Are very small departments necessarily sub-par? This college, which I will not name here, specializes in computer-related programs, which makes its other courses, like political science, unpopular among student applicants.  In one instance, the social science department only had three students who graduated with a degree in politics. Because of the very small student population, the school only had two political science professors who handled all the major subjects. Would you say that this is sub par college?
If you're talking about MIT or Caltech, then the answer would be that their degrees in the humanities and social sciences are equally as respectable as those from any other colleges and universities in terms of graduate admissions (in social sciences/humanities).

Part of this is that we realize that folks who fall out of the mainstream at these schools merit some attention. It takes more of an effort and commitment to do sociology at MIT than it would at U-Michigan. For example, in order to get the credits to graduate, you've also undoubtedly taken courses in that discipline that were offered outside of that institution -- in MIT's case, you'd be taking classes at Harvard/Radcliffe. That takes dedication and forethought. 

Finally, we realize that students choose their undergraduate institutions based on limited knowledge and choice. We weight their accomplishments based on what they were able to do with the resources that they had.