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[quote=Anonymous]My DS was very close to going to Swarthmore but ultimately chose Pomona.

In my mind, Swat and Pomona are closely related. In comparison to Williams and Amherst, Swat and Pomona are slightly more academic, intellectual, and socially conscious. Williams and Amherst are slightly more preprofessional, athletics-dominated, and traditional. I say "slightly" because there are all kinds of students at each school. S and P sent loads of students to Wall Street, law school, etc. and W and A are extremely well represented in PhD programs. All four schools have amazing financial aid that runs deeper into the upper ends of the middle class than most schools. You should run the NPC.

Swat has a reputation for intensity. But a more positive spin on that is that students are genuinely passionate about what they study. Pomona and Swat have an exchange program and the general consensus seems to be the two schools have an equivalent workload but that Pomona students approach it with a more laidback attitude. Some people on DCUM will conflate Swat's rigor with competition, but I've never heard any Swattie corroborate that. While there's no doubt that Swat is rigorous, students appear to be very collaborative and non-competitive with one another. Swat is definitely not a party school, but the claims that its students are miserable is horses**t. Swatties have fun and are mostly normal kids. The vast majority of Swat alums, like the one above, seem very satisfied with their experience. But, like most SLACs, there will always be a few who wish they had gone to a bigger, more socially active school.

What DS liked about Swat: The students are diverse and very interesting. The access to Philly from campus is convenient. Similarly, NYC and DC aren't too far away. The campus is beautiful. The academics are as good as it gets. The resources and opportunities are amazing. The Quaker principles of egalitarianism and equality are actively applied on campus.

DS's reservations about Swat: It's a very small school and it didn't seem like many Swatties take advantage of their ability to take classes at Haverford, Bryn Mawr, or Penn. The immediate town of Swarthmore is tiny and suburban. (Williamstown may have more to offer than Swarthmore.) While the misery reputation is overstated, Swat seemed less social than Pomona.

Why DS chose Pomona: The reservations above weren't dealbreakers. But, in the end, DS concluded that Pomona offered most things that Swat does but has the additional benefits of the 5C Consortium (a greater community of 6k-ish undergrads), warm weather, and a more laidback attitude. He is very happy at Pomona, but I reckon he'd also be happy at Swat.[/quote]

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