St. Olaf College

St. Olaf College (visited 11/3/22)

Fun fact: This is one of few colleges in the country where students can major in Norwegian – and offers the largest number of Norwegian language courses in the country. Started as a school for Norwegian immigrants (which helps to explain the ‘um yah yah!’ chant), St. Olaf also offers a Nordic Studies major. Members of Norwegian royalty have visited campus a number of times, and the Queen was there in October 2022 for a ribbon cutting and broadcasted her weekly webcast from here.

As with all other colleges I’ve visited on the Colleges that Change Lives list, this place is phenomenal! Our tour guide said that it has definitely changed her life: “It’s the first time that I’ve been able to concentrate on being a student and build relationships. We’re in a type of bubble, but in the absolute best sort of way! I can’t thank this place enough for everything I’ve gotten here.”

“We’re kind of a quirky place. We work hard but don’t take ourselves too seriously. We like to have fun!” said our tour guide. “We don’t have Greek life, so the arts, the athletic teams, and the clubs are places we find our people.” Joining things is very much a part of the campus culture, “but it’s not pressured. People do it because they want to.” One of the reps described St. Olaf as “a traditional liberal arts college. Students who flourish here have a sense of purpose and take joy in learning with other people. People eat together. They’re social. It’s key to who we are.” This vibe shown through: students walking around were engaging with each other.

With 3000 undergrads, one person described St. Olaf as “a big small college which is how we like it. We have more diversity in identities; we have a few more people who are like – and unlike – you.” Almost ¼ of domestic students self-identify as BiPOC. Several people described the college as a highly affirming LGBTQI+ community. They have a robust First Gen support system, including mentors, affinity groups, and workshops about financial and other topics relevant to the students (including on recent one on loan forgiveness). Just over half of the students come from outside of Minnesota, including about 100 countries. They’re almost entirely residential with 95% of students living on campus all 4 years. They intentionally match roommates so that students from Minnesota live with students coming from outside of the state. As a side note, this is also a dry campus.

Memorial Chime Tower

Campus is gorgeous with many buildings made of the same stone; it’s reminiscent of Bryn Mawr (or vice versa!). Architectural Digest ranked St. Olaf’s campus 3^rd Most Beautiful Campus in the country. One reason is that there’s no traffic/parking on central campus; “Parking is available but not always the most accessible,” said one tour guide. “It’s on the outskirts to make the campus more walkable.” A few other interesting things to note: there’s a tradition to sled down the hill behind Old Main during the first snowfall every year. Holland Hall (where the social sciences are housed) was modeled off a monastery in France; the tour guide didn’t think there was a particular reason other than the architect liked it. They host a Harry Potter night in the building every fall, complete with Butter Beer, movie showings, and more. “People get entirely decked out for it!” In the center of campus sits the Memorial Chime Tower, built in 2003, which already has “lots of traditions associated with it. People will come back and get engaged here.”

The rooftop garden on the library

Campus sits on a hill overlooking the town Northfield and is surrounded by 400 campus-owned acres of land that includes several miles of trails used by students and faculty. (There’s also an oatmeal factory nearby, and the tour guide loves it: “It smells so good!”) Downtown is a short walk away. Carleton is the other university in town; students can take classes there, provided the same class isn’t being offered at St. Olaf. We asked students about this; “it’s done but it’s not super common.” There’s a busing system that students can use around town that also runs up to the Twin Cities, including to the Mall of America and the airport (about 40 minutes north).

The Music School

Students agree that academics are challenging – but motivated students will do just fine. There’s a lot of resources and support to help the transition but “it’s on you to take advantage of what they offer.” Students major in everything from Dance to Quantitative Economics to Classics (they still teach Latin and Greek). “We’re a little more expansive than some liberal arts colleges, including nursing and social work.” Music is also a big deal; 30% of students participate in some way. They operate a bit like a conservatory (think Lawrence or Oberlin) but it’s integrated more seamlessly into the liberal arts. I loved that a student was in an alcove outside the music building practicing his trombone as we walked by – and didn’t care who was listening! Approximately 700 students participate in the yearly Christmas Festival concert. This year, it’s held at Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis “which is disappointing to alumni and others who wanted to come to campus for their Lutheran Buffet,” said the tour guide.

