@TheGreyKing - my D also did not want a Greek life or a huge party school and purposely avoided colleges with that rep. She is very intelligent and when she likes/respects a teacher, she absolutely loves to learn for learning’s sake. She also tends to enjoy a smaller circle of very close friends and is not a big social butterfly sort. She is a tiny bit concerned that a LAC might be too small of a community for 4 years, but personally I think she will thrive in that environment. I’m happy that she will be in a college where her professors will know her on site and will know if she misses a class, etc. (I attended a large university and made some stupid mistakes and in hindsight realize I wasted some great opportunities due to immarturity and lazy choices.)
My D applied to and was accepted to three schools on your list - Skidmore, Bard and Conn. We visited Skidmore twice (first time during a prettily-snowy 18 degree day in Feb. 2016 and she still liked it!). We visited Conn the Monday before Thanksgiving this past Nov. and the campus was pretty dead, and I’m sure that did nothing to help her with the “vibe.” She liked Conn when we visited, but she was not very excited the day she learned she was accepted. She never visited Bard, although friends have a daughter who goes there and absolutely loves it (she greatly enjoyed a semester in Germany this spring!). Her dad says Bard is the prettiest campus he has ever seen. However, we were scheduled to visit the day after accpeted students day at Skidmore where my D fell hard for the vibe and meeting so many of what she called her people. Instead of going to Bard’s acceptance day the following day, we stayed another night at Skidmore so she could stay in one of the amazing townhouse apartments on campus (the student she shadowed that day was a senior) and attend a party. That experience sealed the deal for her and she’s going to Skidmore.
She is extremely interested in acting and really likes that she can earn a BS in Theater (60 credit hours of theater concentration) while also having the flexibility to double major in something else. (She also used to ride horses in middle school (no time in HS bc of field hockey and acting), and looks forward to starting again as her PE class while at Skidmore.) She also likes to hike & backpack and was very pleased to hear about the Outdoor Club at Skidmore during accepted students day. The area around Skidmore is really beautiful, and it wouldn’t surprise me if our D didn’t want to come home during the summers since there would be so much to keep her near Saratoga Springs.
From a practical perspective, we have been very impressed with the process for newly accepted students. They already sent new students a book for the community summer read (“The Book That Changed America - How Darwin’s Theory of Evolution Ignited a Nation.”) I like that they require freshman to take a Scribner Seminar - students had to submit their 10 choices for a seminar by today and their housing will be determined by whichever seminar they end up with (and their academic advisor will be the teacher of that seminar until they declare a major.) I also really like that they offer the opportunity for a Pre-Orientation experience for a few days before the officlal orientation, which gives the new students the option of meeting another group of like-minded students and also to move into their dorm rooms a few days early. Smart on Skidmore’s part for a variety of reasons.
I’m happy to answer any questions you may have, particularly regarding Skidmore specifics, but every kid is different and the kids who are my D’s people may not at all be your kid’s people.
@TheGreyKing -
Just thought I’d mention - I also visited 7 colleges with CoyoteSon over the summer - we found those visits helpful for ruling school out, but IMO, there is just no good way for a,student to assess the “vibe” fit without students on campus.
By knocking schools off the list during the summer visits, we were able to use the 3-day weekends in the fall (Columbus Day, Veteran’s Day, teacher workdays) wisely to revisit the best schools to check out the vibe.
The second, fall visit helped CoyoteSon better craft his essays for the top contenders. However, there were some colleges that he liked enough to apply based on summer visit – and didn’t visit again with students until “accepted student” days in the spring. By then, I knew Conn College was not a good fit - and CoyoteSon saw that for himself within about an hour of starting the accepted students overnight visit…so this is just a cautionary tale that we could have saved the effort of the essay and a second, long overnight visit to a school that would have never made the list if we had visited with students on campus in the first place.
Thanks. Agree that second visit with students on campus may be needed before matriculation. But with son unwilling to miss school (or, for that matter, his summer camp job), all vacation times must be used for college visits!
Check the school calendars. Many schools are in session by late August, making a summer visit worthwhile in getting a sense of the student vibe. Likewise, schools that offer summer classes would also have more students around.
I know this is a bit late but I do have to put in a plug for F&M, where my daughter is. Everyone’s really friendly, both students and staff. When we visited my freshman in October a professor came trotting across the quad just to say hi, because he saw my daughter who’s in one of his classes. My daughter says that’s typical. Also, there’s a weird-but-good-for-most-kids thing about freshman orientation – they make sure the freshmen are scheduled morning to night, and are never by themselves. In other words, there’s no time to be homesick, and you’re with the same bunch of kids (your house - everyone has one where they live, think Harry Potter) for days, and you kind of automatically make friends so no one’s left out. This probably would have made my other daughter a bit crazy (and she ended up at a very different school) but it’s wonderful for a lot of kids.
Also, tell your son to watch for the power outlets under the trees. Isn’t that the best idea? In any case, my D just finished her freshman year and is already itching to go back. I think that’s a pretty good endorsement.
