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Swarthmore College ( , ) is a
private Private or privates may refer to: Music * "In Private", by Dusty Springfield from the 1990 album ''Reputation'' * Private (band), a Denmark-based band * "Private" (Ryōko Hirosue song), from the 1999 album ''Private'', written and also recorded ...
liberal arts college A liberal arts college or liberal arts institution of higher education is a college with an emphasis on Undergraduate education, undergraduate study in the Liberal arts education, liberal arts of humanities and science. Such colleges aim to impart ...
in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the earliest coeducational colleges in the United States. It was established as a college under the
Religious Society of Friends Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...
. By 1906, Swarthmore had dropped its religious affiliation and officially became
non-sectarian Nonsectarian institutions are secular institutions or other organizations not affiliated with or restricted to a particular religious group. Academic sphere Many North American universities identify themselves as being nonsectarian, such as B ...
. Swarthmore is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution. It is a member of the Tri-College Consortium, a cooperative academic arrangement with
Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh language, Welsh: ) is a Private college, private Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as a ...
and
Haverford College Haverford College ( ) is a private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Haverford, Pennsylvania, United States. It was founded as a men's college in 1833 by members of the Religious Society of Fr ...
. Swarthmore is also affiliated with the
University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...
through the Quaker Consortium, which allows students to cross-register for classes at all four institutions. Swarthmore's alumni include six
Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...
winners, 13
MacArthur Foundation The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private foundation that makes grants and impact investments to support non-profit organizations in approximately 117 countries around the world. It has an endowment of $7.6 billion and ...
fellows, as well as winners of the
Tony Awards The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual cere ...
,
Grammy Awards The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious a ...
,
Academy Awards The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence in ...
,
Emmy Awards The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...
, and the
Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...
.


History

The name "Swarthmore" has its roots in early
Quaker Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...
history. In England, Swarthmoor Hall near the town of
Ulverston Ulverston is a market town and civil parish in Westmorland and Furness, Cumbria, England. Historic counties of England, Historically in Lancashire, it lies a few miles south of the Lake District Lake District National Park, National Park and j ...
, Cumbria, (previously in
Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...
), was the home of Thomas and
Margaret Fell Margaret Fell or Margaret Fox ( Askew, formerly Fell; 1614 – 23 April 1702) was a founder and leading member of the Religious Society of Friends Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Prot ...
in 1652 when
George Fox George Fox (July 1624 Old Style and New Style dates, O.S. – 13 January 1691 Old Style and New Style dates, O.S.) was an English Dissenters, English Dissenter, who was a founder of the Quakers, Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as t ...
, fresh from his epiphany atop Pendle Hill in 1651, came to visit. The visitation turned into a long association, as Fox persuaded the couple of his views. Swarthmore was used for the first meetings of what became known as the Religious Society of Friends (later colloquially labeled "The Quakers"). The college was founded in 1864 by Deborah Fisher Wharton, along with her
industrialist A business magnate, also known as an industrialist or tycoon, is a person who is a powerful entrepreneur and investor who controls, through personal enterprise ownership or a dominant shareholding position, a firm or industry whose goods or ser ...
son, Joseph Wharton, together with a committee of members of the Hicksite Yearly Meetings of
Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
, New York and
Baltimore Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the 30th-most populous U.S. city. The Baltimore metropolitan area is the 20th-large ...
. It is the only college founded by the Hicksite branch of the Society of Friends: previous Quaker institutions, like nearby
Haverford College Haverford College ( ) is a private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Haverford, Pennsylvania, United States. It was founded as a men's college in 1833 by members of the Religious Society of Fr ...
, were Orthodox in their founding history. Swarthmore held its first classes in 1869 and Edward Parrish (1822–1872) was the first president.
Lucretia Mott Lucretia Mott (née Coffin; January 3, 1793 – November 11, 1880) was an American Quakers, Quaker, Abolitionism in the United States, abolitionist, women's rights activist, and social reformer. She had formed the idea of reforming the position ...
(1793–1880) and Martha Ellicott Tyson (1795–1873) were among those Friends who insisted that the new college of Swarthmore be coeducational. Edward Hicks Magill, the second president, served for 17 years. His daughter, Helen Magill, (1853–1944), was in the first class to graduate in 1873; in 1877, she was the first woman in the United States to earn a Ph.D. In the early 1900s, the college had a major collegiate American football program during the formation period of the soon-to-be nationwide sport (playing
Navy A navy, naval force, military maritime fleet, war navy, or maritime force is the military branch, branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral z ...
, Princeton, Columbia and other larger schools) and an active fraternity and sorority life. The 1921 appointment of Frank Aydelotte as president began the development of the school's current academic focus, particularly with his vision for the Honors program based on his experience as a
Rhodes Scholar The Rhodes Scholarship is an international Postgraduate education, postgraduate award for students to study at the University of Oxford in Oxford, United Kingdom. The scholarship is open to people from all backgrounds around the world. Esta ...
. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, Swarthmore was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the
V-12 Navy College Training Program The V-12 Navy College Training Program was designed to supplement the force of commissioned officers in the United States Navy during World War II. Between July 1, 1943, and June 30, 1946, more than 125,000 participants were enrolled in 131 colleg ...
, which offered students a path to a U.S. Navy commission.
Wolfgang Köhler Wolfgang Köhler (; 21 January 1887 – 11 June 1967) was a German psychologist and phenomenologist who, like Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffka, contributed to the creation of Gestalt psychology. During the Nazi regime in Germany, he pro ...
, Hans Wallach, and
Solomon Asch Solomon Eliot Asch (September 14, 1907 – February 20, 1996) was a Polish people, Polish-United States of America, American Gestalt psychology, Gestalt psychologist and pioneer in social psychology. He created seminal pieces of work in impressi ...
were noted psychologists who became professors at Swarthmore, a center for Gestalt psychology. Both Wallach, who was Jewish, and Köhler, who was not, had left
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
because of its discriminatory policies. Köhler came to Swarthmore in 1935 and served until his retirement in 1958. Wallach came in 1936, first as a researcher, also teaching from 1942 until 1975. Asch joined the faculty in 1947 and served until 1966, conducting his noted conformity experiments at Swarthmore. The 1960s and 1970s saw the construction of new buildings: Sharples Dining Hall in 1964, Worth Health Center in 1965, the Dana/Hallowell Residence Halls in 1967, and Lang Music Building in 1973. They also saw a 1967 review of the college initiated by President Courtney Smith, a black protest movement, in which African-American students conducted an eight-day
sit-in A sit-in or sit-down is a form of direct action that involves one or more people occupying an area for a protest, often to promote political, social, or economic change. The protestors gather conspicuously in a space or building, refusing to mo ...
in the admissions office in 1969 to demand increased black enrollment – the sit-in abruptly ended after Smith's death from a heart attack on January 16 – and the establishment of both a Black Cultural Center (1970) and Women's Resource Center (1974). The Environmental Studies program and the Intercultural Center were established in 1992, and in 1993 the Lang Performing Arts Center was opened; the Kohlberg Hall was then established in 1996. In 1999 the college began purchasing renewable energy credits in the form of
wind power Wind power is the use of wind energy to generate useful work. Historically, wind power was used by sails, windmills and windpumps, but today it is mostly used to generate electricity. This article deals only with wind power for electricity ge ...
, and in the 2002–2003 academic year it constructed its first
green roof A green roof or living roof is a roof of a building that is partially or completely covered with vegetation and a growing medium, planted over a waterproofing membrane. It may also include additional layers such as a root barrier and drainage ...
. In 2008, Swarthmore's first mascot, Phineas the Phoenix, made its debut.


