For STEM students (my student is interested in forensics), what do you look for when touring science buildings? The newer the better? State of the art equipment? Any that you have run across that are particularly impressive?
I think the watchwords these days are “collaboration” and “flexibility”. Does the building design provide opportunities for students and teachers to interact outside the classroom? Is it easy to see what’s going on in laboratories other than your own? And, how flexible are the classroom configurations? Can they meet the needs of different pedagogical styles?
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With respect to encouraging faculty-student interaction and interdisciplinary collaboration across faculy, newer, or newly redesigned, science buildings tend to offer intentional open spaces. This is an interior view of Union College’s new science center, for example:
Regarding your child’s preference with respect to major, would they like forensic science itself (which can be limiting in some ways), or perhaps something scientifically broader, such as anthropology?
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Thought this was CMU for a moment. I remember touring the place and it looked quite a bit like this.
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If I had a student looking for a collaborative learning environment I would target schools with programs like the X-Lab at James Madison University.
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My D was focused on accessibility for undergrads, maker spaces, meeting spaces for project teams, state of the art equipment, and size/scope. We toured one school that had a gorgeous new building and then come to find out later it was only for grad students.
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I’m gently nudging in that direction. I believe anthropology would touch on all of student’s interests.
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I am just laughing here but not at you. My son when on tours every single tour stopped at the chemistry buildings that were all sponsored by some impressive company. We stopped doing every tour when visiting and he said “after awhile, all the Chem buildings tend to look the same”. So I guess it depends on what really matters to you.
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In researching anthropology programs, look for those with an available archaeology concentration, which represents the subfield concerned with recovering and analyzing physical evidence. For an even broader scientific foundation, the interdisciplinary field of geoarcheology also may be of interest.
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I would look for any evidences of student led research (like research posters from summer research or class projects). Usually they are posted on the walls. Otherwise, most of undergraduate level science buildings are similar at large (old vs new).