Reed College

[Reed College], located in a nice, quiet neighborhood of Portland, Oregon, is a small [liberal arts college]? well-known for producing [Rhodes scholar]?s and a very high proportion of graduates who go on to earn Ph.D.'s, particularly in the sciences. Reed was founded in 1911 by river trade magnate [Simeon Gannett Reed]? and rapidly gained a reputation for academic excellence. Reed is generally regarded as one of the finest small liberal arts colleges in the United States and certainly among the best on the west coast. Reed is one of the more unusual institutions of higher learning in the United States: it features a traditional liberal arts curriculum, requiring freshmen (who might insist on being called "first year students") to take an intensive introduction to ancient Greece, Rome, and the Middle Ages, though it does very well in the sciences as well. It is a haven for intense intellectuals, idealists, and unkempt rich hippies. Traditionally it has a reputation for making room for students who show promise of one sort or another but who did not do so well in high school; this leads to a lot of blossoming scholars inspired by the extremely intense academic experience, but it also leads to a fair bit of attrition as well. Loren Pope, education editor for the New York Times called Reed "the most intellectual college in the country." Many consider Reed the finest undergraduate institution in the United States.