Academics

Swarthmore's
Oxbridge Oxbridge is a portmanteau of the University of Oxford, Universities of Oxford and University of Cambridge, Cambridge, the two oldest, wealthiest, and most prestigious universities in the United Kingdom. The term is used to refer to them collect ...
tutorial-inspired Honors Program, introduced in 1922, allows students to take double-credit seminars from their third year, and they often write honors
theses A thesis (: theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: D ...
. Seminars are usually composed of four to eight students. Students in seminars will usually write at least three 10-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 final year, Honors students take oral and written examinations conducted by outside experts in their field. Usually one student in each discipline is awarded "Highest Honors"; others are either awarded "High Honors" or "Honors"; rarely, a student is denied Honors altogether by the outside examiner. Each department usually has a grade threshold for admission to the Honors program. Uncommon for a liberal arts college, Swarthmore has an
engineering Engineering is the practice of using natural science, mathematics, and the engineering design process to Problem solving#Engineering, solve problems within technology, increase efficiency and productivity, and improve Systems engineering, s ...
program in which, at the completion of four years' work, students are granted a B.S. in engineering. Other notable programs include minors in
peace and conflict studies Peace and conflict studies is a social science field that identifies and analyzes violence, violent and nonviolence, nonviolent behaviors as well as the structural violence, structural mechanisms attending Conflict (process), conflicts (including ...
,
cognitive science Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary, scientific study of the mind and its processes. It examines the nature, the tasks, and the functions of cognition (in a broad sense). Mental faculties of concern to cognitive scientists include percep ...
and interpretation theory. Swarthmore has an undergraduate student enrollment of 1,620 (for the 2016–2017 year) and 187 faculty members (99% with a terminal degree), for a student-faculty ratio of 8:1. The small college offers more than 600 courses per year in over 40 courses of study. Its most popular majors, based on 2021 graduates, were: * Economics (53) * Biology/Biological Sciences (37) * Computer & Information Sciences (36) * Engineering (23) * Mathematics (18) * Research & Experimental Psychology (16)


Rankings

Some sources, including ''Greene's Guides'',Greene, Howard and Matthew Greene (2000) ''Greenes' Guides to Educational Planning: The Hidden Ivies: Thirty Colleges of Excellence'', HarperCollins, , excerpt a
HarperCollins.com
have termed Swarthmore one of the "
Little Ivies The Little Ivies are an unofficial group of small, academically competitive private liberal arts colleges in the Northeastern United States. The term Little Ivy derives from these schools' small student bodies, standards of academic excellence ...
". In its 2025 college ranking, '' U.S. News & World Report'' ranked Swarthmore as the third-best liberal arts college in the nation, behind Williams and Amherst. Since the inception of the ''U.S. News'' rankings, Amherst, Williams and Swarthmore are the only colleges to have been ranked for the number one liberal arts college. Swarthmore has been ranked the number one liberal arts college in the country six times."Liberal Arts College rankings"
, ''Chronicle of Higher Education''
''
Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...
'' magazine ranked Swarthmore 27th in its 2024-25 ranking of the top 500 U.S. colleges, universities and service academies . Swarthmore ranked third among all institutions of higher education in the United States as measured by the percentage of graduates who went on to earn Ph.D.s between 2013 and 2022. In 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2013, Swarthmore was named the #1 "Best Value" private college by '' The Princeton Review''. Overall selection criteria included more than 30 factors in three areas: academics, costs and financial aid. Swarthmore was also placed on ''The Princeton Review'' Financial Aid Honor Roll along with twelve other institutions for receiving the highest possible rating in its ranking methodology.


