Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grinnell is great - a bit too woke and wacky but it’s massively underrated

Oberlin/kenyon/denison are really hampered by Ohio — Ohio is truly dire whereas the middle of Iowa can be pretty in a little house on prairie way (golden hour Iowa skies are gorgeous)

If the Ohio schools were in traverse city or Madison or Utah, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho , they would be ranked higher.

Ohio is not just “in the Midwest”

It’s one of the most run down and depressing states even compared to non-coastal states

Hmmm. I can take Ohio or leave it. But, Cleveland and Columbus were both surprisingly revitalized and nice when we visited.

Anonymous wrote:Kenyon was #28 two years ago between Bryn Mawr and Scripps. This year’s rankings led to some anomalies and Kenyon was one. W&M was another that sank for national universities. I don’t think either school changed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grinnell is ranked 11th.

Denison and Kenyon are tied for 39th and Oberlin is 51st.

These are not small differences.

Grinnell is tied with Barnard, Claremont McKenna, Middlebury and Wesleyan.

Kenyon and Denison are tied with Hillsdale, Pitzer and Seplman and Oberlin is tied with Principia College.

Where these schools stand in the pecking order is crystal clear.

Don't let US News rule you.

Anonymous wrote:Grinnell is ranked 11th.

Denison and Kenyon are tied for 39th and Oberlin is 51st.

These are not small differences.

Grinnell is tied with Barnard, Claremont McKenna, Middlebury and Wesleyan.

Kenyon and Denison are tied with Hillsdale, Pitzer and Seplman and Oberlin is tied with Principia College.

Where these schools stand in the pecking order is crystal clear.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, the bottom line is this: Grinnell is much more highly ranked than any of the Ohio schools - it’s just outside the top 10, whereas none of the Ohio schools is even in the top 30. Grinnell also has a much lower acceptance rate and yield. Kenyon in particular is nobody’s first choice.

So I agree that you shouldn’t really consider them as peers.

Hmm. I just checked the most recent CDS of both Grinnell and Kenyon. Coincidentally, they both have the exact same percentage of students reporting SAT and ACT scores (28% and 27%). The median ACT score for both schools is 33. The median SAT is 1460 for Grinnell and 1440 for Kenyon. If we can use test scores as a reasonable proxy for academic caliber of the students, it's pretty damn close to a tie. Certainly, they seem to be "peers."

US News definitely ranks Grinnell higher. The endowment is huge, and this enables Grinnell to compete better on the metrics US News favors, which largely revolve around financial aid, Pell grants, etc. Grinnell has more resources and therefore does a better job bringing in low income and diverse students, as well as with merit aid. The stronger financial aid and need blind policy leads to more applications and lower acceptance rates, although this doesn't seem to translate into materially higher average test scores.

Grinnell has much more money and throws it around to attract students, but any rational person looking at these two schools would see them as peers with a lot of similarities. In terms of academic reputation, faculty, etc., Grinnell probably has the edge with hard sciences but not elsewhere. Grinnell also seems to suffer from a Swarthmore-like reputation of being a dull grind school. Kenyon's campus life seems more vibrant, and one basically only hears positive things.

I understand the Grinnellian impulse to separate from the midwest "loser" table in the cafeteria and hang out with the cool rich kids from New England. But you will still always be that awkward Iowa farm boy, who happened to have a rich uncle.

Rather than tear each other down, midwestern SLACs should appreciate one another. It's a pretty special collection of colleges.

The top liberal arts colleges don’t consider Kenyon to be a peer, sorry. But they consider Grinnell to be one. And Kenyon’s yield is pathetic, under 20 percent, which means that the overwhelming majority of its applicants don’t rank it as their school of choice. It’s an also ran. You’re not going to meet Kenyon students who turned down top 10 liberal arts colleges to attend the school. You will see that routinely at Grinnell.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, the bottom line is this: Grinnell is much more highly ranked than any of the Ohio schools - it’s just outside the top 10, whereas none of the Ohio schools is even in the top 30. Grinnell also has a much lower acceptance rate and yield. Kenyon in particular is nobody’s first choice.

So I agree that you shouldn’t really consider them as peers.

Hmm. I just checked the most recent CDS of both Grinnell and Kenyon. Coincidentally, they both have the exact same percentage of students reporting SAT and ACT scores (28% and 27%). The median ACT score for both schools is 33. The median SAT is 1460 for Grinnell and 1440 for Kenyon. If we can use test scores as a reasonable proxy for academic caliber of the students, it's pretty damn close to a tie. Certainly, they seem to be "peers."

US News definitely ranks Grinnell higher. The endowment is huge, and this enables Grinnell to compete better on the metrics US News favors, which largely revolve around financial aid, Pell grants, etc. Grinnell has more resources and therefore does a better job bringing in low income and diverse students, as well as with merit aid. The stronger financial aid and need blind policy leads to more applications and lower acceptance rates, although this doesn't seem to translate into materially higher average test scores.

Grinnell has much more money and throws it around to attract students, but any rational person looking at these two schools would see them as peers with a lot of similarities. In terms of academic reputation, faculty, etc., Grinnell probably has the edge with hard sciences but not elsewhere. Grinnell also seems to suffer from a Swarthmore-like reputation of being a dull grind school. Kenyon's campus life seems more vibrant, and one basically only hears positive things.

I understand the Grinnellian impulse to separate from the midwest "loser" table in the cafeteria and hang out with the cool rich kids from New England. But you will still always be that awkward Iowa farm boy, who happened to have a rich uncle.

Rather than tear each other down, midwestern SLACs should appreciate one another. It's a pretty special collection of colleges.

