Swarthmore College Top Questions

Swat academics are tough. Really tough. Overall, they're also of excellent quality, which makes it better. I love the biology department, and the new Arabic section in the department of Modern Languages is exciting and has some really fabulous professors. The small size of the school does mean that course offerings are sometimes limited, both in topics and in timing, but at least the difficulties that these problems cause are distributed relatively fairly between the lower and upperclassmen. First year seminars are a must for freshmen, and small discussion classes are the best of what Swat has to offer. There really are no easy A's at Swat, but the natural science division is definitely more difficult as a whole. Your poli sci prof may happily hand out C's, but you're not in danger of failing. Orgo offers no such assurances. To be honest, I learn more just from talking with my fellow Swatties than I ever do in class. I'm constantly amazed at what everyone is researching, writing about, or just reading on blogs. And people here >care< about subjects that the rest of the world dismisses as merely academic or intellectual. From what I've seen, even if you manage to sleep through class, it's impossible to graduate from Swarthmore without doing some serious thinking.

Hard. But it's true that students are not competitive with each other, generally. Education at Swarthmore is geared more toward learning for its own sake, but sometimes this really annoys me when there's no practical application whatsoever. Intellectual conversations are everywhere, in the dining hall, walking around campus. But the classes are so interesting. Bio 2, for example, is like a show every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

The academics are challenging. The professors expect quality work and effort from their students. The professors are also williing to put quality effor into their students. All of my professors know my name. I frequent their office hours as much as I need it and I have found they make great efforts to be available to help. Coming in with questions the professors are always willing to assist. In my math class last semester, I came in needing some help. My prof decided he would make me into a math major. I came in and sat down with my econ prof last semester to discuss my paper and she helped me go through the whole process. I quite frequently have conversations with my philosophy professor that extend well beyond the material to larger questions the readings evoke for me. This one-on-one attention is possible mostly by the small class sizes. I am in a history seminar of three students. My largest classes have about 40 students. This makes conversations great and the material accessible.

Professors here definitely know your name! One of my professors had all of our names memorized for the first day of class - he looked us all up on the student directory available to professors and made an effort to be able to recognize us!

The classroom environment at Swarthmore is really nice. I feel that when i'm in class, I can express my opinions clearly and openly. All the professors encourage participation. Most swatties carry these intellectual conversations outside of the classroom, which can sometimes be wierd, but its all good.

There is a incredible level of intimacy between students and professors. You can be sure that at Swarthmore, you will be able to get very personal and unique recommendation letters from more than one teacher.

I'm only a freshman, so I don't have a very wide picture of what the academics are like here. I do take a lot of science classes, though, and I can say that most of the professors are top-notch. The workload, by the way, is what you make of it. It all depends on what classes you take, and how anal you are about grades (if you take a lot of science classes, be prepared to work your ass off to get an A).

All the professors know my name. My favorite class is Intro to Asian American Literature with Mani- she is amazing. My least favorite class that I've taken has to be orgo. Students study every minute of the day- if they don't, they feel guilty about not studying. Class participation is common. Swarthmore students have [pompous] intellectual conversations outside of class. Students are competitive mostly with themselves, and not usually with each other. I am a biology major. The biology department is like a family- they are absolutely wonderful. Mani's class is the most unique/brilliant class I've taken. Swarthmore's academic requirements are really flexible. The education is definitely geared towards learning for its own sake, not getting a job.

Yes, professors know my name. Students study often, late into the night, it's almost necessary. Class participation is common in almost all classes, and even moreso in Literature, Sociology/Anthropology, and History classes. Heated debates are common and easily ignited. yes, swarthmore students do have intellectual conversations out of class, which is usually very nice; to be able to do so on a peer level, totally without academic reason, is something i see as a positive thing....although, again, heated debates are easily ignited once a certain topic is broached and a certain line is crossed. Students generally are not competitive, although there are select few who are overly paranoid about others not working as hard as they are, and will attempt to insure that you are not gaining an undeserved advantage by adamantly refusing to share a few chemical properties of three compounds for a pre-lab assignment. this is not typical. Many do spend time with professors outside of class, for example, afternoon tea every friday with a physics professor. Swarthmore's academic requirements are, for sure, intense and rigorous, but for sure, not impossible.

The largest class I've ever taken at Swarthmore was Intro to Psych and about 100 people were in it. My second day of class, the professor knew my name. I wanted to come to Swarthmore because I wanted to be surrounded by peers that took academics seriously, and I have been disappointed in that regard at Swarthmore. If you envision college being something substantially different than about academics, Swat's probably not the place for you. People devote Saturday and Sunday afternoons to working, and when someone leaves a conversation, it's inevitably with, "I've got work to do". This academic focus definitely spills over into the social life, where I have experienced many wonderful conversations about politics, morality, and current affairs in addition to the more banal things people everywhere talk about. The great thing about Swarthmore is that you can have both really banal conversations about celebrities or who's dating whom, but no one looks at you askance if you start talking about this book you're reading for class that has raised some really interesting questions for you. One aspect of Swarthmore that I was looking forward to but have been slightly disappointed in is class participation. I was looking forward to not being the only person who was interested in having class discussions, but I have found that there are plenty of times that awkward silences fall. I think that this is largely because people are afraid of saying something stupid, so they don't say anything at all. But that doesn't change the fact that the majority of my classes have been discussion based and/or the professor has really encouraged participation, which is plentiful, it just has its lulls at times too.

