Anonymous wrote:other than williams most people I know haven't really heard of any of them unless they personally went there.

Anonymous wrote:other than williams most people I know haven't really heard of any of them unless they personally went there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For premed I would rather my DC go to LACs. Big Us have tons of resources, true. But the big U professors don't give a fxxk about their undergraduate students, or teaching undergraduate in general. This is generally okay if you are engineering major, getting a couple Cs and Ds here and there won't preclude you from getting a job. For premed, entirely another story. They love to weed you out at the introductory courses as the Big U can support all the premed-interested kids.

Unless you are 100% certain you will always be that top 10% kid, and never will have an exam on a sick day and getting an F. LACs are a better bet for parents' investment in the kid's medical career.

So at an LAC it is common to ask a professor to delay your exam because of illness?

Anonymous wrote:For premed I would rather my DC go to LACs. Big Us have tons of resources, true. But the big U professors don't give a fxxk about their undergraduate students, or teaching undergraduate in general. This is generally okay if you are engineering major, getting a couple Cs and Ds here and there won't preclude you from getting a job. For premed, entirely another story. They love to weed you out at the introductory courses as the Big U can support all the premed-interested kids.

Unless you are 100% certain you will always be that top 10% kid, and never will have an exam on a sick day and getting an F. LACs are a better bet for parents' investment in the kid's medical career.

Anonymous wrote:Williams mom here. My kid has tiny classes with lots of interactive discussions and essentially no one on their phones. More in class work and less use of AI. Teachers so clearly deeply invested in their undergrads and not focused entirely on grads and fellows and research. Lots of opportunities for research projects and lots of personalized guidance from staff. Public universities and even many ivies simply don't enjoy these benefits. Most grads head off to meaningful lives and lots of elite grad schools and careers. Williams grads are among the most loyal alum with a per student endowment in the top 5 in the nation.

There are many benefits of a small top LAC in today's world where AI, emotions isolation, and chronic phone use is a real problem.

Clearly tons of benefits of large schools too!

My daughter is also relieved not to be in a Trump state, as are we

She is so happy at Williams and the teaching quality is just outstanding

Anonymous wrote:They sit in that odd in-between where they're lesser-known by the general populace, but are incredibly overhyped by those in the know.

No one cares about your Williams or Amherst or Swarthmore, and they're slowly but surely becoming increasingly irrelevant in today's higher ed landscape.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They sit in that odd in-between where they're lesser-known by the general populace, but are incredibly overhyped by those in the know.

No one cares about your Williams or Amherst or Swarthmore, and they're slowly but surely becoming increasingly irrelevant in today's higher ed landscape.

I can only share my experience of having a kid who went to Grinnell. They became friends with faculty, received an education of unusual breadth and depth, explored several different disciplines, learned to thoughtfully consider and evaluate a wide spectrum of ideas, grew up immensely, became exponentially more articulate, got a fantastic research job straight out of school where their research skills and job performance led supervisors to say they wanted to hire more Grinnell grads, and got into a prestigious PhD program. More importantly, they became an extraordinarily kind and caring person. This was a kid who used to be a little abrasive. Would it have happened at a good public or large private research university? Perhaps, but I don't they'd have received the same level of nurture and adult attention, which I think drove intellectual, academic, personal, and professional growth. There are many great options out there. Sometimes LACs are an excellent fit that can transform your child. No disrespect to any other institution, but I am very grateful for the transformative effect an outstanding LAC had on my kid.

So, your kid couldn't make it to the top 50. I understand.

Anonymous wrote:I had to look this up. Not a good advertisement for the academe. Something tells me the name won’t stick in common parlance. How about “out of your depth,” a phrase that existed long before 1999?

Anonymous wrote:Extending this thread into year five to shit on LACs (and UVA now?). The desire to gatekeep prestige is strong!