斯沃斯莫尔学院|Swarthmore College

Swarthmore college. （也被译为斯沃斯摩尔学院，斯沃茨摩尔学院，思沃斯茅学院等。）位于宾夕法尼亚州斯沃斯莫尔镇（费城西南17公里) 的斯沃思莫尔学院是美国最顶尖的文理学院之一。《美国新闻与世界报道》杂志每年一度的大学排名将美国四年制以上大学分成两部分来排列，一部分是 大学 (University, 包含研究生院与本科学院的综合学院)，另一部分是 文理学院 （Liberal Arts College ，也被译为博雅学院，只有本科生院）。美国教育体制的精髓是自由教育的四年制的 文理学院 。 文理学院 坚持本科教育，教授不搞学术研究，全力以赴关注大学教育并以出色的大学教育为己任。

斯沃斯莫尔学院（Swarthmore College与阿莫斯特学院（Amherst College）和威廉斯学院（Williams College）是文理学院的前三名。而在最近两三年里，斯沃斯莫尔学院排在全国第一名。它的新生录取率不到20%，与加州理工学院相当，比麻省理工学院还要低，而入学新生的平均SAT成绩比杜克、哥伦比亚、康乃尔大学的学生都要高。

教学学术声誉

斯沃斯莫尔学院教学非常严谨，坚持小班化教学方式据统计，从1990年到2000年的十年间，数学班的平均规模是18名学生。有的班级人数在8人以下。虽然每周课时不是很多，但为了获得良好的教学效果，必须事先做大量的预习工作，基本上每节课前要花费两节课的时间。

比起其他文理学院文强理弱不同，斯沃斯莫尔学院做到了真正的文武全才，作为文理学院，它既有其中很不常见的工程系（而且它的工程系还做到了在全美赫赫有名! ）也有其他学校很少见的文科研究学科，比如说战争与和平研究，认知科学，以及翻译理论等。除此之外，学术上斯沃斯莫尔学院还与附近的布尔茅尔（Bryn Mawr College）女子学院，哈弗福特学院（Haverford College）以及宾州州立大学组成了一整套的学术交换体系。 学生可以在四所学校中自由选课。得益于优秀的教学体系。

至今为止，斯沃斯莫尔学院毕业的校友中已经有四名诺贝尔奖得主。此学院同时也有着很高的生源质量。这里学生的SAT考试成绩都与常青藤大学不相上下。由于学费昂贵，学生都希望能得到奖学金，而要想得到奖学金非得有其他方面的特长和优秀表现才行，因此这里的学生是全美国最优秀的高中毕业生。

由于没有研究生院，教师主要精力在本科教学。学生通常可以与教授一对一的交流。 学校办学规模始终维持在一个很低的水平，而且坚持不搞研究生培养，不是办学经费紧张，因为Swarthmore学院是费城地区与宾夕法尼亚大学一起被认为当地最富裕的大学，而是董事会为学校度身定制的办学方针。

美国大学多如牛毛，名校林立，要在这样的竞争中立于不败之地，坚持办学特色和正确合理的定位是非常重要的。正是由于这样的办学方针，才使这所私立学院能长盛不衰。

斯沃斯莫尔学院 是美国很有影响的私立大学。与新英格兰的其他兄弟学校 （包括 Amherst College,Bates College, Bowdoin College, Colby College, Hamilton College, Haverford College, Middlebury College, Trinity College, Swarthmore College, 以及Williams College） 一起并称 小常春藤联盟 （相对于大学的常春藤联盟而言）。 其优秀严谨的本科教学质量可与常青藤大学的哈佛，普林斯顿，耶鲁大学相媲美，而其他常青藤大学的本科质量还与斯沃斯莫尔学院有一定差距。

Campus

Swarthmore is located 11 miles southwest of the city of Philadelphia. The campus consists of 357 acres (1.44 km2), based on a north-south axis anchored by Parrish Hall, which houses numerous administrative offices and student lounges, as well as two floors of student housing. The campus radio station WSRN-FM broadcasts from the top.

From the SEPTA Swarthmore commuter train station and the ville of Swarthmore to the south, the oak-lined Magill Walk leads north up a hill to Parrish. The campus is also coterminous with the Scott Arboretum, cited by some as a main staple of the campus s renowned beauty.

The majority of the buildings housing classrooms and department offices are located to the north of Parrish, as is Woolman dormitory. McCabe Library is to the east of Parrish, as are the dorms of Willets, Mertz, Worth, Alice Paul, and David Kemp Hall. To the west are the dorms of Wharton, Dana, and Hallowell, along with the Scott Amphitheater. The Crum Woods generally extend westward from the campus, toward the Crum Creek. South of Parrish are Sharples dining hall, the two non-residential fraternities (Phi Psi and Delta Upsilon), and various other buildings. Palmer, Pittenger, and Roberts dormitories are south of the railroad station, as are the athletic facilities, while Mary Lyon dorm is off-campus to the southwest.