Admissions

The college is considered by '' U.S. News & World Report'' as "most selective", with 10.7% of the 9,383 applicants accepted during the 2016–2017 admissions cycle. The number of applicants was the highest in the college's history and among the highest overall of any liberal arts college. The college saw increases in the number of underrepresented students, first-generation college students, and international students. The college reports that "Twenty-five percent of the admitted students are among the first generation in their family to attend college" and "Of the admitted students attending high schools reporting class rank, 94 percent are in the top decile". The class of 2022 admissions statistics have been fully released, where 13,012 applicants resulted in 1013 admits for an admit rate of 7.78%. In 2012, '' The Princeton Review'' gave Swarthmore a 99 out of 99 on their Admissions Selectivity Rating.


Graduates

At Swarthmore, 15% of earners of undergraduate degrees immediately enter graduate or professional school, and, within five years of graduation, 75% of alumni enter these programs. Alumni of the school earn graduate degrees most commonly at institutions that include
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
, the
University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...
,
Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
,
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
,
Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...
, the
University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...
,
Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
and the
University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
. At graduate programs, the most common fields for Swarthmore graduates to enter are math & physical sciences, humanities, social sciences, life sciences and engineering. PayScale reports that Swarthmore graduates have an average starting salary of $70,800 and an average mid-career salary of $142,900, making their salaries the 31st highest among all college and university graduates with only a bachelor's. This puts them above larger institutions such as Vanderbilt,
Brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing and painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors Orange (colour), orange and black. In the ...
and
Johns Hopkins Johns Hopkins (May 19, 1795 – December 24, 1873) was an American merchant, investor, and philanthropist. Born on a plantation, he left his home to start a career at the age of 17, and settled in Baltimore, Maryland, where he remained for mos ...
—ranked 70th, 33rd and 95th, respectively. Swarthmore is also ninth among liberal arts colleges alone.


Endowment and tuition fees

As a
need-blind Need-blind admission in the United States refers to a college admission policy that does not take into account an applicant's financial status when deciding whether to accept them. This approach typically results in a higher percentage of accepted ...
school, Swarthmore makes admission decisions and financial aid decisions independently. The cost of tuition, student activity fees, room and board for the 2024–25 academic year was $85,802 (tuition fees were $65,058). The college meets 100% of admitted student demonstrated need without use of student loans, an important distinction from the many schools that meet 100% of demonstrated need, but only through loans (which must be repaid) rather than institutional grant- and scholarship-based funding (which does not require repayment). Financial aid is accessed by 56% of the student body, and the average financial aid award was $50,361 during the 2017–18 year. Swarthmore has the eleventh largest endowment per undergraduate in the country. Operating revenue for the 2016 fiscal year was $148,086,000, over 50% of which was provided by the endowment. Swarthmore ended a $230 million capital campaign on October 6, 2006, when President Bloom declared the project completed, three months ahead of schedule. The campaign, christened the "Meaning of Swarthmore", had been underway officially since the fall of 2001. Out of the college's alumni, 87% participated in the effort. Swarthmore's endowment at the end of the 2019 fiscal year was $2.13 billion. Endowment per student was $1,370,157 for the same year, one of the highest rates in the country.As of June 30, 2021 At the end of 2007, the Swarthmore Board of Managers approved the decision for the college to eliminate student loans from all financial aid packages. Instead, additional aid scholarships are granted.


Campus

The campus consists of , 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 fourth floor houses
campus radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...
station WSRN-FM as well as the weekly student newspaper, ''The Phoenix''. From the SEPTA Swarthmore commuter train station and the borough of Swarthmore to the south, the oak-lined Magill Walk leads north up a hill to Parrish. The campus is coterminous with the grounds of the Scott Arboretum, cited by some as a main staple of the campus's renowned beauty. In 2011, '' Travel + Leisure'' named Swarthmore one of the most beautiful college campuses in the United States. The majority of the buildings housing classrooms and department offices are located to the north of Parrish, as are Kyle and Woolman dormitories. McCabe Library is to the east of Parrish, as are the dorms Willets, Mertz, Worth, The Lodges, Alice Paul and David Kemp. To the west are the dorms Wharton, Dana, Hallowell and Danawell, along with the Scott Amphitheater, an open wooded outdoor amphitheater, in which graduations and college collections (meetings) are held. The Crum Woods extend westward from the main campus, and many buildings on the forest side of the campus incorporate views of the woods. South of Parrish is the Dining Center, attached to the former Sharples dining hall, and other smaller buildings. Dormitories Palmer, Pittenger, Roberts, and the NPPR Apartments are south of the railroad station, as are the athletic facilities, while the 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.


Friends Historical Library

Friends Historical Library was established in 1871 to collect, preserve and make available archival,
manuscript A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand or typewritten, as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in some indirect or automated way. More recently, the term has ...
, printed and visual records concerning the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) from their origins mid-seventeenth century to the present. Besides the focus on Quaker history, the holdings are a significant research collection for the regional and local history of the middle-Atlantic region of the United States and the history of American social reform. Quakers played prominent roles in almost every major reform movement in American history, including
abolition Abolition refers to the act of putting an end to something by law, and may refer to: *Abolitionism, abolition of slavery *Capital punishment#Abolition of capital punishment, Abolition of the death penalty, also called capital punishment *Abolitio ...
,
African-American history African-American history started with the forced transportation of List of ethnic groups of Africa, Africans to North America in the 16th and 17th centuries. The European colonization of the Americas, and the resulting Atlantic slave trade, ...
, Indian rights,
women's rights Women's rights are the rights and Entitlement (fair division), entitlements claimed for women and girls worldwide. They formed the basis for the women's rights movement in the 19th century and the feminist movements during the 20th and 21st c ...
,
prison reform Prison reform is the attempt to improve conditions inside prisons, improve the effectiveness of a penal system, reduce recidivism or implement alternatives to incarceration. It also focuses on ensuring the reinstatement of those whose lives are ...
, humane treatment of the mentally ill, and temperance. The collections also reflect the significant role Friends played in the development of science, technology, education and business in Britain and America. The library also maintains the Swarthmore College Archives and the papers of the Swarthmore Historical Society. Within the
archive An archive is an accumulation of historical records or materials, in any medium, or the physical facility in which they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or organ ...
s is what was formerly known as the Jane Addams Peace Collection and later called the Swarthmore College Peace Collection (SCPC). The SCPC includes papers from
Jane Addams Laura Jane Addams (September 6, 1860May 21, 1935) was an American Settlement movement, settlement activist, Social reform, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator, philosopher, and author. She was a leader in the history of s ...
' collection and material from over 59 countries. The
Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize (Swedish language, Swedish and ) is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the Will and testament, will of Sweden, Swedish industrialist, inventor, and armaments manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Nobe ...
, awarded to Addams, is part of the collection. The SCPC states that "Well over fifty percent of all the holdings in the Peace Collection concern women's activism around the world." The SCPC was started when Lucy Biddle Lewis, a member of the board of managers, discovered that Addams was burning her old papers, and convinced her to donate them instead to the Friends Historical Library. After
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, the librarian at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
, Julian P. Boyd, appraised the papers in the SCPC's collection and found that they were of "rare historic value".