Message to a professor from a student

I asked a couple students what their favorite/coolest class was:

• Film and Media Theory – “He treated us like we’re capable of rising to the challenge of the dense material. We looked at some tricky stuff, but it was dynamic and relevant; he brought it to life.”
• Urban Sociology – “We live in a city. We researched an urban city in what we call home and did ethnographic research. It was eye-opening.”

Big Old, the wind turbine

They’re on a 4-1-4 academic calendar. Interim, a month in January, “focuses on one thing. It’s a great personal and intellectual experience,” said the tour guide. “It’s also a great time to be on campus. It’s cold as hell, but it’s contemplative.” However, in any given Interim, 600 students study off campus; many students do more than one trip as an undergrad. There are also plenty of summer opportunities on and off campus. Many students stick around for research or to work on the campus farm that supplies food to the dining hall. They’re big on Farm to Fork and other sustainable efforts – there’s even a wind turbine on campus (not so subtly called “Big Ole”) which provides about 1/3 of power on campus.

Another thing St. Olaf is known for is providing opportunities to study off campus. They’ve been named a top institution for numbers of students who study abroad. There are robust opportunities for semester or year-long study abroad in addition to Interim. Students are globally engaged. “People show up asking where they’re going to study abroad. It’s part of the culture here.” They offer extensive language classes (and majors), concentrations, Learning Communities, and other opportunities that support language acquisition, cultural appreciation, and more. Students can get a certificate in Languages Across the Curriculum or join learning communities such as Asian Conversations.

St. Olaf is one of 26 US institutions affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, one of the largest Christian denominations in the US with about 3 million members. However, this is classified as a “Third-Path Institution”: it’s both religiously rooted and religiously inclusive. “It falls between Sectarian (deeply rooted in one religious tradition and dedicated to nurturing students in that tradition, going out of their way to have students and staff of that one denomination) and Non-Sectarian with no religious rootedness.” Only 20% of their student body self-identify as Lutheran as compared to 26% who don’t claim an affiliation. They could do a better job of attracting students from non-Christian faiths: only about 6% of students self-identify as members of another religion (Hindu, Jain, Muslim, and Jewish). Despite this, they do have a rabbi on staff and have some active student groups, including one for Muslim students.

This is a place that students can come and have conversations about faith – but it’s not expected. They can also be a person of NO faith. “Lutheran tradition invites people to engage with a body of thought,” said a rep. Students must fulfill religious 2 Gen Ed requirements:

1. Religion, Faith, and Values which builds religious literacy with a focus on a religious tradition or set of related traditions.
2. Christian Theology in Dialogue which focuses on the dialogue of ideas: there’s a list of options including things like Queer Theory in Christianity or Religious Pluralism and Community.

One of the professors said that “learning about religions is the unlearning of hate. It comes down to having conversations with other people who may be different from you. St Olaf does a good job of that.” A daily Chapel service is offered but never required. The chapel itself is an event space so students say that if feels inclusive. “Religion is as large or as small as you want it to be,” said a student which is a common refrain at many schools I’ve visited.

In one of our discussions with Admissions, Deans, and Faculty, we asked, “Who is going to choose St. Olaf over the others?” referring to Carleton and Macalester, the 2 peer institutions we also visited on this fly-in. The answers were interesting:

• “The community is built differently here – not better, just different. There’s an ethos here based on trust and honor. We have an Honor Code that’s taken very seriously. Professors don’t proctor exams. The students’ mailboxes aren’t locked. There’s a lot of trust on campus.”
• “We attract different students. Students who come here are asking, ‘What do I need to know to be a better music teacher when I get out?’ not ‘What do I need to do to get an A?’ We don’t get a lot of cross-apps. I think all the colleges benefit when students visit St. Olaf and Carleton [both in the same town] at the same time and when they visit Mac, too. Sometimes being bigger helps. St Olaf tends to hits all the boxes.”

