Question What schools have the best undergraduate philosophy departments in the US? By "best", I mean most academically rigorous, most qualified faculty, and most extensive course offerings. I've been trying to research this online but every opinion I can find on the subject seems to come from one website - philosophicalgourmet.com - and I have no idea what this site's credentials are. If anyone has an opinion based on their own research or personal experience, I am eager to hear it.

Accepted:
November 3, 2010

Comments

The remarks on the topic at the Philosophical Gourmet website seem to me to be generally on target. (For those remarks, click here.)

Generally, I think that liberal arts colleges (such as Amherst, Williams, Oberlin, or the Claremont Colleges), or universities that do not have graduate students (e.g., Dartmouth), are better places not only for undergraduates interested in studying philosophy, but for undergraduates generally. (Full disclosure: I attended Amherst College as an undergraduate, and did my graduate work at Harvard, before moving on to Johns Hopkins and am now at UC Irvine.) I have been associated with a number of different kinds of institutions, from a small college, to a largish research university, to a small research university, to a very large research university. While I think that in principle, it is possible for an undergraduate to get a good education in philosophy--or any subject, for that matter--at any school. However, at a large research university, the student may have relatively little direct contact with faculty members, unless s/he makes an effort to meet with faculty members during their office hours, and even then, iwhat sort of experience the student will have largely depends on the faculty member's commitment to undergraduate education. In schools without graduate programs--even schools that have demanding research obligations as part of the requirements for tenure--faculty are, as a rule, more interested in undergraduate education, and so undergraduates will find it much easier to engage with faculty members at such institutions. In terms of range of classes, of course, there will be a broader range of courses offered, at a greater variety of levels--i.e., from introductory courses to graduate seminars--at a university with a graduate program. (Advanced undergraduates often do take graduate seminars.)

I myself think that when choosing an undergraduate institution one should try to go to the very best institution that one can. If one knows that one is already interested in academia, then one might do well to consider attending a small liberal arts college, although depending on one's character, one may be able to have a similar experience at a university with graduate students. For example, Princeton University, although a university with top-ranked graduate departments in various disciplines in the humanities, has a commitment to undergraduate education that I believe rivals that of small colleges; by contrast, Johns Hopkins, despite the fact that courses in the humanities, especially at the mid-and higher-levels, are no larger than those at a small liberal arts college, is--at least in my experience, and throughout the humanities--definitely oriented more towards research and graduate teaching and less attention tends to be given to undergraduates. Of course, some professors at either of these last-mentioned institutions may be exceptions to the general rule that I just advanced.

My recommendation is this: in considering where to apply, you should look at the Philosophy Department offerings and try to get a sense for their range--one clue is just to see how many different courses have been offered in the past few years; once you have been accepted at some schools, then you should try to get in touch with undergraduates at those schools--maybe even philosophy majors--in order to find out what their academic experience has been like.