Swarthmore College Top Questions

The best thing about Swarthmore is the beautiful campus itself, the strange little nooks and crannies and secret gardens all around. My favorite place to idle around campus was near Crumhenge, on the forest trails and under the railway bridge. I have many amazing memories of pterodactyl hunts by moonlight, bombing across New Jersey on road trips to write about for the Phoenix, meeting my boyfriend at WSRN (he had the radio show after mine and we've been dating for six years now), shooting a zombie movie in the Crum, singing gypsy folk songs in Russian class, crowd-surfing at a GWAR concert in Philly and so much more. The school is definitely on the small side, which makes it more personal, but by the end of junior year it felt clausterphobic. Fortunately Philly is a train ride away. Most student complaints involved the food plan, the small size of some dorm rooms. In fact, the campus was so crowded at one point that some students (including myself) were housed in a nearby retirement center! I believe most of the college's money is spent on academics and extracurricular activities rather than on more superficial improvements like massive state-of-the-art luxury dorms or installment of fast food franchises. Which is fine! (And yes, thankfully, they've since built a new dorm. I don't think the retirement center is in the picture these days.) As for controversy, yes! We had the usual liberal arts college hullaballoos that engulfed the whole campus until everyone explained why they were offended, Kumbaya was sung, and we moved on to the next provocation. If you pride yourself on being "politically incorrect," you may wish to go elsewhere for college.

Best thing-all the free money floating around in the departments. The school is crazy small, but it works sometimes. People are too hard core about academics, they have to let loose sometimes. Weekends are dead, and the septa is not all is hyped up to be, Philly is not 15 minutes away, more like 45 on the train that runs once an hour.

the best thing is definitely the rigorous academics and the professors who actually care about teaching. hmm, the thing i'd change isn't really something that is possible to change - my biggest issue with swat was A) everyone separates by race and other cliques and B) there are a lot of really annoying insufferable people. oh well. i kind of liked that it was small, although it made it hard to avoid ex boyfriends. most people don't react at all when i tell them where i went to school, because they haven't heard of it. my employers have heard of it, though, and were impressed, and it helped me get my previous job. when i was in school i spent most of my time on campus, in my dorm or in kohlberg or on the lawn. i lived in the ville during my last semester, but . . . there's nothing in the ville except renato's and the cheese shop. i liked swarthmore's administration, they were extremely helpful and wonderful when i got sick, the dean got involved personally with me and i was able to keep all the credits from that semester even though i missed several months of class. i have no idea what the most recent controversy is, the last i remember is the mascot thing. there's always a controversy at swat. i think there is definitely school pride, most students feel proud about going there, though i think there is a small but vocal minority who hate it and only go for the academics and name. i don't really think swat is that unusual, people used to say the student body was unusual but every year it seems like they admit more "normal" people and fewer freaks. i will always remember going to puerto rico for a week to study bugs and being given the opportunity to study abroad in kenya. student complaints: too much homework, crushing workloads, high tuition, annoying peers.

The best thing about Swarthmore is that it is not just full of well-meaning nice people, but well-meaning nice people who are willing to fail, to look bad, and then dust themselves off and do the hard work of getting good things done. The students may not know they have this in them when they arrive there, but this vision, resilience and work ethic is in the DNA of the community that a break-away sect of egalitarian Quakers started at the end of the Civil War, and the students carry it with them when they leave. The one thing I would change about Swarthmore is I would encourage certain departments (English Literature, History) to increase their emphasis on teaching the practical nuts and bolts applications of its offerings. The natural sciences and engineering majors happily are forced to learn the tools of doing original research, and that’s why their graduates go on prepared to continue their research and are to immediately launch into pre-doctoral work. The departments don’t all emphasize the idea of learning discrete skills and applying them to increasingly more ambitious tasks. For example, many departments' majors typically have no ability to assist their professors with their research. I think these departments should give their students the opportunity work on more collaborative, tangible projects, the equivalent of science labs or archeological digs.

The best thing about Swarthmore is that there are so many great things about Swarthmore! I think the size is perfect.When I tell people I go to Swarthmore, some people are really impressed, and others ask "where's that?" I would change the amount of support that athletic teams get from the student body (it would be more fun if we had a lot of fans at our games)! A lot of students complain about the food at the dining hall, but so far, I haven;t really had a problem with it.

I love Swarthmore and it has provided me with just about everything I have needed in four years. I love the culture, the intensity, the professors, the friends, everything. That said, four years is just the right amount of time and I'll be ready to move on this June.

First reaction to when I tell people about Swarthmore: "Oh. Where's that?" or "Oh. Is that an all girls school?" Even boys get asked if it's an all girls school! Nope, it's co-ed and was one of the first co-ed schools in the country. Nobody has heard of it and knows where it is unless they are well-educated themselves - most Ivy League kids have heard of it. There is no college town! "The Ville" has a few restaurants, a laundromat and a co-op, but is decidedly not a center of campus life. I love Swarthmore's tiny size. You can fit everyone in one auditorium or cafeteria, and you run into people you know literally every ten feet. You have small classes and groups, so everyone is very supportive. Nobody is separated by more than two degrees. The biggest recent controversy was about the College Republicans posters, which urged students to 'come out' as Republicans. Some queer students took issue with the appropriation of the term 'come out' by the homophobic agenda of the Republicans, and they counter-posted stating this. The Republicans then counter-posted again, and there was some ripping down of each others posters. The President of the Republicans wrote an editorial accusing a very visible queer figure of making the posters, which she didn't. This resulted in a big debate about free speech and where being a Republican makes you inherently homophobic because of the party's stance.