Student life

One thousand six hundred and forty-seven students (colloquially referred to as "Swatties") attend Swarthmore . The median family income of Swatties is $165,500, with 53% of students coming from the top 10% highest-earning families and 18.2% from the bottom 60%.


Mock trial

Founded in 2000, the Swarthmore mock trial team placed tenth at the 2000 American Mock Trial Association (AMTA) National Championship Tournament and was awarded "Best New School". Dennis Cheng '01 was awarded the prestigious "Spirit of AMTA" award in 2000. Swarthmore's team placed second at the 2001 AMTA National Championship Tournament. The Swarthmore Mock Trial program has also won numerous accolades and boasted a team of over 25 members for the 2013–2014 season. The 2010–2011 competitive season resulted in all three teams competing at Regional Championships, two teams going on to Opening Round Championships, and one team qualifying and competing at the 2011 National Championships held in
Des Moines Des Moines is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities in Iowa, most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is the county seat of Polk County, Iowa, Polk County with parts extending into Warren County, Iowa, Wa ...
, Iowa, where the team placed 15th in their division. Other successes included placing first at the Philadelphia Regional competition in February 2011, and winning the University of Massachusetts Amherst's invitational tournament in February 2014.


Greek life

Until 2019, two Greek organizations existed on the campus in the form of
fraternities A fraternity (; whence, " brotherhood") or fraternal organization is an organization, society, club or fraternal order traditionally of men but also women associated together for various religious or secular aims. Fraternity in the Western conce ...
: Delta Upsilon and local Phi Psi, a former chapter of Phi Kappa Psi. A third,
Phi Sigma Kappa Phi Sigma Kappa (), colloquially known as Phi Sig or PSK, is a men's social and academic Fraternities and sororities, fraternity with approximately 74 List of Phi Sigma Kappa chapters#Chapters, active chapters and provisional chapters in North Am ...
fraternity, maintained a chapter on campus from 1906 to 1991 and continues strong alumni involvement.
Sororities In North America, fraternities and sororities ( and ) are social clubs at colleges and universities. They are sometimes collectively referred to as Greek life or Greek-letter organizations, as well as collegiate fraternities or collegiate sorori ...
were abandoned in the 1930s following student outrage about discrimination within the sorority system, and leading to a 79-year ban. However, in September 2012, the college announced that the ban on sororities would be reversed as of the 2013 term, citing
Title IX Title IX is a landmark federal civil rights law in the United States that was enacted as part (Title IX) of the Education Amendments of 1972. It prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or any other education program that receiv ...
regulations. The four women who helped overturn the ban subsequently spearheaded the reestablishment of a
Kappa Alpha Theta Kappa Alpha Theta (), commonly referred to simply as Theta, is an international Fraternities and sororities, sorority founded on January 27, 1870, at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. It was the first Greek-letter fraternity established ...
chapter the following spring. The announcement sparked controversy on campus; a petition seeking a referendum to continue the ban was dismissed, again citing a legal opinion that to disallow the sorority chapter would be a violation of Title IX regulations. The sorority admitted its first pledge class in the Spring of 2013. A further non-binding referendum was later distributed, but by then the controversy had cooled: Of the six items on the referendum, only one passed, which asked "Do you support admitting students of all genders to sororities and fraternities?" No action was taken on the referendum. In April 2019, two student publications, ''Voices'' and ''The Phoenix'', published leaked minutes from Swarthmore's chapter of Phi Psi dating from 2013 to 2016. The 116-page document contained a plethora of
misogynistic Misogyny () is hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against women or girls. It is a form of sexism that can keep women at a lower social status than men, thus maintaining the social roles of patriarchy. Misogyny has been widely practis ...
,
racist Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one Race (human categorization), race or ethnicity over another. It may also me ...
, and
homophobic Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who identify or are perceived as being lesbian, Gay men, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred, or ant ...
jokes and slurs as well as pornographic images and evidence of
hazing Hazing (American English), initiation, beasting (British English), bastardisation (Australian English), ragging (South Asian English) or deposition refers to any activity expected of someone in joining or participating in a group that humiliates, ...
. Students responded by calling for the college's administration to immediately terminate all fraternity leases on campus, staging a sit-in at the Phi Psi house until the demands were met. Both Delta Upsilon and Phi Psi announced their voluntary disbandment on April 30, 2019. President Valerie Smith subsequently announced on May 10, 2019, that Greek letter organizations were no longer allowed at Swarthmore.


