Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Bowdoin is currently outranking Pomona and Wellesley.

Why stop at 5 or 6. Middlebury, Hamilton, Wesleyan, Colby and Bates are strong too. Enough of the ranking -- let your kid pick the school where they feel comfortable and it will be great.

I agree, and why stop there? As I posted much earlier

There are 9 SLACs with with SAT medians above 1500

Amherst
Bowdoin
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wellesley
Williams

and another cluster right behind them (1480+)
Carleton
Colgate
Davidson
Hamilton
Haverford
Vassar
Washington & Lee

Academically their student bodies are indistinguishable.

Wesleyan
Bates
Colby
Smith
Grinnell

are all great schools with only slightly lower SAT averages.

26 well resourced schools all with excellent students. The idea that one can objectively stack rank them is frankly foolish.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Actually there are 9 (with SAT medians above 1500)

Amherst
Bowdoin
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wellesley
Williams

With another cluster right behind them (1480+)
Carleton
Colgate
Davidson
Hamilton
Haverford
Vassar
Washington & Lee

Wesleyan way better than Washington & Lee and others. Most LAC are similar actually. Wes, with Williams & Amherst considered little 3

Completely agree, this is an insane list. Wesleyan is tier below WAS but just, and frankly better than Bowdoin. If someone said t5 I wouldn't argue.

+1 Colgate, Washington & Lee, Davidson nowhere near top status. (I mean, one celebrates the confederacy with half its name!) I've taught at a number of these schools and can say Wesleyan is at a different level.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Bowdoin is currently outranking Pomona and Wellesley.

Why stop at 5 or 6. Middlebury, Hamilton, Wesleyan, Colby and Bates are strong too. Enough of the ranking -- let your kid pick the school where they feel comfortable and it will be great.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAC boosters either have an inferiority complex or looking for justification for spending $360,000 for a bachelor's degree for a school 50% of the public isn't familiar.

At least 50% of the public is composed of total morons whose recognition of your college is of zero concern.

LOL! EXACTLY!!!!

What do people know about Barnard. DD trying to decide. Isn't it a top LAC too?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAC boosters either have an inferiority complex or looking for justification for spending $360,000 for a bachelor's degree for a school 50% of the public isn't familiar.

University boosters prioritize brand recognition over education quality because they are less likely to rely on actual academic merit. Cheating is way more rampant in a room with 300 students and a different grader for each assignment than a room with 30 students and a single prof.

“University boosters” are not a thing. Most people just don’t want to go to a college smaller than their high school.

Anonymous wrote:Why people look down on T5 lacs? It seems the majority of kids (and parents) desire T20 university.

Because many people who don't draw or paint or sculpt feel that liberal arts is not for them.

Anonymous wrote:My DD is at one and chose it over Brown. I have yet to run into anyone in real life who looks down on her choice, and she's doing just fine.

Would be interested to hear your DD's reasoning. With the primacy of undergrad education at Brown my DS felt like it resembled a very large LAC more than it did massive universities like Penn, Cornell or Columbia. I guess it is still much larger than the typical 2000 kid LAC but wondering if there were other considerations.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Actually there are 9 (with SAT medians above 1500)

Amherst
Bowdoin
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wellesley
Williams

With another cluster right behind them (1480+)
Carleton
Colgate
Davidson
Hamilton
Haverford
Vassar
Washington & Lee

Wesleyan way better than Washington & Lee and others. Most LAC are similar actually. Wes, with Williams & Amherst considered little 3

Completely agree, this is an insane list. Wesleyan is tier below WAS but just, and frankly better than Bowdoin. If someone said t5 I wouldn't argue.

Anonymous wrote:I chose a WASP school over Northwestern back in the day. Northwestern wasn’t the same T-10 school it is now. I’d make the same decision even today.

Northwestern is not really exactly the same as Penn or Brown, say. I'd go to Williams or Swarthmore over NW any day.

SLAC grads I've worked with in San Francisco and DC also had impressive grad degrees I wasn't aware of before getting to know them better (mostly business in my sphere). They were the ones who didn't lead with HBS, Stanford GSB, or Wharton when describing their educations. A few bigger schools are also that way (Princeton, Dartmouth, and Notre Dame are the ones that come to mind right away).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Actually there are 9 (with SAT medians above 1500)

Amherst
Bowdoin
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wellesley
Williams

With another cluster right behind them (1480+)
Carleton
Colgate
Davidson
Hamilton
Haverford
Vassar
Washington & Lee

Wesleyan way better than Washington & Lee and others. Most LAC are similar actually. Wes, with Williams & Amherst considered little 3

What in the world is a "little 3?" That term is definitely not used, and Williams and Amherst are grouped with Swarthmore and Pomona. Wes is great for artsy students.

The term has “definitely” been used for decades. Wes is not what it once was, partly because they expanded enrollment after going coed, and partly because the woke virus took too many casualties.

Amherst, Swarthmore, and Williams tend to attract the best students who "really want to attend a SLAC." Wellesley, Pomona and a few others too to a slightly lesser extent. It is similar to the Ivy League where there are tiers. With the top 3 group (which are the only 3 US News has ever ranked #1 and who have never dropped lower than #4), I think most are pretty comfortable with kids choosing the SLAC over a T20.
If anything, in my experience, some SLAC kids and grads take pride in turning down certain other name schools that other T20 kids don't turn down without a serious financial incentive (rather than an inferiority complex). We know from these forums that many T20 schools are picked due to not getting in REA elsewhere or settling for a really good shot at ED or ED2 versus shooting your RD shot. The Chicagos, Georgetowns, Cornells, and even Dukes of the world are the ones whose students and alumni sometimes come across as having a bit of an inferiority complex.

Anonymous wrote:LAC boosters either have an inferiority complex or looking for justification for spending $360,000 for a bachelor's degree for a school 50% of the public isn't familiar.

At least 50% of the public is composed of total morons whose recognition of your college is of zero concern.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are the T5 Lacs?

in no particular order
swarthmore
williams
bowdoin
pomona
amherst
wellesley

yes, there are 6 not 5

There are 5, Bowdoin should be taken off the list.

Actually there are 9 (with SAT medians above 1500)

Amherst
Bowdoin
Claremont McKenna
Harvey Mudd
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wellesley
Williams

With another cluster right behind them (1480+)
Carleton
Colgate
Davidson
Hamilton
Haverford
Vassar
Washington & Lee

Wesleyan way better than Washington & Lee and others. Most LAC are similar actually. Wes, with Williams & Amherst considered little 3

What in the world is a "little 3?" That term is definitely not used, and Williams and Amherst are grouped with Swarthmore and Pomona. Wes is great for artsy students.