NJ Mom of 2

1. Is the student population of Barnard made up of a large % of women from NYC prep schools?

2. Is much of the student population made up of relative locals (metropolitan area) students who go home on the weekends?

3. I guess I am wondering how diverse Barnard really is??

mythmom

We did not those descriptions to be the case.

In D's six person frosh suite, there were two women from prep school, both from Texas. Two women were from the NY metro area (including D). The young woman from Brooklyn did go home often, but D, from eastern LI, came home only when there were assigned vacations. Of the remaining two, one was from a public in rural Georgia, and the other was from a public in Ohio.

The young woman from GA was extremely low income; two were from the next income bracket; then the next. Only one woman is wealthy and another almost wealthy -- the two Texans.

Barnard is definitely not as diverse as some schools, but we did not find the stereotype of NYC preppies true at all.

mardad

1. My older daughter's roommate was the daughter of Chinese-Vietnamese immigrants who lived in New York. Her best friend was from the Bronx. Both girls were on big scholarships. The roommate had a boy friend so she didn't do much with the other girls in the dorm. On the other hand her parents had the group of 6 over to their restaurant for dinner.
2. Our younger daughter's roommate was from San Francisco, but her family lived in France during the summers and is moving back to Paris.
3. There is a plurality of Easterners but not a majority. They are in frequent contact with their mothers by phone but rarely go home. There is just too much to do in New York. I wish some of them would go home, so my daughter would do more homework. It's not a wild party school with booze, but there are plenty of intellectual distractions. I guess that's what college is all about.
4. The president has expressly stated that she wants to recruit westerners and international students from Asia. (New Jersey is west of New York, isn't it?)

churchmusicmom

You can go to the Barnard website and search for the Common Set Data (in admissions, I believe) and you will find the breakdown of where admitted students came from in any given year.

My d's suitemates were from Florida, Texas, PA, Michigan, and Connecticut. We are from the Southeast....

mardad

Most of the Liberal Arts colleges have about 30% of entering students coming from private schools. This includes prep and religious schools. I don't think this factors into admissions except that the college advisors of the private schools and certain public schools which have sent a lot of students to Barnard will be on a first-name basis with someone Barnard's committee. This may help get in.
Once admitted the students who took AP classes have a leg up in the intro classes. If you took AP Chem in either type of school, a lot of Chem 2001, the one premeds take, is repetition. This advantage disappears with the next level of classes.

NJ Mom of 2

Thanks for all your comments. Barnard is most definitely on DD's list but after spending a summer with many NYC prep kids she began feeling that Barnard would be a similar experience. There are so many things about the school to love!