aquaphiliac

I'm planning on going driving out from Massachusetts on one of those days. Anyone else gonna make the trip?

Maximum1

I'll be there. Driving from Maryland.

comprenezvous

Driving from Georgia!

mhartz20

I just got back from it. Not too bad, but if you want to get a good impression of Colgate life, then don't go. The administration doctors it up quite a bit. You don't get the feeling of an average day or night. I'd suggest going on a non official visit weekend. They put it on a Tuesday night when nothing happens on campus... If you have a good host, they can make it interesting though.

Modadunn

son visited today and is staying with a friend from HS tonight. I, however, couldnt get a room in town or just outside of it and am staying in a hotel nearly an hour from campus. So.. something for parents to consider during family weekends!

This said.. I imagine S is getting a real taste of a typical friday night while also knowing his mother is picking him up at 9 in the morning. Thing is, I was kinda disappointed in the tour. There asn't much insight into regular classrooms and I got very different numbers from the tour guide and our freshman friend on class sizes.

lydia08

Freshmen tend to be in "larger" introductory classes, while tour guides have access to the actual statistics, so while your friend may be in 25 person intro classes (or maybe intro psychology, one of 3 classes bigger than 50), the actual average of all classes is 18, according to the most recent materials. You'll get much smaller classes after your first year, so while they're probably not incorrect for their own (and friends') situation, the average over all classes is 18.

jrpar

Modadunn - sorry to hear you are staying so far away. That is definitely a pain. As far as class sizes, over the past four years nearly all of my son's classes have been under 20. The "big" classes are some of the intro classes. Once you get past the intro classes, each department keeps a very tight lid on enrollment in the upper level courses (which then has the flip side problem of making it tough to get into some classes!)

Anyways, you'll have to let us know if your son made it to the Jug.

cadence76

Modadunn--we went tue/Wed for the open house--and actually, were somewhat disappointed. Great school, good facilites, but not at all a "fit" for D. AND--big issue for her aspirations--Colgate is much stricter than many other schools about portability of fin aid into study away programs. Don't think it will work for us--BIG disappointment--but, that said, it is a terrific school in so many ways. And, all of you Colgate people must have calves of steel to climb that hill all the time!

ticklemepink

Class sizes vary a bit. I think I personally had an average of about 20 people during my time at Colgate with the largest being one of the history classes (35 students). Smallest? Aside from independent studies, 5 people in a 300 level seminar.

Yes, Colgate does pick Tuesday nights on purpose. I do remember sitting in a meeting for hosts and the student in charge gently warned us "We at Colgate have livers of steels but they do not yet! So be careful with your prospectives!"

As for the calves... and bums... No question about it. Only the first 2-3 weeks of each semester are the toughest.

aquaphiliac

I was under the impression that they could not accommodate you outside of the official visit days which is why I signed up for that. Yes, I do realize that prospective students will be wined and dined in order to try to get them to come there, but hopefully I will have some time to steal away from my host and get a candid perspective from an unsuspecting passerby. :P

ticklemepink

I think part of the issue is that it's getting very close to the finals time and many people will not want to host prospectives. Colgate tends to have their last week of class at the end of the month so people are scrambling to start/finish their final projects that are due that week before the actual exam in the following week. So those dates are set aside so everyone has a chance to talk about Colgate and not be distracted.

Modadunn

Yes, son made it to the jug, but you have to be 19 and he is not. Apparently, they squirreled him in someway. He found it odd that no one, even when asked, had much to say about "school" but they had plenty to say about where the party or how to party or who has the parties. I think my son's exact words were, "I don't think I want to have that much temptation." Also, frankly. he felt it was so much like his HS in terms of personality and the people. And while beautiful, I agree... the stairs are ridiculous, but not hard to believe they probably have a lower rate of freshman 15 than other schools!

gellino

Not necessarily, because most of the freshman live on top of the hill; so aren't going up and down as much as they will in the next three years.