Media


''The Swarthmore Phoenix''

''The Swarthmore Phoenix'' has been the independent campus newspaper of Swarthmore College since 1881 or 1882. The phoenix has deep roots in Swarthmore lore. When the college's iconic Parrish Hall was gutted by fire in 1881, it was immediately rebuilt, rising, some noted, from the ashes like the bird found in
Egyptian ''Egyptian'' describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of year ...
and
Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...
. Thereafter, ''The Phoenix'' became the name of the campus newspaper. With an early staff that often numbered fewer than ten people, ''The Phoenix'' was first published monthly, then moved to a bi-weekly schedule in 1894. It is now published weekly. ''The Phoenix'' first appeared
online In computer technology and telecommunications, online indicates a state of connectivity, and offline indicates a disconnected state. In modern terminology, this usually refers to an Internet connection, but (especially when expressed as "on lin ...
in September 1995. The newspaper is printed by Hocking News in Lancaster County.


''Voices'' (and ''The Daily Gazette'')

''Voices'' was founded in 2017 as "an online news publication solely dedicated to centering marginalized voices and creating space for them to tell their own stories", in response to controversial articles about African-American protests in the already-existing online publication ''The Daily Gazette''. In May 2018, ''The Daily Gazette'', which had been published since 1996, merged with ''The Phoenix''.


Magazines

There are a number of magazines at Swarthmore, most of which are published semi-annually at the end of each semester. One is ''Spike'', Swarthmore's humor magazine, founded in 1993. The others are literary magazines, including ''Nacht'', which publishes long-form non-fiction, fiction, poetry and artwork; ''Small Craft Warnings'', which publishes poetry, fiction and artwork; ''Scarlet Letters'', which publishes women's literature; ''Enie'', for Spanish literature; ''Visibility Zine'', for literature and art by historically marginalized groups; ''OURstory'', for literature relating to diversity issues; ''Bug-Eyed Magazine'', a very limited-run science fiction/fantasy magazine published by Psi Phi, formerly known as Swarthmore Warders of Imaginative Literature (SWIL); ''Remappings'' (formerly "''CelebrASIAN''"), published by the Swarthmore Asian Organization; ''Alchemy'', a collection of academic writings published by the Swarthmore Writing Associates; ''Mjumbe'', published by the Swarthmore African-American Student Society; and a magazine for French literature. An
erotica Erotica is art, literature or photography that deals substantively with subject matter that is erotic, sexually stimulating or sexually arousing. Some critics regard pornography as a type of erotica, but many consider it to be different. Erot ...
magazine, ''!'' (pronounced "bang") was briefly published in 2005 in homage to an earlier publication, ''Untouchables''. Most of the literary magazines print approximately 500 copies, with around 100 pages. There is also a photography magazine, ''Pun/ctum'', which features work from students and alumni.


Radio station

WSRN 91.5 FM is the college radio station. It has a mix of indie, rock,
hip-hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hi ...
,
electronic dance Electronic dance music (EDM), also referred to as dance music or club music, is a broad range of percussive electronic music genres originally made for nightclubs, raves, and List of electronic dance music festivals, festivals. It is generally ...
,
folk Folk or Folks may refer to: Sociology *Nation *People * Folklore ** Folk art ** Folk dance ** Folk hero ** Folk horror ** Folk music *** Folk metal *** Folk punk *** Folk rock ** Folk religion * Folk taxonomy Arts, entertainment, and media * Fo ...
,
world The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that Existence, exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk ...
,
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...
and
classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be #Relationship to other music traditions, distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical mu ...
, as well as a number of radio
talk shows A talk show is a television programming, radio programming or podcast genre structured around the act of spontaneous conversation.Bernard M. Timberg, Robert J. Erler'' (2010Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Show', pp.3-4Erler, Robert (20 ...
. At one time, WSRN had a significant news department, and covered events such as the 1969 black protest movement extensively. In the 1990s, WSRN centered its programming on the immensely popular "Hank and Bernie Show", starring undergraduates Hank Hanks and Bernie Bernstein. Hank and Bernie conducted wide-ranging and entertaining interviews of sports stars and cultural icons such as Lou Piniella, Mark Grace, Jake Plummer, Greg Ostertag, Andy Karich and Mark "the Bird" Fidrych, and also engaged the Swarthmore community in discussions on campus issues and current events. Upwards of 90 percent of the Swarthmore community would tune in to the Hank and Bernie Show and many members of the surrounding villages and towns would also listen and call in. Many archived recordings of musical and spoken word performances exist, such as the once-annual Swarthmore Folk Festival. Today WSRN focuses virtually exclusively on entertainment, though it has covered significant news developments such as the athletic cuts in 2000 and the effects of the
September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...
on campus. War News Radio and The Sudan Radio Project (formerly the Darfur Radio Project) do broadcast news on WSRN, however. Currently, the longest running show in WSRN's lineup is "Oído al Tambor", which focuses on news and music from
Latin America Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...
. The show has been running non-stop, on Sundays from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m., since September 2006. After its members graduated in December 2009, the show's concept was revived by the show "Rayuela", which has been running since September 2009.


Societies and groups


A cappella

The
collegiate a cappella Collegiate a cappella (or college a cappella) ensembles are college-affiliated singing groups, primarily in the United States, and, increasingly, the United Kingdom and Ireland, that perform entirely without musical instruments. The groups are typ ...
groups include Sixteen Feet, the college's oldest group (founded in 1981), as well as its first and only all-male group. Grapevine is its corresponding all-female group (founded in 1983), and Mixed Company is a co-ed group. Essence of Soul is the college's all-black group. The youngest group, OffBeat was founded in the fall of 2013 as a group open to all genders and identities. In addition, Chaverim is a co-ed group that includes students from the Tri-College Consortium and draws on music from cultures around the world for its repertoire. The groups, self-run as volunteer clubs with college support, travel to other schools to participate in concerts. Once every semester, all of the school's a cappella groups collaborate for a joint concert called Jamboree, which includes visiting groups from other colleges and universities.