© 2022

Carleton College

Carleton College (visited 10/3/22)

Someone had said that Carleton gave off something of an “Eastern Elite College vibe” and I can’t disagree with that after visiting. The campus has lots of brick, trees, and open spaces. Students come across as slightly more preppy than those at some peer institutions – but they’re also super smart (not surprising since Carleton has under a 20% acceptance rate). It’s a good environment for those who want a challenge without being cut-throat. One professor said, “Students are smart and intense in the classroom, but they’re laid back out of it. It’s a good balance.” The President, who teaches at least one class a year, also talked about this trend: “There’s no such thing here as being too nerdy. They bring a level of curiosity that’s unusual. I got asked if they’re nervous about having the president as a teacher. Not noticeably. They ask for extensions a lot!”

People said this about the types of students who would thrive here:

• Those who will take some risks. They know that they won’t get it right the first time and they’re ok with that. If they’re willing to participate in trying, failing, and trying again, they’ll be successful.
• Those receptive to feedback. Many of them will get Cs on papers here; they’ve never had a teacher say, “This paragraph makes no sense” before. They figure it out and get better.
• They’re excited about learning. It’s wonderful to have students come and enjoy engaging with learning and each other. They’re eager to see the reading lists. Some of it they’ve never seen before and will challenge them, but they’re excited about it.
• They appreciate what they can get from talking to peers and professors.
• Students who are ok sitting with messiness, who are ok looking at all the info and knowing they’ll figure out some of what’s going on but not all of it because they haven’t learned enough yet.

“We attract students who love to learn and teachers who love to teach” – and they’ve recently been ranked #1 for undergrad teaching. “I’m not sure why but it feels true. Teachers work hard at it.” The teachers we spoke to were incredibly enthusiastic; I can see why the students like engaging with them. “We’re always interacting with them; I always try to get them interested in the archaeological digs over the summer.”

Almost ¾ of students study off-campus during their time here, including faculty-led programs. “What I love teaching on site is the way in which you see scholarship and the world they’re studying come together and how they bring new insights to a new space. They come back very different in terms of how they understand what they’re studying. They’re living it. They have to manage life in spaces where it’s done differently, interact with people in another language or ethos.”

Classes are on the trimester system so students are only taking 3 classes at a time, “and they really focus. It seems like if they take 4 classes, you kind of know that one is a throw-away, and you hope it isn’t yours,” said a faculty member. Some of the students’ favorite classes were: “Freedom and Alienation in Black America” and “Mathematics of Climate Change.” Students can take classes at St. Olaf, the other college in town (with caveats, like if that class isn’t offered at Carleton), “but they sign on knowing they’re on a different schedule and will take that into account.”

Students don’t declare a major until sophomore year. Until then, they say they’re a “Prospective X major.” All students complete Senior Comps which are major specific; students cannot combine interests or majors into one project which is why most students don’t double major.

A cat sculpture in the library that the students will dress up for holidays

Students must be proficient in another language through the 3^rd semester of the class but can test out of it. When talking to the faculty panel, I asked what classes they really love to teach and why:

• First year Seminars. There’s so much growth in such a short amount of time.
• I love the intro classes. There’s something special about the first time that students see something and figure it out. But I also love the upper-level seminars because we delve into new topics and the theoretical things with students who are excited as I am about it.
• Experiential Archaeology and History where we try to figure out the life behind people who didn’t leave a record. Like, how do you turn left with a massive army? I bring in local speakers: shepherds, someone to talk about iron, and how bread making without leavening. Students dig their own clay and build a kiln. They have to write lab reports and they think they’re getting away with it!
• Intro to Comp Sci: we have all sorts of people showing up: people majoring and those just wanting to try it out. We teach them the same. They make progress. They’re learning to think algorhythmically. It can also show how many places CS touches. Let’s look at ethics or cryptology. It’s things I don’t usually teach or research but can delve into.

Part of the Center for Creativity in the town’s old high school

Although there’s a great central campus, the university is more spread out than many similarly sized peer institutions: they’ve spread into town and incorporated several old buildings near campus. The old local High School is now the Center for Creativity which has phenomenal arts spaces for Dance, theater, and more. There’s more traffic on and around campus than at some others, noticeably St. Olaf, located right up the hill. Freshman can’t have cars on campus; after that, students are assigned to lots on a first-come-first-served basis. “I didn’t get my car until this summer and registered late so my lot is further away,” said our tour guide.