Classes are small, personal, professors know you on a first name basis and you know many of them on a first name basis as well. I've heard of an Arabic professor inviting students over to his house for wine and hookah. It can get pretty personal which is cool because you get a lot of attention. My favorite and most unique class was French Cultural and Critical Theory which was listed under French and an interdisciplinary area of study known as Interpretation Theory. Basically, it was a French continental professor giving you a survey on a bunch of prominent continental philosophers (French or otherwise). The continental 'canon' was huge: Foucault, Derrida, Butler, Zizek, Lacan, Freud, Benjamin, Agamben, Baudrillard, Mouffe to list a few. It was an amazing eye-opener and mind-blower into an entirely new area of thought which I hadn't explored before. There seems to be lots of classes that reveal entire fields of knowledge which you had never discovered before. It was great. My least favorite class was some Intro to Phil class. Intro classes are usually more uninteresting because they are more basic and mundane. Class participation is very common which is great because so many ideas are discussed in every class. Swatties have lots of intellectual conversations outside of class which is awesome because you can talk about classes and subjects you've never heard of before. Talking to people outside your major outside of class is one of the most enlightening things you can do. Students aren't competitive. Even though Swat can be intense, people aren't overly concerned about grades and there's no cutthroat competition amongst people. Swat's academic requirements are very minimal and you can get out of em with AP's as well. There is a P.E. requirement which can be silly but there are some interesting P.E. classes like Aikido that you can take. Swarthmore is geared more toward learning for its own sake but it also prepares you for the job market very well and the Career Center can help you out a lot in that regards. But if you want to go on to further study after college, Swarthmore is definitely the place to be. Small classes and personal relations with good professors translates into amazing preparation for grad school and connections to good letters of recommendations.

I expected the transition from high school to college to be far more intense than I experienced during my first two years here. Yes, the school work is much harder and I barely sleep several days of the week. Arabic, in particular, is a constant struggle. But studying the humanities, the field in which I've chosen to concentrate, doesn't seem to have changed since high school. I can still bullshit my way through literary analyses, hold empty discussions on nebulous topics, and get away without reading. I'm fine with it. My point is that for the most part, I stimulate my intellect, the classes don't. My own research and reading almost invariably yields the greatest rewards--at least in the humanities. And God knows I'm terrible at the natural sciences, so I won't even bother describing my experience with them. In general, however, the professors are always ready to elucidate any confusing shit, the academic requirements are reasonable, and the class selection never fails to fascinate.

Students study a lot, sometimes on Saturday nights if need be. Class participation is common; classes are highly interactive with a small number of students. Students are other Engineering programs tend to be overstressed and suicidal; however, the Engineering students at Swarthmore are encouraged to work as a team in all our assignments, which inherently removes competitive urges. The professors are very accessible and spend a lot of time with us. Sometimes, they'll even be around just to help you at 10PM on a Sunday night. The amount of personal research they do is minimal because they are mainly here to help us learn. Sometimes, I'll just be sitting in the Hicks lounge, and a professor will come by and share an article with me. 20 out of my 32 minimum credits are devoted to fulfilling my Engineering credits, which spans across Math, Physics, Computer Science, Chemistry & Engineering. But I still feel there is a lot of room to take electives that aren't directly satisfying a requirement. The education at Swarthmore is definitely geared towards learning for its own sake. However, there is Career Services to guide students to getting a job.

Tough. Professors expect alot out of their students. Students work a lot and yes, intellectual discussion does sometimes occur outside of class. Personal attention is a big thing at Swarthmore (student-faculty ratio 8:1) as professors know you and your abilities. My classics professor once wrote an entire page (single-spaced) of comments on a paper I had written. Swarthmore definitely is a place to learn how to think, and I have certainly been challenged in ways that I couldn't have imagined.

I love my professors. Yes they all know who I am and I feel totally comfortable talking with them. My classes are difficult but I feel like I am pushed in a good way, and I feel like I am growing as a person through all the stuff that I do both in the classroom and as work on my own. Yes, I admit it is hard work but I am prouder of myself because of it, and truly believe that i will succeed after college because of the work I am putting in here and now.

Aside from intro classes, classes are so small that professors usually do know everyone's names and class participation is (unfortunately) highly necessary. Students have the sometimes annoying habit of engaging in class conversations even outside of class, on weekends, and when drunk. THAT is how passionate they are. Education at Swarthmore is definitely geared toward learning for its own sake rather than getting a job. Thus, I fear many of us will be jobless after graduation.

My professors tend to know my name, and recognize me after classes are over. Students also tend to hold intellectual discussions long after class has finished.

I enjoy the relationships that you are able to build with your professors because they do end up being a lot more personal, that they would be at larger institutions. I have to say that in general I am pleased with the structure of the academics here at Swarthmore, just not the diversity of the teachers, and the size of the English department in particular because we have a very limited course selection that usually gravitates towards the same material. I wouldn't mind if the limited material was more varied and interesting, but on the whole it just isn't.

Although academics at Swarthmore are much more demanding than at any other institution I have been to, I really enjoy studying here. In High school I had some classes that I was required to take and I would never ever look forward to those classes. However, I have yet to have a class here at Swarthmore that I have not yet not wanted to attend. In engineering, I find myself frequently staying up all night in the engineering building, because I become so immersed in the material, that I want to understand it as well as I can. I do believe that the academics challenge you more than most colleges will, but I do believe that it is for our benefit and I can truly see some of the benefits that will soon come from our efforts.

yes they know my name, favorite class ever was foundations drawing and michelangelo, least favorite are the ones im taking right now, students study all the time, participation is common, sure they have intellectual converstations, not competitive, SWARTHMORE EDUCATION WILL NOT PREPARE ANYBODY FOR A JOB, its for the sake of higher learning, to learn and study things that are completely useless in the professional world and to get into grad school to learn more useless things, you learn things in the professional world through experience but basic skills are still needed for that job which is absent at swarthmore. they dont even have a design or communications class for pete sake