Most intellectual colleges?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What about Oberlin? William & Mary?

We are also looking for a school with an intellectual bent but not a pressure cooker. Is there such a thing?

Having a child at Oberlin I’d say it’s very much an intellectual place where students love to learn, without being a pressure cooker. One example is their ExCo program where many students offer courses for fellow students just for the pleasure of sharing ideas. My child took several cool classes (in addition to a regular course load) as a freshman and then co-taught a class sophomore year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I felt that most people I knew at Middlebury loved learning and supporting their peers.

Perhaps 2-3 decades ago.

Certainly not now.

OP, are you open to going abroad?

I was there one decade ago. Is your certainty based on anything?

Multiple disgusting and anti-intellectual incidents in the last 5 years.

Perpetrated by how many Middlebury students?

Way too many

I take it you’re a conservative who’s butthurt about recent protests. (I have zero connection to Middlebury.)

NP- not conservative and wouldn’t not have kid apply to Midd on the basis of referenced events. Am concerned about increasingly viewing everything as for or against, right or wrong, especially in academia. What’s now on Facebook has been in academia for the last 8 plus years. It’s a terrifyingly closed mindset.

This is 100% false, and it’s a message amplified by the rightwing press. Do you watch Fox? Read the WSJ? Consume other pieces of the Murdoch press?

Universities are a largely tolerant place, and if anything conservatives get special status exceeding the quality of their ideas by virtue of donor funding of speakers and campus orgs.

Anyone who believes universities are mean to conservatives has been hoodwinked by the rightwing press, and by grifters and liars like Jordan Peterson.
In actual reality, universities are filled with smart people who realize conservative “ideas” are flimsy cover over an ideological agenda designed to benefit billionaires and hurt average Americans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about Oberlin? William & Mary?

We are also looking for a school with an intellectual bent but not a pressure cooker. Is there such a thing?

Having a child at Oberlin I’d say it’s very much an intellectual place where students love to learn, without being a pressure cooker. One example is their ExCo program where many students offer courses for fellow students just for the pleasure of sharing ideas. My child took several cool classes (in addition to a regular course load) as a freshman and then co-taught a class sophomore year.

+1.

Just check out the number of Nobels, Rhodes, Truman’s, Marshall’s, Fulbright’s, MacArthurs, Grammys, Emmys...

[Anonymous]

UVA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are schools where students are the most excited about learning for the sake of learning?

Are you contrasting that with schools where people are most excited about learning for the sake of preparing themselves for a successful career, or do you mean something else? I have a business degree and an engineering degree, so I don't have any familiarity with this "learning for the sake of learning" concept. All of us were just trying to get jobs.

Do you have a passion for something like arts and music with no consideration for remuneration, to play at a club or a bookstore for all the books you can read? That’s music for music’s sake. Or Gregory Perelman, who declined the $1 million prize for proving the Poincaré conjecture. Or Jean-Paul Sartre who declined the Nobel Prize in literature.

Not really the OP topic, but would you have gotten those particular degrees if you didn't have some love, at least like, for the subjects? I can't imagine doing the work and the studying if the learning itself was not in some way rewarding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

For undergrads, top foreign schools are certainly more intellectually demanding than US ones.

And the reason is that SJWs have taken over here with their bias, ignorance and bullying, which often prevents actual learning and growth.

I'd never in a million years send my kids to Oberlin or Midd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are schools where students are the most excited about learning for the sake of learning?

Are you contrasting that with schools where people are most excited about learning for the sake of preparing themselves for a successful career, or do you mean something else? I have a business degree and an engineering degree, so I don't have any familiarity with this "learning for the sake of learning" concept. All of us were just trying to get jobs.

Do you have a passion for something like arts and music with no consideration for remuneration, to play at a club or a bookstore for all the books you can read? That’s music for music’s sake. Or Gregory Perelman, who declined the $1 million prize for proving the Poincaré conjecture. Or Jean-Paul Sartre who declined the Nobel Prize in literature.