Swarthmore Fire and Protective Association

Swarthmore College students are eligible to participate in the local
emergency department An emergency department (ED), also known as an accident and emergency department (A&E), emergency room (ER), emergency ward (EW) or casualty department, is a medical treatment facility specializing in emergency medicine, the Acute (medicine), ...
, the Swarthmore Fire and Protective Association. They are trained as firefighters and as
emergency medical technician An emergency medical technician (often, more simply, EMT) is a medical professional that provides emergency medical services. EMTs are most commonly found serving on ambulances and in fire departments in the US and Canada, as full-time and som ...
s (EMTs) and are qualified on both the state and national level. The fire department responds to over 200 fire calls and almost 800 EMS calls a year. A fire horn, colloquially deemed the "fire moose", is located within the Swarthmore campus and its sound has become a fixture of campus life.


Swarthmore College Computer Society

Swarthmore College Computer Society (SCCS) is a student-run volunteer organization independent of the official ITS department of the college. SCCS operates a set of servers that provide web applications for the Swarthmore College community, e-mail accounts,
Unix Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...
shell login accounts, server storage space and webspace to students, professors, alumni and other student-run organizations. SCCS hosts over 100 mailing lists used by various student groups, and over 130 organizational websites. SCCS also provides a computer lab and gaming room, located in Clothier basement beneath Essie Mae's snack bar.


Impact

In September 2003, the SCCS servers survived a slashdotting while hosting a copy of the Diebold memos on behalf of the student group Free Culture Swarthmore, then known as the Swarthmore Coalition for the Digital Commons. SCCS staff promptly complied with the relevant
DMCA The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or ...
takedown request received by the college's ITS department. SCCS was noted in ''PC Magazine'' article "Top 20 Wired Colleges" as one of the reasons for ranking Swarthmore #4 on that list. Three SCCS-related papers have been accepted for publication at the USENIX Large Installation System Administration (LISA) Conference, one of which was awarded Best Paper.


Athletics

Swarthmore's athletic department has 22 varsity intercollegiate sports teams including
badminton Badminton is a racquet sport played using racket (sports equipment), racquets to hit a shuttlecock across a net (device), net. Although it may be played with larger teams, the most common forms of the game are "singles" (with one player per s ...
,
baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...
,
basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...
, cross country,
field hockey Field hockey (or simply referred to as hockey in some countries where ice hockey is not popular) is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with 11 players in total, made up of 10 field players and a goalk ...
,
golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit a Golf ball, ball into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standa ...
,
lacrosse Lacrosse is a contact team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game w ...
,
soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...
,
softball Softball is a Variations of baseball, variation of baseball, the difference being that it is played with a larger ball, on a smaller field, and with only underhand pitches (where the ball is released while the hand is primarily below the ball) ...
,
swimming Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, such as saltwater or freshwater environments, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Swimmers achieve locomotion by coordinating limb and body movements to achieve hydrody ...
,
tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...
,
track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...
, and
volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...
. The
football team A football team is a group of players selected to play together in the various team sports known as football. Such teams could be selected to play in a match against an opposing team, to represent a football club, group, state or nation, an All-st ...
was controversially eliminated in 2000, along with
wrestling Wrestling is a martial art, combat sport, and form of entertainment that involves grappling with an opponent and striving to obtain a position of advantage through different throws or techniques, within a given ruleset. Wrestling involves di ...
and, initially,
badminton Badminton is a racquet sport played using racket (sports equipment), racquets to hit a shuttlecock across a net (device), net. Although it may be played with larger teams, the most common forms of the game are "singles" (with one player per s ...
. The Board of Managers cited lack of athletes on campus and difficulty of recruiting as reasons for terminating the programs. The department also offers a number of club sport options, including men's and women's rugby, ultimate frisbee,
volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...
,
fencing Fencing is a combat sport that features sword fighting. It consists of three primary disciplines: Foil (fencing), foil, épée, and Sabre (fencing), sabre (also spelled ''saber''), each with its own blade and set of rules. Most competitive fe ...
and squash. The participation rate of students in intercollegiate or club sports is 40 percent. Swarthmore is a charter member of the
Centennial Conference The Centennial Conference is an intercollegiate athletic conference which competes in the NCAA's Division III. Chartered member teams are located in Maryland and Pennsylvania; associate members are also located in New York and Virginia. Ele ...
, a group of private colleges in Pennsylvania and Maryland and is a member of
NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is the lowest division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that do not offer athletic scholarships to student- ...
. The men's basketball team is currently coached by Landry Kosmalski who was named Division III's National Coach of the Year in 2020. In the 2018–19 season, the Garnet reached the NCAA Division III Championship Game for the first time but lost to the
University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh The University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh (UW Oshkosh or UWO) is a public university in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, United States. It is part of the University of Wisconsin System and offers bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degree programs to around 13,0 ...
96–82. The 2019–20 team began the season 26–0 and were the last unbeaten team remaining out of all of Division I, II and III. The Garnet were ranked No. 1 in the nation by D3hoops.com for the entirety of the season, becoming the first team to be ranked at the top of that poll from start to finish. Swarthmore has won 26 Centennial Conference team championships and claims four national championships in men's lacrosse in 1900, 1904, 1905 and 1910, four national championships in men's tennis in 1977, 1981, 1985 and 1990, two men's tennis doubles national championships in 1976 and 1985, and two individual championships in women's track and field in 2016 and 2023.