I know you don’t want to add, but did your son consider Vassar? My daughter who is a learning-for-learning’s-sake-not-Greek-partying kind of kid really loved it. Alas, the financials did not work for us.
Of the schools you mention, the only one she visited in depth was Dickinson. Maybe she was just unlucky but she didn’t see a lot of student engagement in the two classes that she visited. I know that @intparent 's daughter had a wonderful experience there.
Not sure how I missed this post the first time around. My D is a recent graduate of Lafayette College and had a wonderful experience there. I do think that the school has found that “secret sauce” where students are academically challenged yet can find time to pursue EC activities, research with professors, and have some fun. My D was a psychology major and loved the department. She took on a major role in 2 research projects with professors one of which had results published in a peer reviewed journal. She also had some friends who were very happy history majors there – two of them did research with Donald Miller who is a well-known historian/author (he worked with Tom Hanks on some HBO projects) who is a professor at the college. And FWIW it is pretty easy to double major or have a major and a minor at Lafayette due in part to a very flexible core curriculum.The opportunities to develop close relationships with professors and get involved in research on campus abound.
Socially, there is Greek Life but it is not overwhelming – my D joined a low key sorority and a few of her male friends joined frats. An important aspect of Greek Life at Lafayette is that people don’t pledge until sophomore year so firm friendships are established before that process even starts. My D found time to pursue a wide range of activities on campus and had friends involved in everything from varsity sports to theater.
The campus is lovely. I have to say that the dorms are OK – some are nice and others are in need of a facelift. But I don’t think that is a huge deal if a student is happy and engaged at college. My D’s freshman year dorm was one of the ones in need of a facelift – yet she wouldn’t trade her experience there and the friendships she made in the dorm for anything. I don’t know a lot about the food because they got a new provider when she was an upperclassman and by that time she went down to having only a very small meal plan.
We visited a number of other schools on your list as well. Skidmore she felt was too “artsy” for her tastes (but she has friends who are very happy there), F&M was a school that was very high on her list, and Dickinson she liked but didn’t love (and I don’t know why).
Anyway, good luck with the search. If you have any particular questions about Lafayette that a mom can answer feel free to PM me at any point in your search.
Bard and Sarah Lawrence are sort of outliers by any measure. I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone who didn’t view themselves as an outsider, iconoclast, weirdo, etc. And I say that with affection. You will not have anything resembling a “traditional” college experience there. The other schools on your list are all fairly conventional LACs, some more intense or artsier than others, but none are as “out there” as Bard and Sarah Lawrence. You really have to be a specific type of student to thrive at those places. Visiting is a MUST. It’s not even worth applying without visiting, that’s how unique they are. I was a weirdo brainiac artist in high school and even I felt way too mellow to fit in when I visited them. “Difference” isn’t just celebrated there; it’s worshipped. And it can be exhausting if you’re not on that wavelength.
@Temperantia You may be done visiting at this point, sorry to have missed this thread earlier. My oldest D applied to 3 of the schools in the post’s title several years ago, Fand M, Lafayette and Dickinson. There was lots to like about all 3. F and M was high on her list, it had a very intellectual vibe that was important to her, but students also seemed very relaxed and happy. Lancaster has a nice small city/college town vibe. We visited during a Friday and attended their common hour lunch gathering, which was really fun. My D chose another college, but a good friend of hers is at F and M and has had a great experience. Likewise, Carlisle/DIckinson location was really nice, too, although a but more rural.
The same D also applied to Gettysburg College, Muhlenburg College, and Ursinus College(one of the CTCL.org schools, also very nice), all in PA. She ended up at URichmond which she also loved the feel of, and they offered her a nice scholarship. They have a very active ultimate frisbee club, which she enjoyed for several years. Her younger sister also currently attends UR and is enjoying frisbee there, too. They have liked the small classes, excellent professors, good research and internship opportunities, and the Richmond area is very nice with lots of nice restaurants, parks, museums, historic sites, outdoor activities. The campus is gorgeous, the dining hall food is really good, always seems to win awards, in fact, it is so good that we actually look forward to eating there on visits, and the weekend brunches are very popular with the locals! Although it is more like 7 hour drive from LI, there is an amtrak stiop several miles from campus with good service to NY area/norheast corridor. My kids have often used amtrak to travel to and from home, it has been a nice perk.
This was an old thread, but the new information about colleges provided in it was helpful, so thank you to all of you who replied.
From last August through this coming August, we have been visiting colleges on most of our vacations.
I know many of you can suggest other great schools, but we are no longer looking for more suggestions of new schools. At some point, we need to say enough is enough-- and I think that is the point when he has a mix of reach, target and likely schools that he likes and would be truly happy to attend. There are other wonderful schools he will not be exploring, because he already has found many colleges he likes and some favorites.
@mamaedefamilia – Yes, we did visit (and like) Vassar. My husband is an alumnus.