The top liberal arts colleges don’t consider Kenyon to be a peer, sorry. But they consider Grinnell to be one. And Kenyon’s yield is pathetic, under 20 percent, which means that the overwhelming majority of its applicants don’t rank it as their school of choice. It’s an also ran. You’re not going to meet Kenyon students who turned down top 10 liberal arts colleges to attend the school. You will see that routinely at Grinnell.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grinnell is great - a bit too woke and wacky but it’s massively underrated

Oberlin/kenyon/denison are really hampered by Ohio — Ohio is truly dire whereas the middle of Iowa can be pretty in a little house on prairie way (golden hour Iowa skies are gorgeous)

If the Ohio schools were in traverse city or Madison or Utah, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho , they would be ranked higher.

Ohio is not just “in the Midwest”

It’s one of the most run down and depressing states even compared to non-coastal states

I grew up in NW PA and went to Pitt. I know run-down and depressed towns.

We wide the OH college tour last year. We were all pleasantly surprised. I was expecting our travels around OH to be similar to our travels around rural parts of PA- rundown and depressing. Columbus and the surrounding areas were anything but run down and depressing. I found the areas on the way to Kenyon and surrounding Kenyon to be much prettier than rural parts of PA.
Cleveland was also nicer than I thought. I’m a big Pittsburgh booster (seriously, if you haven’t visited, just go) and always enjoy the vibrancy of Oakland and Pitts campus, but the Case neighborhood was just as vibrant and dare I say I found it nicer.

Don’t dismiss OH. You may be pleasantly surprised.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, the bottom line is this: Grinnell is much more highly ranked than any of the Ohio schools - it’s just outside the top 10, whereas none of the Ohio schools is even in the top 30. Grinnell also has a much lower acceptance rate and yield. Kenyon in particular is nobody’s first choice.

So I agree that you shouldn’t really consider them as peers.

Hmm. I just checked the most recent CDS of both Grinnell and Kenyon. Coincidentally, they both have the exact same percentage of students reporting SAT and ACT scores (28% and 27%). The median ACT score for both schools is 33. The median SAT is 1460 for Grinnell and 1440 for Kenyon. If we can use test scores as a reasonable proxy for academic caliber of the students, it's pretty damn close to a tie. Certainly, they seem to be "peers."

US News definitely ranks Grinnell higher. The endowment is huge, and this enables Grinnell to compete better on the metrics US News favors, which largely revolve around financial aid, Pell grants, etc. Grinnell has more resources and therefore does a better job bringing in low income and diverse students, as well as with merit aid. The stronger financial aid and need blind policy leads to more applications and lower acceptance rates, although this doesn't seem to translate into materially higher average test scores.

Grinnell has much more money and throws it around to attract students, but any rational person looking at these two schools would see them as peers with a lot of similarities. In terms of academic reputation, faculty, etc., Grinnell probably has the edge with hard sciences but not elsewhere. Grinnell also seems to suffer from a Swarthmore-like reputation of being a dull grind school. Kenyon's campus life seems more vibrant, and one basically only hears positive things.

I understand the Grinnellian impulse to separate from the midwest "loser" table in the cafeteria and hang out with the cool rich kids from New England. But you will still always be that awkward Iowa farm boy, who happened to have a rich uncle.

Rather than tear each other down, midwestern SLACs should appreciate one another. It's a pretty special collection of colleges.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One answer to the OP’s question is greater geographic diversity fwiw. The northeast LACs are often very heavily skewed towards the northeast (NY,NJ,CT,MA).

Our DC is at one of these schools. After spending their whole life in the Mid-Atlantic/NE, they've really appreciated going to school with folks from around the country.

Anonymous wrote:One answer to the OP’s question is greater geographic diversity fwiw. The northeast LACs are often very heavily skewed towards the northeast (NY,NJ,CT,MA).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grinnell is great - a bit too woke and wacky but it’s massively underrated

Oberlin/kenyon/denison are really hampered by Ohio — Ohio is truly dire whereas the middle of Iowa can be pretty in a little house on prairie way (golden hour Iowa skies are gorgeous)

If the Ohio schools were in traverse city or Madison or Utah, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho , they would be ranked higher.

Ohio is not just “in the Midwest”

It’s one of the most run down and depressing states even compared to non-coastal states

Hmmm. I can take Ohio or leave it. But, Cleveland and Columbus were both surprisingly revitalized and nice when we visited.

I think the Grinnell Booster got their nose bent out of joint about Grinnell being super white. Although attacking the entire state of Ohio is ?? odd. Ohio’s got the same type of red state politics as, well, Iowa. Maybe a bit better since Amendments 1&2 passed on abortion and pot. But, Ohio is de-rust belting nicely. Oberlin is 20-30 minutes from Cleveland, which has Case Western, the Cleveland Clinic, decent art and natural history museums, a good orchestra, little Italy… That plus Columbus, with THE Ohio State, are nice areas. (So it Pittsburgh. All three cities surprised me when we visited. In a good way). Not where I would choose to spend January— the lake effect means business. But, I didn’t visit these areas and immediately have the urge to start reciting The Wasteland, as the Grinnell Booster suggests.

Grinnell is definitely off by itself, geographically. So, I don’t tend to think of it as being in a trio with Kenyon and Oberlin. Iowa is really far away. I tend to place Oberlin & Kenyon with the PA schools and/or Denison and Wooster. Wouldn’t Grinnell be a better fit with the Wisconsin schools, like Lawrence and Beloit, and the Minnesota schools (Macalaster, St.Olaf and Carleton)? I think all those schools except Carleton do merit.

As for visiting, Grinnell is a stand alone trip.