The College has three main libraries (McCabe Library, the Cornell Library of Science and Engineering, and the Underhill Music and Dance Library) and seven other specialized collections.In total, the libraries hold over 800,000 print volumes as well as an expanding digital library of over 10,000 online journal subscriptions, rerence materials, e-books, and other scholarly databases.

Recently, Swarthmore has added wireless access in all of the campus residence halls. The wireless network is also available in all administrative and academic buildings, and in many of the campus s outdoor spaces.

Academics

Reputation

In its 2008 college ranking, U.S. News World Report ranked Swarthmore as the number-three liberal arts college, with an overall score of 95/100, behind Williams and Amherst, respectively. Since the inception of the U.S. News rankings, Amherst, Williams, and Swarthmore are the only colleges to have been ranked #1 on the liberal arts rankings list, with the three colleges often switching places with each other every year. Swarthmore has been ranked the number one liberal arts college in the country a total of six times so far (the most recent being in 2002).

Some sources, including Greene s Guides,have called Swarthmore one of the Little Ivies .

Swarthmore ranks 10th in a 2004 Wall Street Journal survey of feeder schools to elite business, medical, and law schools.

PC World ranked Swarthmore as the 4th most wired college in the nation in a 2006 report.

In 2008, The Princeton Review gave Swarthmore a 99 (the highest possible score) on their Admissions Selectivity Rating.

In a 2008 ranking by Forbes Magazine, Swarthmore was rated the #4 undergraduate institution in America (behind Princeton, CalTech, and Harvard respectively).

Academic Program

Swarthmore s Oxford tutorial-inspired Honors Program allows students to take double-credit seminars from their junior year and often write honors theses. Seminars are usually composed of four to eight students. Students in seminars will usually write at least three ten-page papers per seminar, and often one of these papers is expanded into a 20-30 page paper by the end of the seminar. At the end of their senior year, Honors students take oral and written examinations conducted by outside experts in their field. Around one student in each discipline is awarded Highest Honors others are either awarded High Honors or Honors rarely, a student is denied any Honors altogether by the outside examiner. Each department usually has a grade threshold for admittance to the Honors program.

Unusual for a liberal arts college, Swarthmore has an engineering program; at the end of four years, students are granted a B.S. in Engineering. Other notable programs include minors in peace and conflict studies, cognitive science, and interpretation theory.

Swarthmore has a total undergraduate student enrollment of 1,491 (for the 2007-2008 year) and 165 faculty members (99% with a terminal degree), for a student-faculty ratio of 8:1. Despite the small size of the college, the college offers more than 600 courses a year in over 50 courses of study.Swarthmore has a reputation as a very academic college. 90% of graduates eventually attend graduate or professional school. With the highest frequency, alumni earn graduate degrees at UC Berkeley, University of Chicago, Harvard, MIT, New York University, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton, Stanford, and Yale.

Swarthmore is a member of the Tri-College Consortium (or TriCo) with nearby Bryn Mawr College and Haverford College, which allows students from any of the three to cross-register for courses at any of the others. The consortium as a whole is additionally affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania and students are able to cross-register for courses there as well.

Though students and faculty tout the College s relative lack of grade inflation,Swarthmore s average undergraduate GPA increased from 2.83 in 1973 to 3.24 in 1997.Furthermore, Princeton s grade-point average has risen from 3.08 in 1973 to 3.42 in 1997, and Swarthmore s collective GPA in 1997 was 3.24. Therore, although the grade at Princeton has gone up 11 percent, the increase at Swarthmore has been 14.5 percent--nearly 30 percent greater.

Since the 1970s, Swarthmore students have won 28 Rhodes Scholarships, 8 Marshall Scholarships, 151 Fulbright Scholarships, 22 Truman Scholarships, 13 Luce Scholarships, 67 Watson Fellowships, 3 Soros Fellowships, 18 Goldwater Scholarships, 84 Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowships, 13 National Endowment for the Humanities Grants for Younger Scholars, 234 National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowships, 35 Woodrow Wilson Fellowships, and 1 Mitchell Scholarship.

Admissions

In 2008, 15% of applicants were admitted to Swarthmore for the Class of 2012. 30% of the admitted students were valedictorians or salutatorians, 51% were in the top 2% of their high school class, and 89% in the top decile.For the Class of 2011, the middle 50% SAT range for mathematics, critical reading, and writing were 680-760, 680-780, and 680-760, respectively.The Middle 50% ACT range is 27 - 33.