the more renowned R1 engineering schools after getting admitted. This is such a big plus for Mudd students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

Wesleyan is way too left compared to the 5Cs? People with no real connection to the school regurgitate this stereotype but this hasn’t been my family’s experience. I don’t find it to be far to the left of many of its NESCAC peers, save maybe Williams. And the presence of CMC does not turn the 5Cs into U Chicago. Many of the other schools are just as if not more left leaning than Wes.

The 5Cs have Claremont McKenna and literally arrested/expelled their protestors. Much more moderate than most lacs. They also aren’t scared of conservatives on campus: https://www.cmc.edu/athenaeum/end-race-politics-arguments-colorblind-america and https://www.cmc.edu/athenaeum/disagree-better-2024-dreier-roundtable-civility-award.

They have faculty at the Claremont institute, a conservative blog shared by all the 5Cs known as the Claremont Independent, and appear much more open to conservative thought than most other LACs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I expect a notable rise in Washington & Lee, Davidson and the 5Cs. I don’t see it at Wesleyan — it’s too far left for a lot of kids but a great school.

What a random 3 schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A majority of LACs will not experience the endowment tax and have not experienced many research cuts from the government. They seem like they could gain a bit of popularity if they invest in student experience. What LACs do you see rising/have continued to rise? For example, some people think Pomona is Williams and Amherst level, which is REALLY surprising, since it was a party school for dolts when I was applying to college!

How old are you? I applied to college in 1995 and it was a desirable school then for smart kids.

Same. I was a CA kid and Pomona was right there with Berkeley and UCLA when I graduated in 1994. It has pretty consistently been within the top 5 on USWNR while generally having the lowest acceptance rate among LACs for the past two decades. When people say that Pomona has had a recent rise, I assume those people are old as dirt.