Swarthmore is definitely the right place for me. I really wanted a small liberal arts school to give me the small community experience. At the same time I wanted to be close to a big city so that I could get away from campus and have some good food, museums, and activities to go to on the weekends. Swat has definitely met my needs in those terms. The small size of the school is good because you see familiar faces, but you don't necessarily know everyone on campus. More importantly, it gives you a sense of comfort when you walk around. For example, it's incredibly likely that you'll know someone when you go to Sharples for a meal or when you have a new class, so you can relax there. Although the size and location of Swarthmore are awesome, I think the best thing about the college is the student body. There are so many amazing people at this school, and I love having the opportunity to meet and get know them. There are so many people do so many awesome things. I have a friend who is starting his own non-profit organization. Some of my best friends started the Peer Counseling program. I know people working on election stuff, planning for Swarthmore in 2020, organizing service opportunities, tutoring, working on global health issues, teaching kids music, working with children with disabilities, choreographing dances, planning social change projects, and everyone is doing this on top of being a Swarthmore student. I'm in constant awe of how much people are actually doing, and it's inspiring to be surrounded by these people. On the other hand, it is important to note that there some of the "super-awkward Swatties." These are the people who seem to have little to no social interaction skills, people who will only look down when they're walking around campus and don't really understand how to have a comfortable conversation. These people do exist, but it's not any reason to bring the school down. If anything, these people provide for some entertaining stories about awkward Swattie moments. Plus, you know, deep down, that these people are probably still doing something awesome, you just don't know what it is. Overall the campus is also a physically gorgeous place to be. Although everyone complains about the cold rain at some point as they trek up the hill from Sharples, the campus is beautiful. I love having the Crum Woods right next to us. It's a great place to go on runs, and it gives awesome places to sit and connect with nature. Plus, the Crum Regatta is always a treat. In addition, the campus is safe. I feel comfortable walking around alone at any point of the day. Although, in light of recent events, I am increasingly worried about safety on campus. I have become more aware of the sexual assault on campus this year, and the biggest thing I would change about Swat is the way that it deals with sexual assault. (I should note that the sexual assault cases I've heard have been committed by friends of the victims and in dorm rooms, so the outdoor safety isn't necessarily an issue.) I think there needs to be a much better method of dealing with sexual assault and providing the campus with information and updates about what is happening on campus. Even though I'm concerned about how the college handles sexual assault cases, I still think Swat is a great place. It's an amazing educational experience and it's given me so many opportunities to figure out what I love and what's important to me. Perhaps more importantly, I've made some of my best friends here. There are so many people who I know I can count on no matter what. Although that may come with most college experiences, I think that Swarthmore's is especially unique because you have so many people who are all interested and invested in both academics and social change. It really provides friends that do more than support you and your endeavors in creating change; they understand you and what you're going through, which gives you an amazing set of people to go to under any circumstances.

One of Swarthmore's strengths is how invested it is in having students in decision-making processes. (I think this has something to do with the school's Quaker background, consensus etc.) I will also say that I think this also makes the school run less efficiently than it otherwise might. The size of the school can sometimes feel too small - maybe not for your first year or two, when you're still meeting new people, but by senior year I started to feel like every party I went to had the same rotating cast of 60 or so people. I came to Swarthmore from the southeast, where a lot of people weren't familiar with the school. When I told people where I was attending, they'd often look at me with a puzzled sort of glance, as if to say, "But I thought you were smart?" I guess the flip side of that is that, when people do know what Swarthmore "means," they're invariably really impressed. Where'd I spend most of my time on campus: varied from season to season and year to year. I spent a lot of time at the cafeteria - there's only one on campus, which both made it a big part of my social life and also a frequently nerve-racking experience, if there was someone I wanted to avoid. Freshman year I spent a lot of time on my hall with the other new students, or in the dorms with my friends. By senior year, I spent a lot of time in the library, studying and socializing and complaining with my friends. Swarthmore is barely a town at all - I don't think many people spend much time in the Ville (as it's called) aside from getting an occasional slice of pizza or picking up food for their seminar breaks at the Co-Op. There is, however, train access into Philadelphia, which can be nice for the occasional escape. I knew some kids who went into Philly every weekend or more, and others who never went. I'd say the average number of trips into the city would be once a month. There's a peculiar sort of school pride at Swarthmore. Not school spirit in the traditional sense (admittedly I was pretty estranged from the athletic scene, but for me that sort of rah-rah stuff seemed non-existent). People are definitely loyal to the school, even as they're complaining about it - there's shared pride in our collective weirdness, or something. I've become convinced, more since leaving, that there IS something unusual about Swarthmore: it teaches its students a certain way of looking at the world, and most people come out of it hyper-analytical, more than a little bit liberal, with strong ideas about right and wrong.

The school is just the right size, on the small side if anything. At campus events, you can "work the crowd" and know almost everyone, but there are always new people to meet. While Swarthmore had a reputation (at least when I applied in 2004) for being really quirky and off-beat, that is generally not so. People here are the same as everywhere, except that they are extremely concerned with doing everything. There is a LOT of pressure to be constantly busy, to be constantly studying or working or volunteering. You get judged pretty heavily if you like being relaxed, and because of this almost everyone I know (including myself) has taken a semester off because they went crazy from the pressure.