Swarthmore College: Graduation

Today I graduated from Swarthmore College! While this isn’t an academic post, I do have some thoughts to share regarding my time at Swarthmore College. If there are any edits/additions you want to see, let me know.

My Experiences in a Liberal Arts College

I will say this once, and never repeat it again. Swarthmore is freaking hard, and don’t roll your eyes at me. That’s not to say college should be easy to everyone else. But here, I will give reasons why I believe Swarthmore, or liberal arts colleges for that matter, are hard:

• Smaller class sizes, leading to more attention from the professor
• Fewer instances of grade inflation and grade “chasing”
• Choosing to do the honors program

The first point is a double-edged sword. While I was able to spend more time talking to my professors during office hours, meet with professors at random times of the day, or actually have the professor ask the class questions, this also meant that professor were able to spend more time evaluating me. In a normal class of 20-30 students, such as Probability or Mathematical Statistics, the professor was able to ask rigorous/long-winded questions knowing that she would be able to grade all of them with great detail. In one exam, I was required to solve and code an EM algorithm for a distribution mixture within a time limit. This is an extremely tedious problem to do, and I can imagine it would be a pain to grade when students do it wrong. Yet, it still is a part of our evaluation when we receive our final grade. This is especially true in honors seminars, when there are only at most 12 other students in the class. Here, there really isn’t a place to hide. In seminars, when I went up to the board and screwed up a presentation, the professor takes that into account. When I got back my seminar papers, I usually saw a bunch of markups, corrections, and comments. This leads to the second point, where there are fewer instances of grade inflation. There is still grade inflation at Swarthmore, such as in seminars, the lowest average grade one receives is an B+, or huge curves in intermediate coursework, but I find this to be less true than that in other schools. My basis for comparison is primarily with my cousin’s experience at Harvard University, both as an undergrad and a PhD TA. From his accounts, I have heard that grade inflation or “grade chasing” are prominent, such as asking for answers in problem sessions and avoiding harder classes. From what I saw at Swarthmore, my friends and I would take classes we were interested in or with the “good” professors, without stopping to think how difficult it may be. I will say that getting terrible grades despite trying really hard is a common occurance, and professors do not sugercoat their final grades that much. For me, that was pouring hours and hours into real analysis only got me an average grade. And finally, we come to the honors program. As much as I complained about the hours I poured into this program, now that I’m on the other side, I am so glad to have done it. It sucked that I had to prep for four written honors exams along with my other finals during finals period and study for the orals exams while my friends were partying on the last day of exams. However, not only did I feel like I was mastering the material to the point it would carry with me longer, but also studying with other passionate and driven honors students felt extremely reassuring. When we all finished our last oral that Tuesday, it made our celebrations that much sweeter.

This leads me to my next point: the peers you will meet and friends you will make are some of the best people in this world. Swarthmore students are passionate in what they do, whether it be climate change, education, history, or social justice. Being immersed in the Swarthmore environment and experience for the past four years have made me a completely different person. Here are a couple things I have become more aware of: (1) I am more aware of modern racial issues and controversies, (2) I better understand the pains of victims of sexual violence, and (3) I am more attune to instances of gender disparities and inequalities. And while I have only scratched the surface of all these topics, I would not have been literate in these issues without my wonder Swarthmore peers. Furthermore, I have made lasting friendships that will last moving forward. This may not be a right reason for pursuing a PhD, but the opportunities to contribute to literature with my peers as will continue to motivate me in this path.

Oh right! Swarthmore is gorgeous and has some cool trees… not much more I could say about this.

My Sell for a Liberal Arts Education

I have gave two main bullets for my experiences, so here’s a couple selling points for going to a liberal arts college.

• Smaller class sizes. Think of all the opportunities one can interact with the professor!
• The students are passionate and driven. Do not underestimate the power of great friends.
• The ability and encouragement to try new things. For me, that was playing Ultimate Frisbee.
• Tighter alumni networks. I’ve seen this from personal experience, but Swatties help other Swatties both academically and professionally.

Conclusion

At the end of it all, all the “Where is Swarthmore?” or “Is that a good school?” have not deterred my love for Swarthmore. And why should it? I have made some great friends and further discovered my passions. Four years ago, I chose to go to Swarthmore, and four years later, I regret nothing.