The quad: the “Bald Spot” is on the far side

The campus quad is nicknamed “the Bald Spot” (the tour guide acknowledged it not being a creative name!). There’s an indentation in the middle which they’ll flood in the winter and let freeze so students can play hockey and Broomball, a big tradition on campus. This is also the location of the Freshman Frisbee Toss; at the end of Orientation, students are given frisbees which, after a speech from the President, they toss into the Bald Spot indicating that they’re not Carleton Students. (There are plenty of events for seniors, too, to mark the closing of their Carleton experiences, as well).

One of the dorm areas

Almost all students (98%) live on campus in a variety of living options. About 20% live in Special Interest Houses ranging from Cookie House (yes, they bake there!), Canoe (Outdoor Enthusiasts), Asia House, Freedom House (black students), religiously based housing, Activism, and more. Our tour guide said that this is a place where students show up to events. Their weekly Convocation Series brings in big-name speakers (like Obama when he was a Senator). Students can sign up to have lunch with them after the event. We asked her what she likes to do off campus; coffee was a big thing, but “I don’t go off campus a lot, at least not for major events. There’s so much to do on campus that I end up getting busy here. I go off more often to pick things up that I need or maybe a meal but not for entertainment as much as I thought I would.”

Some living options close to town.

There’s a lot of local stuff right off campus in the cute downtown area. The town library is only a block away, and there are bookstores, coffee shops, restaurants, and more within a 5-minute walk (including a museum where they do an annual Jesse James reenactment). There’s a large Latin American diaspora here “so you get a lot of amazing food that you don’t expect in Minnesota,” said one of the reps we were walking with downtown. “There are great restaurants in general.” There aren’t any chain stores in downtown; all of them are further out.

© 2022

Macalester College

Macalester College (visited 10/4/22)

Fun fact: Not surprising for a college with Scottish roots, Macalester has a pipe band and all students can take free bagpipe lessons!

“At our core, we’re a liberal arts college. We’re a mission driven institution: internationalism, service to society, academics. These inform all we do. Students live those values,” said an admission rep. Mac attracts a community of students who are engaged, sometimes to a fault. “Students are so earnest! They are when they’re athletes, when they’re so sure they know the way forward (which changes, of course!), when they’re trying to figure out how to be an adult, about their academics, about improving the world they’re living in. Sometimes I need a little less earnestness; it’s 8am,” said one of the Deans. Students arrive at Mac prepared to think about things. They have an idea of what their ideals are and are willing to be uncomfortable.

In the wake of George Floyd being murdered in Minneapolis, we asked what the aftermath looked like on campus. “Racial reckoning happens every day depending on the skin you live in. Students are figuring out how to work through anger and fear, listening to others when they don’t understand or if they’ve had an experience they haven’t lived.” Students are hungry to talk about privilege and oppression as well as intersectionality. The president has even offered to reimburse students for bail money if they were charged while protesting!

“We’ve all been learning how to have hard conversations. We aren’t going to be perfect,” said one of the Deans, who went on to say that with this comes a sense of ‘Institutional Restlessness,’ a striving to be better. A faculty member added to this by saying, “I see it as innovation. We’re known for trying things. We wrestle with ideas. Sometimes we fail, but we figure it out. It’s designed to look at the students who are here now and figure out what they’re going to need in the future.”

Mac’s location St. Paul/the Twin Cities adds value to what they can offer to students. The college has built a multitude of partnerships with businesses and community organizations to provide service-learning, experiential education, internships/externships, and other community-based educational opportunities. They help students get meaningful internships (many students stay in town for this, but they can be done away over the summer, too); many are paid, but the university provides stipends to students if they’re unpaid. Many classes engage with the city and community organizations in order to enrich the curriculum and coursework. “There are tons of things,” said a student. “I took a geology/art class that looked at landscape and urban design. We were always trekking around the city.”

A class being held outside

Although in a city, this is an insular 3-block campus in a residential neighborhood. We asked our female tour guide about being in the city and if this reflected in safety issues; “I’m pretty small, and I walk around at all hours. I’ve never felt unsafe here.” Students get free bus passes for the MSP city busses which stop on campus. It’s a 15-minute ride to downtown Minneapolis, and the light rail runs all over, including the Mall of America and the airport.

