<p>A lot of kids from our area got to WVU, which is three hours away. Most of them love it. I agree with Kathiep that it is a good choice for a B (or slightly lower) student who wants to attend a big flagship with lots of sports excitement. It does have a reputation as a party school. OOS tuition is very reasonable compared to other state flagships. This would be a good choice for a kid who loves skiing and hiking. There are a lot of tech/research companies in the area, so I imagine that there are good internship opportunities for computer science and engineering students. I know of one Jewish student who attends and likes it, but I don’t know how much Jewish life exists on campus. (It is West Virginia).</p>
<p>My daughter and I had a meeting yesterday afternoon and then she finished two essays and submitted her first application! Three more are just about ready to send. That only leaves one more to complete by 11/1. If she doesn’t get into her ED school, she plans to apply to two more schools in December. They are both common ap schools, so most of those apps are already complete. I feel much better today.</p>
<p>momjr: Congratulations! I remember that relief! And, I love the way you said that you and your D “had a meeting yesterday afternoon” - you truly are a project manager!</p>
<p>At our NJ school, WVU is popular among hard partying, sports minded C students and they enjoy it once there. WVU is big time in football and basketball, which for sports-minded kids means it is above such other relatively easy OOS admission flagships as UMass and URI. </p>
<p>I have not done a statistical survey, but similar schools might be Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arizona State and Oklahoma State. I think Michigan State and the other Big 10, Big East, ACC, Pac 10 and Big 12 schools are harder to get into.</p>
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<p>rm: haven’t seen this one but given it’s publishing date of July 2010, I guess that’s why…curious to see the list (although 120 sounds like quite alot!!!)…</p>
<p>The Oy Vey book is on Amazon and, with the “search inside” feature, you can get a sense of it–for example, a search for “Elon” found it mentioned twice, apparently both as a “school similar to” schools discussed in more depth.</p>
<p>I was amused that the book’s promo stressed that the author is an attorney; like the “Oy vey” title, it reminded me of how Jews were sgtereotyped as speaking 50 years ago “Oy vey, my son–the attorney, not the doctor–says it is raining on Miami Beach!”</p>
<p>Yes, I have read it. I thought it was written in a style that was very easy to read. I think that anyone who has been doing the research we have been doing, will not find much new in the book. That being said, it was a well written book. It wasn’t as dry to read as some of the college guides I have looked at. </p>
<p>For someone with a Jewish kid just getting started it would be a great book to have. To me, it’s a beginning of the process book. JMHO.</p>
<p>^^mdmom: any schools mentioned that we have not discussed at any point here?</p>
<p>just read a few of the pages posted on Amazon; maybe we should send this guy a link to “Blessing of a B-” (which I wish I had read 5 years ago…)</p>
<p>rodney - I don’t remember seeing anything that we hadn’t mentioned. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t, but they were probably schools that didn’t pertain to my D. For example we are not looking at schools with under 2500 kids or anything on the West coast.</p>
<p>[Calendar</a> of Events](<a href=“http://www.wvu.edu/~wvuhillel/WVU_Hillel/Calendar_of_Events.html]Calendar”>http://www.wvu.edu/~wvuhillel/WVU_Hillel/Calendar_of_Events.html)</p>
<p>Seems fairly active.</p>
<p>Blurb from Hillel website:</p>
<p>Campus Profile:</p>
<p>WVU Hillel is a very strong and active student organization on campus. Our building is located on University Avenue – a 2 min walk from the downtown campus. Every week we have Shabbat dinner on Friday evening, starting at 6:30 pm. This is a great opportunity to eat a delicious, home cooked meal - much better than dorm food! Sundays we have bagel brunch at 12:30 – bagels, lox, cream cheese, doughnuts, orange juice, etc. </p>
<p>We also have meetings once a week, where the student officers, directors, and members get together and plan events. Some of our past events have been trips to Kennywood (an amusement park in Pittsburgh), shopping in Pittsburgh, a panel discussion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Holocaust Memorial Day - Yom Hashoah, Hanukkah and other holiday celebrations, Shabbat cookouts, camping trips, visits to other Hillels, involvement with AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee), etc. We also have a big gathering for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, including a break the fast, and a Passover Seder.</p>
<p>WVU does not have a huge Jewish population, but the students who come to Hillel are all very close and it’s a great place to meet Jewish friends. Everyone is welcome at WVU Hillel!</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/24/charleston[/url]”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/24/charleston</a></p>
<p>Article on the male/female imbalance at CofC.</p>
<p>"Worries Over a 2-to-1 Ratio</p>
<p>September 24, 2010</p>
<p>The gender gap among college undergraduates is nothing new. But at the College of Charleston, the gap is looking like more of a chasm.</p>
<p>With a gender ratio of about two to one approximately 34 percent of students are male and 66 percent are female the college is an outlier. But that ratio is not too far out of the ordinary for Charleston, say officials, who aren’t fretting too much over the gap.</p>
<p>I think we would like to see more male presence, but on the flip side of that, we are very strong academically, said Donald C. Burkard, associate vice president for admissions and enrollment planning at Charleston. Percentages dont always tell the story.</p>
<p>Chris Weekley of the Charleston class of 2014 said in an e-mail that he has always been conscious of the gap. I certainly did not choose the college because of the ratio of males to females, and it does not bother me, he said. College is a huge change from high school in so many ways that this is just a minor one.</p>