Not really the OP topic, but would you have gotten those particular degrees if you didn't have some love, at least like, for the subjects? I can't imagine doing the work and the studying if the learning itself was not in some way rewarding.

Probably 1-2% of the population truly love what they do. I am sure most people actually enjoy their work but I think mostly they are there because their their paycheck is there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

For undergrads, top foreign schools are certainly more intellectually demanding than US ones.

And the reason is that SJWs have taken over here with their bias, ignorance and bullying, which often prevents actual learning and growth.

I'd never in a million years send my kids to Oberlin or Midd.

OP’s question is intellectually challenging colleges, not whether you would send your kids there, whether your kids have the chops to get in there, whether you can afford the tuition there, whether your kids would “fit” in there...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wesleyan in CT

+1 for Wesleyan

Re: comments on SJW activity at SLACs. It’s not new. Back in the 90’s at Wes we called it “being PC.” I had a hard time with it back then, but it made me think. Intellectual debates happened at meals & in dorms, there was room to process, and I came to my own conclusions - which were sometimes different than the party line.

Fast forward 20-25 years, and I work with a fair number of younger colleagues. My older and contemporaneous colleagues who went to more “hard-core” technical schools complain that they don’t understand the younger crew, but I think that all of the SJW-style activity back in the day at Wes has been a great help in relating to & understanding my reports & mentees. My boss jokes that I am a “millennial-to-boomer translator.”

The saying “Everything old is new again” is often accurate. Overall, I think that it was good for me to hash out PC/SJW issues in my 20’s in an intellectually stimulating environment, as I am less likely to be flummoxed by the behavior of “kids these days” in my mid-late 40s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UVA

Not to say it is anti-intellectual or the kids aren't engaged, but this is not how I think of UVA. I think of Chicago, Reed, Swarthmore, Harvey Mudd. LACs are probably more in this mold.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

The U.S. university "system" is a runaway train wreck of student debt, poor completion rates, administrative bloat, and costs that are far above any other system in the world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

The U.S. university "system" is a runaway train wreck of student debt, poor completion rates, administrative bloat, and costs that are far above any other system in the world.

I just don’t think of Chicago in the same league as Oxford. Or even HYPS. It’s a notch above UVA or UCBerkeley.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

For undergrads, top foreign schools are certainly more intellectually demanding than US ones.

And the reason is that SJWs have taken over here with their bias, ignorance and bullying, which often prevents actual learning and growth.

I'd never in a million years send my kids to Oberlin or Midd.

OP’s question is intellectually challenging colleges, not whether you would send your kids there, whether your kids have the chops to get in there, whether you can afford the tuition there, whether your kids would “fit” in there...

Look up the recent trial against Oberlin.

Do you see much intellectual rigor among Oberlin administrators and faculty?

I see a bunch of bullies who have forgotten what intellectual rigor means.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Chicago and also Oxford. My DC just spent a year there and it was a truly unique intellectual experience all around - nothing like it in the states.

Get ready for more statements like this: that Oxford or other foreign universities are better than the US.

Republicans aim to destroy our university system, the best in the world and the driver of the US tech economy. And it’s working.

For undergrads, top foreign schools are certainly more intellectually demanding than US ones.

And the reason is that SJWs have taken over here with their bias, ignorance and bullying, which often prevents actual learning and growth.

I'd never in a million years send my kids to Oberlin or Midd.

OP’s question is intellectually challenging colleges, not whether you would send your kids there, whether your kids have the chops to get in there, whether you can afford the tuition there, whether your kids would “fit” in there...

Look up the recent trial against Oberlin.

Do you see much intellectual rigor among Oberlin administrators and faculty?

I see a bunch of bullies who have forgotten what intellectual rigor means.

If you are talking scandals, you there are other threads - u of md death scandal, Duke lacrosse scandal, Yale, Stanford admissions scandal... The list goes on and on... there’s a thread on McKenna, Midd, High Point...