Notable people


Alumni

Swarthmore's alumni include six
Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...
winners, namely the 2024 Physics laureate John Hopfield (1954), the 2006 Physics laureate John C. Mather (1968), the 2004 Economics laureate
Edward Prescott Edward Christian Prescott (December 26, 1940 – November 6, 2022) was an American economist. He received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 2004, sharing the award with Finn E. Kydland, "for their contributions to dynamic macroeconomics: ...
(1962), the 1975 Physiology or Medicine laureates
David Baltimore David Baltimore (born March 7, 1938) is an American biologist, university administrator, and 1975 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine. He is a professor of biology at the California Institute of Tech ...
(1960) and
Howard Martin Temin Howard Martin Temin (December 10, 1934 – February 9, 1994) was an American geneticist and virologist. He discovered reverse transcriptase in the 1970s at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, for which he shared the 1975 Nobel Prize in Phy ...
(1955), and the 1972 Chemistry laureate Christian B. Anfinsen (1937). It is surpassed only by the
California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes ...
and
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
in per capita production of Nobel laureates in the United States. Alumni also include 13
MacArthur Fellows The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and colloquially called the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the MacArthur Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to typically between 20 and ...
and hundreds of other prominent figures in law, art, science, business, politics and other fields. *
Detlev Bronk Detlev Wulf Bronk (August 13, 1897 – November 17, 1975) was a prominent American scientist, educator, and administrator. He is credited with establishing biophysics as a recognized discipline. Bronk served as president of Johns Hopkins Universi ...
(1920), former president of
Johns Hopkins University The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...
; former president of the
National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...
*
Michael Dukakis Michael Stanley Dukakis ( ; born November 3, 1933) is an American politician and lawyer who served as governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1991. He is the longest-serving governor in Massachusetts history and only the s ...
(1955), former
Governor of Massachusetts The governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is the head of government of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The governor is the chief executive, head of the state cabinet and the commander-in-chief of the commonw ...
(1975–1979, 1983–1991) and the Democratic nominee in the 1988 presidential election * Sandra Faber (1966), astronomer known for her research on the evolution of galaxies, co-discoverer of Faber–Jackson relation * Christiana Figueres (1979), Costa Rican diplomat, Executive Secretary of the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is the UN process for negotiating an agreement to limit dangerous climate change. It is an international treaty among countries to combat "dangerous human interference with th ...
(2010–2016) *
Andre Gunder Frank Andre Gunder Frank (February 24, 1929 – April 25, 2005) was a German- American sociologist and economic historian who promoted dependency theory after 1970 and world-systems theory after 1984. He employed some Marxian concepts on polit ...
(1950), sociologist and economic historian, promoted
dependency theory Dependency theory is the idea that resources flow from a " periphery" of poor and exploited states to a " core" of wealthy states, enriching the latter at the expense of the former. A central contention of dependency theory is that poor states ...
and
world-systems theory World-systems theory (also known as world-systems analysis or the world-systems perspective)Immanuel Wallerstein, (2004), "World-systems Analysis." In ''World System History'', ed. George Modelski, in ''Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems'' (E ...
* Jonathan Franzen (1981), novelist and essayist ('' The Corrections'') *
Allan Gibbard Allan Fletcher Gibbard (born 1942) is an American philosopher who is the Richard B. Brandt Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Gibbard has made major contributions to contemporary e ...
(1963), philosopher and social choice theorist, Richard B. Brandt Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the
University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...
* Carol Gilligan (1958), feminist, ethicist and psychologist who researched ethical community and ethical relationships * Josh Green (1992), Democratic
Governor of Hawaii The governor of Hawaii () is the head of government of the U.S. state of Hawaii and its various agencies and departments, as provided in the Hawaii State Constitution Article V, Sections 1 through 6. It is a directly elected position, votes bei ...
(2022–present) * Arlie Russell Hochschild (1962), author and professor emeritus of sociology at the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...
*
Stephen Lang Stephen Lang (born July 11, 1952) is an American stage and screen actor. He gained fame for his role as main antagonist Miles Quaritch, Colonel Miles Quaritch in James Cameron's ''Avatar (2009 film), Avatar'' (2009), for which he won the Saturn ...
(1973),
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
-nominated actor and playwright; star of
Avatar Avatar (, ; ) is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means . It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appearance" is sometimes u ...
, '' Gods and Generals'', '' Gettysburg'', ''
Tombstone A gravestone or tombstone is a marker, usually stone, that is placed over a grave. A marker set at the head of the grave may be called a headstone. An especially old or elaborate stone slab may be called a funeral stele, stela, or slab. The us ...
'', and '' Terra Nova'' *
Carl Levin Carl Milton Levin (June 28, 1934 – July 29, 2021) was an American attorney and politician who served as a List of United States senators from Michigan, United States senator from Michigan from 1979 to 2015. A member of the Democratic Party (U ...
(1956), Democratic former US Senator from
Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...
(1979–2015) * David K. Lewis (1962), philosopher who researched Analytic Metaphysics, rated as one of the fifteen most important philosophers in the past 200 years. * Beth Littleford, actress, first woman correspondent on ''
the Daily Show ''The Daily Show'' is an American late-night talk show, late-night talk and news satire television program. It airs each Monday through Thursday on Comedy Central in the United States, with extended episodes released shortly after on Paramount+ ...
'', attended for three years *
Lee MacPhail Leland Stanford MacPhail Jr. (October 25, 1917 – November 8, 2012) was an American front-office executive in Major League Baseball. MacPhail was a baseball executive for 45 years, serving as the director of player personnel for the New York Y ...
(1939), baseball executive, former president of
American League The American League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the American League (AL), is the younger of two sports leagues, leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada. It developed from the Western L ...
(1974–1983); inducted into the
Baseball Hall of Fame The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a history museum and hall of fame in Cooperstown, New York, operated by a private foundation. It serves as the central collection and gathering space for the history of baseball in the United S ...
(1998) *
James A. Michener James Albert Michener ( or ; February 3, 1907 – October 16, 1997) was an American writer. He wrote more than 40 books, most of which were long, fictional family sagas covering the lives of many generations, set in particular geographic locales ...
(1929), novelist, who left $10 million (including the copyrights to his works) to Swarthmore. * Isabel Briggs Myers (1919), co-creator of the
Myers–Briggs Type Indicator The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a self-report questionnaire that makes pseudoscientific claims to categorize individuals into 16 distinct "psychological types" or "personality types". The MBTI was constructed during World War II by ...
assessment. *
Ted Nelson Theodor Holm Nelson (born June 17, 1937) is an American pioneer of information technology, philosopher, and sociologist. He coined the terms ''hypertext'' and ''hypermedia'' in 1963 and published them in 1965. According to his 1997 ''Forbes'' p ...
(1959), pioneer of information technology, philosopher and sociologist; coined the terms "
hypertext Hypertext is E-text, text displayed on a computer display or other electronic devices with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access. Hypertext documents are interconnected by hyperlinks, which are typic ...
" and "
hypermedia Hypermedia, an extension of hypertext, is a nonlinear medium of information that includes graphics, audio, video, plain text and hyperlinks. This designation contrasts with the broader term ''multimedia'', which may include non-interactive linear ...
". *
Alice Paul Alice Stokes Paul (January 11, 1885 – July 9, 1977) was an American Quaker, suffragette, suffragist, feminist, and women's rights activist, and one of the foremost leaders and strategists of the campaign for the Nineteenth Amendment to the Unit ...
(1905),
suffragist Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to vo ...
and
National Woman's Party The National Woman's Party (NWP) was an American women's political organization formed in 1916 to fight for women's suffrage. After achieving this goal with the 1920 adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the NWP ...
founder. * Robert D. Putnam (1963), political scientist ( Two-level game theory, ''
Bowling Alone ''Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community'' is a 2000 nonfiction book by Robert D. Putnam. It was developed from his 1995 essay entitled "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital". Putnam surveys the decline of soc ...
'') * Jane S. Richardson (1962), biophysicist, inventor of
Ribbon diagram Ribbon diagrams, also known as Richardson diagrams, are three-dimensional space, 3D schematic representations of protein structure and are one of the most common methods of protein depiction used today. The ribbon depicts the general course and o ...
s *
Sally Ride Sally Kristen Ride (May 26, 1951 – July 23, 2012) was an American astronaut and physicist. Born in Los Angeles, she joined NASA in 1978, and in 1983 became the first American woman and the third woman to fly in space, after cosmonauts V ...
, astronaut and physicist, first American woman in space, attended for three semesters * Nancy Roman (1946), NASA's first Chief of Astronomy in the Office of Space Science, 'mother of the Hubble telescope' * Peter Schickele (1957), musical composer and satirist (
P. D. Q. Bach P. D. Q. Bach is a fictional composer created by the American composer and musical satirist Peter Schickele for a five-decade career performing the "discovered" works of the "only forgotten son" of the Bach family. Schickele's music combines Par ...
) * Charlotte Moore Sitterly (1920), astronomer, known for her extensive spectroscopic studies of the Sun and chemical elements *
Kenneth Turan Kenneth Turan (; born October 27, 1946) is an American retired film critic, author, and lecturer in the Master of Professional Writing Program at the University of Southern California. He was a film critic for the ''Los Angeles Times'' from 1991 ...
(1967), film critic, formerly for ''The Los Angeles Times'' *
Chris Van Hollen Christopher Van Hollen Jr. ( ; born January 10, 1959) is an American attorney and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Maryland, a seat he has held since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. re ...
(1983), Democratic US Representative (2003–2017) and US Senator (2017–present) from
Maryland Maryland ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It borders the states of Virginia to its south, West Virginia to its west, Pennsylvania to its north, and Delaware to its east ...
; Chairman of the
Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) is the Democratic Hill committee for the United States Senate. Its purpose is to elect Democrats to the United States Senate. The DSCC's current Chair is Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of Ne ...
(2017–2018) * Peter J. Weinberger (1964), computer scientist, contributed to the AWK programming language * Robert Zoellick (1976), former president of the
World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...
.


