Wells
Most professors will not only know your name, but know more about you than you might think. They are very perceptive and are almost as invested in your education as you are. Of course, this all varies from professor to professor, but I have had little disappointment with the professors that I have had. The conference style classes at Reed are designed to facilitate this, and professors often serve more as facilitators of discussion rather than lecturers.
While we recieve a traditional GPA and grades, they are not shown to the student unless he or she has lower than a C average in the class, or they request a transcript. This keeps competition to a minimum, though of course egos tend to collide in a conference setting. This is a much more productive form of competition, however, as at least something can be learned from in-class debates.
Our education is very conservative, in the sense that we have very few courses geared towards immediately practical application. Reed is truly a school where one learns for learning's sake.
Jesse
Knowing professors here is similar to knowing them in high school. Reed's conference style classes really allow student-teacher interaction on a personal level that you can't get at huge universities. As a result of these conference style classes, class participation is off the charts: from insight to questions, everything gets addressed.
Conversation outside of class regarding coursework is common, sometimes too common. People here are generally interested in subjects outside of their concentration, allowing good conversations to flow regularly.
My favorite class right now is my Introduction to Analysis class in the math department. Reed's philosophy of teaching makes this class very different from any math class I've taken in high school. Instead of being calculation based, this class teaches the students why the mathematics they are learning works. It is an incredible system, and I have derived more from this math class than any I have previously taken.
Reed's academic requirements are demanding, and force you to vary from your field throughout your career here. It is a liberal arts college, after all :)
Reed's education is definitely, definitely geared toward learning for its own sake. There are no perfectly job-aligned majors here, and classes are designed to be rigorous, rather than to pump out tons of undergrads with degrees.