California Private School Suggestions for Summer Visit?

Parent Cafe
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<p>Hi Folks-</p>

<p>I have a son who is a rising Sophomore, so am beginning the process of trying to educate myself about this surreal new world of college and college admissions. Wow, have things changed in one generation! My 15-year-old, on the other hand, isn’t the least bit interested yet in what he will be doing, and where, in 3 years. At this point he wants to go somewhere warm with hot girls and a basketball team. He did get great grades with a difficult courseload, however, so at least he is on the right track for when his frontal lobe is more prepared for college decisions.</p>

<p>I know its a little early yet to look closely at specific colleges, but we live in the PacNW, and will be down in Santa Barbara for some basketball camps. Does anyone have some suggestions about some good colleges to look at? I am thinking more in the lines of ‘this is a smaller liberal arts college’, ‘this is a big university’, ‘this is a super reach’, etc., to show my son some of the differences in colleges. I am not interested in California public schools, as that is not a financial reality due to our out-of-state status.</p>

<p>We could either go south and look at USC, Occidental, Claremont McKenna, Pomona, University of Redlands. Or go North and go to Stanford, Santa Clara University, or University of San Francisco. Not all of these, of course, I’m thinking two either in LA or 2 in San Fran. Other suggestions also appreciated.</p>

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<p>Assuming you’re driving you’ll go right through the bay area anyway and SB isn’t terribly far form LA so why not try to see 2 in each location? Sometimes it’s not all about the college, it’s about the location as well, and he might find he prefers one to the other.</p>

<p>I don’t know if he’s into the beach or might want to be but if so there’s a big difference between the beaches in the bay area and those in the LA area with the ones in the LA area being much more ‘beachy’ and actually swimmable and more fun due to the warmth and different climate, so you might want to be sure to visit the beach in each area.</p>