<p>The college of about 10,100 undergraduates and 1,600 graduate students has been growing its enrollment, Burkard said, but because both sexes are enrolling annually at a relatively equal pace, the difference hasnt changed much. However, the male population is typically somewhere around 38 percent, not too far out of line with other liberal arts colleges, he said."</p>
<p>Still, Charleston is making some efforts to increase its appeal to male applicants. For instance, it recently established a rugby team and a discovery informatics M.B.A., as well as international business and international studies programs. It’s also stepping up its high-school male recruiting. And there has been talk “purely talk” about reinstating the football team that dissolved in the early 1900s. Burkard also thinks that although there is nothing explicit in the college’s strategic plan aimed at closing the gap, if everything in the plan is accomplished, it could help lower the ratio.</p>
<p>Burkard points to many factors that make the college and the city more attractive to women: a strong arts culture, rich history, lots of shopping and restaurants in a beautiful setting. Charleston was also one of the first colleges to admit women and has very strong academic programs, he said."</p>
<p>We will be visiting in the spring - like a lot of what we have read and heard - curious to see what S2 thinks or this more urban campus - and whether the gender imbalance will be noticeable or bothersome.</p>
<p>I recall the Muhlenberg, Goucher and JMU ratios not being very different. It explains why, in a time of cost cutting, some colleges ahve actually started football teams, because they often bring in over 100 “extra” boys to campus in prospective players alone.</p>
<p>The boys I know who went to JMU found the cominbaiton of a lopsided geneder ratio and a party reputation irresistible.</p>
<p>On a related note, the interaction I have seen on a coed floor with adjoining male and female bathrooms has been very positive–kids treating each other much more as friends raher than potential dates and the boys showing less Animal House behavior.</p>
<p>Re CofC gender imbalance: There are thousands of male college students less than mile away at the Citadel.</p>
<p>I am speculating that the colleges which have a good Business school and/or Engineering school, plus some good sports (football) are more likely to have at least 40-50% men enrolled. It might be worth Rockville Mom’s time to find out if the schools of high interest on her list (Elon for example) have a good ratio of men to women, if that makes a difference.
I also heard that Goucher has more women than men.</p>
<p>In our case, I really don’t care if there are more women than men. I am much more focused on price and availability of majors my son wants.</p>
<p>mdcissp, you will like this story: a young man that I know who has Asperger’s started college this year. He joined a club which had as its purpose promoting interaction between students with Asperger’s and typically developing students who wanted to get to know students with Asperger’s. The only problem was that he was the only student with Asperger’s who joined the club! Many, many typically developing students joined because they wanted to interact with students with Asperger’s. I would venture to guess that most of them are girls. Needless to say, he was getting a lot of attention…I think that they finally managed to recruit a few more students with Asperger’s to join. He is loving college and he also has a roommate and gets along with him fine.
I just thought you’d enjoy hearing a success-so-far story!</p>
<p>Hi-Great story! Can you please post which college this Asperger’s student attends? If you don’t want to post the name of the school publicly, please PM me. Thanks so much.</p>
<p>The reallity is that women are attending college in higher numbers than men. One thing my D has looked at is the ratio. If any school is at the 60 women/40 men ratio she is taking it off of her list. I really can’t say that I blame her. Most of the schools are not balanced 50/50, but when it drops down so low, I think it changes the dynamics on campus. Reviews I have read on unbalanced campuses seem to support this. Elon is at the 60/40 ratio. I also thinks it helps in the admission process if your S is applying to one of these schools, since most schools do want to try to balance out the class.</p>
<p>I think MD is right that engineering, business (although less than before) and big time football are key draws for men. Education, theater, and health professions draw lage groups of women, plus the overall numbers are weighted towards women, in part because men are more likely to go into the military, trades or minor league sports before college and because, in certain large minority groups, women are much more likely to attend college than men.</p>
<p>LI, if you want evidence supporting your daughter’s decision, note a Times article last year about how women at UNC throw themselves desparately at any man. You might caution her that, by junior and senior year, many women find that even a 50/50 ratio has become functionally much worse, because the the younger men are too immature for the upperclasswomen, but the younger women are in the competition for the upperclassmen.</p>
<p>And we thought my S had a disadvantage applying to colleges as a white Jewish male! He figured if he were asian or any other ethnic group, he’d have a better chance!</p>
<p>The schools he’s looking at are pretty evenly divided between male/female, but I’m sure he would not complain to know there are a few hundred more females at the school he ends up at!! :)</p>
<p>I think the gender imbalance will be more of an issue the smaller the school - like at Goucher, for instance. I don’t see it being a big problem at Cof C or JMU - at least not for a boy!:)</p>
<p>I also think boys have a distinct advantage in the admissions process right now - which is good - looking at S2’s grades last night - he is going to need all the help he can get!</p>