[Labyrinthos]

You are desrcribing Columbia’s School of General Studies, not Columbia College. Columbia College is a traditional four year college founded in 1754 as King’s College. Columbia College is an Ivy League school and those attending it consider it to be the peer of — or superior to Harvard, Yale or Princeton.

Yes, you are correct. I apologize for the error.

If 0bama had gone to Columbia School of General Studies, could he have graduated with a B.A. in Political Science, without being known by the more traditional students in the School of Arts and Sciences? And if he did go to the School of General Studies, is the admissions standards such that 0bama would be ashamed of admiting the truth?

[Piranha]

The admission standards at GS were fine. Nobody would be ashamed of having attended there. Often students who want Ivy League cachet would enroll there, as well as students who wanted to transfer in from other schools but didn’t want to take the required courses in Columbia College’s “core curriculum”. In addition, older students (meaning people who were in their mid-20s instead of fresh out of high school) would attend, as would students who wanted to take classes part time or without necessarily wanting to get a bachelor’s degree. There also were some joint degree programs, like the program between the Jewish Theological Seminary, which is the seminary of Conservative Judaism, and the School of General Studies.

[Kenny Bunk]

If 0bama had gone to Columbia School of General Studies, could he have graduated with a B.A. in Political Science, without being known by the more traditional students in the School of Arts and Sciences?

Yes.

And if he did go to the School of General Studies, are the admissions standards such that 0bama would be ashamed of admitting the truth?

Look, the truth is the guy has a degree from Columbia. That's what he admits. The rest is for him to know and for us to find out. General Studies? Any body with a check can sign up for a course. Every big university has one, it seems. It's not all that rigorous and never was. But it can be tough, administratively speaking, to put together a degree program.

[Parmenio]

Yes, it’s possible to keep a very low profile, even at Columbia College. Obama attended only for the junior and senior years, lessening the chances that anyone would have remembered him, compared to someone who attended the full four years. When I was at Columbia (College ‘75) people generally looked down at General Studies which was perceived as having lower admission standards. Unfair perhaps, but that’s what people thought.

I don’t want to give the impression that I’m defending Obama. On the the contrary, in many respects his critical thinking abilities do not compare well with those who have undertaken rigorous liberal arts studies.