I think campus life/culture is almost as important as the school academics when choosing the right college. What do you guys think? Is this something that you would take into a consideration when making your final college choice?
If yes, which method do you find to be most helpful?
- talking to HS counselors
- talking to college counselors
- talking to current college students
I have spoken to a couple of college admissions officers and “student ambassadors” and it seems like they sugarcoat a lot of things…
If you value campus life and student culture, then by far the most helpful method would be the third one (though of course it be wisest to use a combination of all of those methods, along with others). Students who work as tour guides or in similar positions can be very helpful, but you’re right - they do have a motivation to sugarcoat things. If you really want to find out about campus culture, go visit colleges and make an effort to talk to students you see around the campus, many of whom will be more than happy to answer your questions. A great way to do this is to eat in the dining hall. This will not only give you an easy way to find students to talk to, but it will also give you a sense of what community and group dynamics are like at the school and what the vibe is like in large social settings.
If you are unable to visit some schools, consider student review websites, which can often tell you a lot about campus culture. Unigo and Niche would be a good place to start.
Re my last post: the stars were supposed to be U n i g o (remove the spaces). Don’t know why it was edited out.
Thanks! i will check out the websites as well.
There are also books that give you an “insider’s” look at campus culture. Some are a few years old, but I don’t think the campus culture would differ very much from what it was a few years ago.
I think overnight visits can be helpful, although I also realize that sometimes they can leave a prospective student with an inaccurate perception; for example, an unfriendly host or a host whose habits clash drastically with your own. But I think there are ways to maximize these visits in order to learn as much as possible about the campus culture. The overnight visits that were the most helpful to my daughter were the ones where she spent time with a lot of different students and not just with her host. At one school, she watched one of the presidential debates in a dorm common room. At another, her host had an obligation that took her off campus for a while, and she wound up being invited to an a cappella rehearsal by some other students. These experiences, plus eating three meals in the dining hall and being able to see and hear what was going on around her, were very helpful.
A visit is best, of course. But a book called the Fiske Guide also has a good reputation for giving an accurate picture of the culture of various schools.
And I would absolutely take campus life into account, as much as possible. Some people don’t have a lot of choices for various reasons, but to the extent you do, it is definitely an important thing to consider. At every academic level there are lots of schools and each school has its own character, culture and environment. It will make an enormous difference in your experience. It gets talked about a lot on CC, often under the heading of fit, in the sense of whether a particular school’s culture is the right fit for a particular person.