Because they’re so close to so many other institutions, students have opportunities for cross-registration at St. Thomas, St. Catherine, Hamline, and Augsburg. They also have a looser agreement with Minneapolis College of Art and Design; students can take 1 class per term but must get approval for it before registering. There aren’t shuttles between campuses, but St Tom’s is walkable (“It’s about 5 minutes down the street,” said the tour guide) and the others are accessible on public transportation.

This is an incredibly inclusive community in all sorts of ways. They’ve been named one of the most LGBTQ-friendly campuses in the country. Almost 20% of students are First Gen; almost 40% self-identify as BIPOC. At the end of many events, students will come up and recite the Peace prayer (“It’s not really a prayer”) in their own language. “It’s a good reminder to recenter and take a breath and what we’re about.”

As part of their Internationalism mission, they provide a ton of international experiences which includes everything from working with immigrant or other international groups in town to going abroad. More than half of the students study abroad, and 11 departments require some sort of study-away experience. Students are required to show competency through 4 semesters of a language (or can test out). There are Language Living Communities for all languages they teach (including Portuguese, Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, and Russian); they each house 15-20 students; students can choose to live there starting in their sophomore year. “Students live here a lot before going abroad to give them a jump start with the language.” They also have robust multicultural resources, including the Lealtad-Suzuki Center. “We want people to explore and take pride in their own identity but also engage with people who aren’t like them.”

They have a 2-year residency requirement. There are three first-year dorms with mostly double rooms; they’re not super large but they get the job done. They have all-gender and single-gender floor options. Juniors and seniors who choose to move off campus mostly live within about a mile and stay involved on campus. In addition to the Language Houses, there are multiple other options including Interfaith, All Gender, Healthy Living, and even a Vegetarian Coop – located under the bleachers of one of the athletic fields! They cook together a couple times a week and get funding to shop for the food.

A couple major traditions that got shout-outs from students we talked to were Midnight Breakfasts and Pushball. Midnight breakfast happens at the end of every semester before exams; from 9pm-midnight, the President, deans, and professors cook breakfast in the dining hall. Pushball, an annual event on Founders Day, the classes play each other. “It’s a huge deal! We get really competitive. I remember one where one guy rolled up and over the ball – and then it rolled over him. He’s ok, though! He popped right back up!”

The concert hall

Academics are challenging but manageable according to the students we talked to. The facilities are impressive for a school this size, including some that are more unusual for a school this size such as an amazing concert hall and an observatory. A few programs you wouldn’t necessarily expect at a smaller school include Performance Design and Technologies; Food, Agriculture, and Society; Human Rights and Humanitarianism; Critical Theory; International Development; and Astronomy (which explains the observatory!).

I asked students what their favorite classes were; they were so enthusiastic about what they were doing that it was hard for many to come up with one (so some told me about two!):

Part of the Science Building

• Distress Disorder and Disfunction (DSM): “This was called ‘Abnormal Psych’ class until a student asked what ‘Abnormal’ really meant!”
• Microbiology: “We do so many fun experiments including making sourdough starter!”
• International Storytelling: “We’re learning about different cultural storytelling forms to break away from Western standards. We do a lot of oral storytelling in class, and they’ll bring pizza in during it.”
• Advanced Archaeology Seminar: “We do a lot of 3D modeling, use drones, and spend a lot of time going into the field.”
• Comparative Feminisms: “The professor is amazing and so kind! She was the highlight of the class. She created a safe community to discuss ideas. It was very theoretical and difficult, but we learned so much.”
• Psychology of Sustainable Behavior. “We had do a 10 day project in which we tried to get to as close to zero-waste as possible. It … was a bit of a disaster, but we tried hard and make huge strides in seeing what the problems were and how we can make it easier for people and also help convince people to even try to take steps forward.”

All of us got to sit in on two sample classes which were absolutely amazing! The teachers were engaging and funny. One of the two classes was the Psych of Sustainable Behavior; I would’ve taken the whole thing if I had the option. One of the teachers said this about their students: “They’re collaborative which I appreciate. The way they teach tends to be engaging and fun. Students want to learn with you, not in spite of you.”

© 2022