Answered by Timothy S
I can't tell you a whole lot about Liberty, but I've been a student at Cedarville for the last two years. Both schools have quite a few rules, whether that counts as legalism or not depends on what you view as legalistic. Things that I think make Cedarville unique, for good or bad are. - Chapel 5 days a week. Your allowed 8 skips a semester so if you really need an extra hour for sleep or homework you can get it. - Required bible minor. You will have 6 bible classes you need to take, and many more that you can if you want to. I've taken all but the last one of these classes. I’ve learned a lot and enjoyed every one. - A rec center with everything that a quality gym has including a climbing wall, except it has no pool. It's free for students to do anything in there including climbing the wall. - Buffet style cafeteria with half a dozen lines and a two week rotating menu. The food isn't great, but it's not bad. I think it gets boring after the first couple months though. - Its surrounded by cornfields and the closest Wal-Mart/fast food/etc. is in a town a 20 min drive away. (There is a subway, coffee shop and pizza place in Cedarville) - Weekly room checks. It can be irritating, but not as much as a really messy roommate would be. - Dress code, no jeans in class, no skin showing between your shirt and pants, guys shirts should have collar, no pierced noses or purple mohawks. I like dressing up so this didn’t bother me any. - No girls in guys dorms or guys in girls dorms except on open dorm nights (about once a month). Most dorm lounges are open to everyone. - Amazing faculty. The teachers really know what they are teaching and they really care about the students. I don't know how the school was able to get so many amazing people into one place. - Amazing students. It's a pretty even mix of public school, private school, and home schooled kids. There are also quite a few international students and missionary kids. - Strong sciences, The engineering and nursing programs are great. Gen-ed classes like earth science are also some of the best classes I've taken. - Weak arts, The music and theater programs are good, but the visual arts are all but neglected. Building designs are pretty utilitarian and the art displayed around campus is far from world class. Mostly posters of Ansel Adams or watercolors in cheap frames. - 20+ republicans for each democrat in the student body. - Clean and pretty campus. Even the dorm bathrooms are cleaned every weekday, the lake can get a little scummy at times. Almost everything I don’t like about the school is in that list above and if I were to write everything I like about the school the list would take me hours to type up so I’ll stop it here. I really love the school and am glad that God helped me to find it. I wouldn’t say Cedarville is legalistic, 95% of the rules don’t bother me because they prohibit things I wouldn’t normally do. The other 5% I have no problem following because it is within my Christian liberty to refrain from things I think are good, and within my Christian love to do it to build others up for Christ. If something like a nose ring would offend a group of Christians at the school, I’d be hurting my ability to minister to and fellowship with them by having one. I don’t think this school is for everyone, but it has exceeded my expectations in hundreds of different ways. And the friendships I’ve made here are so much deeper then anything in high school. It’s great to be around people who challenge me to be more like Christ almost all the time. Hope this helps some. - Tim