Faculty

*
Solomon Asch Solomon Eliot Asch (September 14, 1907 – February 20, 1996) was a Polish people, Polish-United States of America, American Gestalt psychology, Gestalt psychologist and pioneer in social psychology. He created seminal pieces of work in impressi ...
, Gestalt psychologist, conformity experiments *
Monroe Beardsley Monroe Curtis Beardsley ( ; December 10, 1915 – September 18, 1985) was an American philosopher of art. Biography Beardsley was born and raised in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and educated at Yale University (B.A. 1936, Ph.D. 1939), where he ...
, philosopher of art (
instrumentalism In philosophy of science and in epistemology, instrumentalism is a methodological view that ideas are useful instruments, and that the worth of an idea is based on how effective it is in explaining and predicting natural phenomena. According to in ...
) *
Wolfgang Köhler Wolfgang Köhler (; 21 January 1887 – 11 June 1967) was a German psychologist and phenomenologist who, like Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffka, contributed to the creation of Gestalt psychology. During the Nazi regime in Germany, he pro ...
, Gestalt psychologist ( psychology of problem solving) * Frederic Pryor, economist


References


Bibliography

*


External links

*
Athletics website
{{Coord, 39, 54, 18, N, 75, 21, 14, W, type:edu_region:US-PA, display=title, format=dms 1864 establishments in Pennsylvania Eastern Pennsylvania Rugby Union Liberal arts colleges in Pennsylvania Quakerism in Pennsylvania Quaker universities and colleges Swarthmore, Pennsylvania Universities and colleges in Delaware County, Pennsylvania Private universities and colleges in Pennsylvania Need-blind educational institutions Universities and colleges established in 1864