| Small
By Choice The Advantages of Small Colleges |
The Council of Independent Colleges A Special Report on the Role of Small Independent Colleges in America |
Focus on the
Undergraduate
High Quality Education
Liberal Arts Education
for a Lifetime
Emphasis on Values
Significant Opportunities
Advantageous Teaching
Environment
Leadership
Financially &
Administratively Efficient
College "Family"
Commitment
Among the nation's 3,200 colleges and universities, approximately 720 are small, independent institutions. They enroll 3,000 or fewer students, grant the baccalaureate degree, and stress the liberal arts. They are governed by independent boards of trustees, are beholden neither to state nor federal authorities, and are free to act as they see fit.
A simple but compelling historical fact best conveys the value placed upon these institutions: They have prospered in the educational marketplace for more than two centuries by consciously choosing to remain small, even though many at numerous times in their history could have elected to grow.
By consciously remaining small, wisely using available resources, and hewing steadfastly to their mission, small college have sustained themselves since the earliest times of the Republic. Today, America's small colleges are a vital component in higher education. Small size is a proven success story. These are the reasons.
Small colleges focus on the education of the undergraduate
student.
This is an arrow-straight mission, unencumbered by the demands of faculty
research grants and undiffused by a proliferation of public service activities.
Teaching comes first. Of course, faculty at small colleges carry out research
- much of it distinguished. However, it is research that links directly
to the undergraduate instruction program; it is scholarship that feeds
the teaching and learning processes. This sharp focus on the undergraduate
gives small college a beneficial advantage in developing the academic
talents of students.
"A combination of forces in American higher education has resulted in the transformation of professors from teachers concerned with their students' characters and minds to professional scholars committed more to their specific disciplines than to teaching or the life of the academic institutions where they hold their appointments. Research and specialization may be what graduate schools are all about, but they are not what undergraduate college are about ..."
-from "Integrity in the College Curriculum: A Report to the Academic Community," Association of American Colleges, 1985.
Learn more about the
high quality education available to all kinds of students at small
colleges ...
This Special Report is made possible by a generous grant from the Atlantic Richfield Foundation.
This Special Report was published by the Council of Independent Colleges in association with JB Associates Washington, Ltd., Washington D.C.
The Council of Independent College (CIC)
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