Grinnell College Top Questions

Academics at Grinnell are rigorous. You will be continuously challenged to stretch yourself to the limit, especially in the areas of writing and class participation. Professors at Grinnell don't lecture very often. Instead, most classes are conducted in a class-discussion format in which each student is expected to contribute to the construction of knowledge in the daily classroom environmnet. This participation is usually part of your grade. The good thing, though, is that because the classes are so small (average is about 15-20), the professor works hard to create a comfortable environment in which you're free to speak your mind. And in the process, you really get to know your fellow classmates. I've met some of my best friends in class. That doesn't happen at many schools. Intellectual conversations are extremely common outside of class. One of the things I love most about Grinnell is that it's not competitive at all. Discussions about grades are rare, and students are quick to help a fellow classmate study for an exam, edit a paper, or find a resource. Students at Grinnell study A LOT. I think I study an average of 5 hours a night. You simply can not start your homework for Monday on a Sunday night. The reading load is heavy, and you'll have several papers in every class. But the professors make is possible to do well. They are available for you outside of class during office hours and by email or phone call. The profs want you to do well, and they will literally sit with you for an hour editing your paper before you hand it in. Profs are very approachable, and it's not uncommon for them to invite students to their homes for dinner, invite them to an academic conference, or encourage them to apply to do research with them over the summer. Grinnell's individually advised curriculum is nothing short of awesome! Grinnell has no general education requirements other than one class--a writing intensive introduction to Grinnell academic life called "The First Year Tutorial." Other than that, you are free to pick all your own classes. There are requirements for your major, but you'll still have 2-3 classes each semester that you take outside your major department. It's extremely common for science majors to take theater classes, sociology majors to take bio, or math majors to take english. Grinnell students are truly well-rounded. One of my favorite classes was my social psychology class. In this class, each student designed and conducted their own in-depth experiment which they ran with actual participants. This is an experience that most college students don't receive until graduate school! Because Grinnell is a liberal arts college, its education is geared toward learning for its own sake--learning to become a life-long learner. Fortunately, the skills you learn at Grinnell will be useful in nearly every career and profession.

There is alot of work both in and out of class, but if you do it you always feel rewarded! (Well in most cases!)

Grinnell is awesome because professor do truly get to know you personally. The professors are what gives Grinnell its academic quality. They are extremely intelligent and capable in what they teach and they know how and are able to teach their students.

So I'm a bio major and my intro bio class was something unusual. Instead of being taught as a content-based lecture class like most schools, it was organized in a special topic/research seminar format. We read and discussed articles in a specific field of biology my professor was an expert in, and then used the information we gained from reading real, first-hand research articles to design our own experiments to test relevant questions in our field. My group removed bacteria from spinach, identified fecal contaminants, assessed their antibiotic resistance, and then mutated them with UV to observe how that resistance changed. The class put down a solid foundation of skills I will need to be a research scientist: reading and understanding primary literature, designing experiments, using sterile lab technique/working with microorganisms, giving oral presentations alone and in groups, making and presenting posters, writing full fledged, formal scientific papers, and many other useful things. It was amazing!

I'm on first name basis with all my profs. I talk to many of them outside of class all the time. We pull pranks on them, and they do the same to us some times. If you are into forming a close tie with your professors, Grinnell is the best place to be. As a science major, we have a lot of really cool toys to play with. Although we do not have the most high-tech toys that big universities might have, we are given 100{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} access to pretty much everything around here. That means I get to work on a multi-hundred-thousand dollars Xray Spectroscopy machine, the giant telescope out in the observatory, etc. The downside--homework is a real bitch. For every credit of class (16 credit is the normal load), expect to spend 3 hours outside for homework, officially. In reality, expect to up to 6 hours on homework per credit of class taken, and a few more for studying, and then some more to meet with the prof. On a project weeks, sleep is a rare occasion.

CHALLENGING! Academic life is tough. Especially since it seems that most people at Grinnell live to challenge themselves and almost work themselves to death. Stress usually runs high Sunday through Thursday but most people are able to relax on the weekends. Professors are great. Every prof I have had knows my name, and I am pretty close with all of my math profs, as well as several physics profs. Students study frequently (sometimes it feels as though every spare moment is either in the library or some academic building) but are never opposed to a study break. Intellectual conversations are incredibly common outside of class, though usually it involves a late-night dorm hall conversation about religion or philosophy or politics... and then you KNOW you belong at Grinnell. Sometimes dining hall conversations can also become academically heavy, but usually friends will laugh it off because meal chats are generally more light-hearted and joking. The math major is challenging and the math department is fantastic. I know many other majors and we all do work together (this is generally encouraged in departments like math, physics, chem... anything where there are regular problem sets). There is a math department picnic in the fall and spring and over the summer, many opportunities for research with members of the department. The picnic is especially fun; professors bring their families and everyone eats and talks (sometimes nerdy math stuff) and has a great time. Students are competitive (most high-achievers are to some extent) but not usually with each other. It is more of a competition with oneself, trying to do better on this upcoming exam than the last one... improving the paper by a letter grade, never trying to do better than that girl across the room. Academic requirements are interesting -- no core classes or distribution requirements beyond first year tutorial (and 3 classes in each division in order to graduate with honors or study abroad, which is really not THAT difficult). I think that the education at Grinnell is geared toward doing whatever the student wants to do; there are so many resources, the students just need to know how to take advantage of them all.

If I were to change one thing, I would have smaller class sizes.

The great thing about a small school is that the Professors know who you are and are always willing to help with whatever you are working on in or outside of class. Academics are more difficult here than at other colleges and require about 1.5-2 hours of studying for every hour spent in class. Of course, if you take good notes in most classes, studying does not take that much time. Not everyone is vocal during classes but a good majority of people are, of course that makes class more interesting because so many people have different opinions and it makes the classes go by faster. There are not a lot of lecture courses here which is great. The requirements here are not unrealistic but very open to letting you pursue your major but still take other unrealted "fun" classes as well. Grinnell sends a large of students to grad school, though I hear it is not difficult to get a job coming out of Grinnell either.

Not enough can be said about the quality of the professors at Grinnell College, in short though, they are all qualified and dedicated. The teaching staff isn't just helpful, they are often as engaged in the campus community as the students. Classes never reach more than 30 students in size and they are always taught by professors, unlike at larger schools. Grinnell is unique in that is doesn't have any general requirements for graduation and this allows for students to explore various courses of study and really take advantage of the liberal arts education offered here.

Most classes are small. I've never heard of a class being larger than 30 people, and so the student-teacher relationships here are great. You are always being taught by an actual professor, and therefore it's pretty much guaranteed that they will know your name. There is consistently a lot of in-class participation, as well as outside projects and random conversations continuing in-class discussions. I remember one time at lunch when my roommate had just come from Philosophy and our entire table got into a debate about whether God "thinks." The academic requirements are really easy to fulfill at Grinnell because of one reason: there's only one required class. That's the freshman tutorial, a class that gets you up to speed on college-level writing, and it's only for the first semester of your freshman year. After that, it's up to you.