<p>Oddly enough, there is another CC–Cruisecritic.com–which could easily be called Cruise Confidential because of the similarities. One difference is that each sailing has its own thread–and the posters actually meet onboard at a “meet and mingle” with with some catering (chocolate strawberries, etc) sponsored by the ship. </p>
<p>Perhaps Elon should do the same for its MidAtlantic fans on this thread?</p>
<p>Yabe - so apparently you are destined to be a part of “CC” wherever you go! That’s pretty funny. Have a great time on your cruise.</p>
<p>I guess on the southern friendliness thing I think about my daily interactions at the grocery store, etc. and I just don’t see the same level of warmth and friendliness here in MD that I see in NC. However, I think people are generally more polite (generalization of course) in the south. My son had a friend from Wake spend the night with us last spring as he was traveling by car from Michigan to NC and needed a place to stop for the night. We did nothing special - gave the kid dinner and a place to sleep and then he was on his way very early the next morning. He sent a thank you note a few days later! My jaw dropped. I’m a big believer in kids writing thank you notes for b-day gifts and so forth - but this was very unexpected. So yes, I think there really are some cultural differences - even in states like MD and NC that are only 5 or so hours apart.</p>
<p>Hummmm: They served chocolate covered strawberries at S1’s admitted students weekend and now he goes to school there. There may be something to this.</p>
<p>OMG. My worlds collide! I have been active on the other cc also! Different screen name though. We have cruised nearly every year since 2004 (but my next cruise won’t be till a girls cruise in 2012 for my big bday). I met several people on cruises that I first met online. So much fun!</p>
<p>I’m sure we would all get along well in person too!</p>
<p>Congratulations to your son on Juniata, emilybee! Have you visited? If you did, what did you think of the school? I know parents and kids who have liked their visits very much, but none of them are Jewish.</p>
<p>Perhaps some of you have seen this article about the U.S. Dept of Education’s Office for Civil Rights policy on anti-semitism on campus, which was reprinted in a number of Jewish newspapers:
[The</a> Institute for Jewish and Community Research](<a href=“http://www.jewishresearch.org/v2/campus_harassment.htm]The”>http://www.jewishresearch.org/v2/campus_harassment.htm)</p>
<p>Congrats to Emilybee and Holliesue on the Juniata acceptances. I don’t know much about this school. What part of PA is it in?</p>
<p>momjr., it is in a rather rural part of PA. There is an Amtrak station that is pretty close to the school. </p>
<p>We really liked Juniata and it ended up as my son’s second choice. Congratulations to those who were accepted!! BTW, I had a tough time saying good-bye to Juniata when my son chose to attend another school.</p>
<p>To spare Emily and Hollie touting it, Juniata is profiled in Colleges That Change Lives. It is an excellent, long-established small (under 2000 kids) school with a clear sense of how it wants to help kids mature and learn.</p>
<p>Good Grief! When will I ever catch up?</p>
<p>My daughter and I visited MiamiUniversity (Ohio) yesterday and are on our way tomorrow to Elon and JMU.</p>
<p>I’ll skip most of the regular things you can find about Miami elsewhere except to say that it is a huge, sprawling, beautiful campus, even with snow on the ground and no leaves on the trees it’s attractive. It must be striking in the Spring and Fall. I’m usually not a fan of red brick Georgian campuses, but Miami is about the best I’ve seen in this style. Partly it’s how well maintained and new it all looks, bright well maintained brickwork with custard yellow wood trim. There are also a few newer buildings, also in red brick but with modern design that somehow fit in perfectly. All in all everything about the place makes it look and feel like a solid school to attend. It’s mid sized in student body at about 17k, but the facilities and size of campus made it feel like a much larger school, more prestigious private university.</p>
<p>Although it is located in the middle of cornfields a little less than an hour from Dayton and Cinncinatti, there’s a nice four block high street with lots of places to eat ,a movie theatre and other stores. </p>
<p>Friday night we went to services and a complementary dinner at the Hillel, located a block or so off campus (or maybe on campus, it’s hard to tell what is on campus and what isn’t). At the beginning of the service there were maybe 25 students pretty equally divided between male and female. They all sang and harmonized beautifully and it was an enjoyable service . By the time the dinner of salad, matzah ball soup, grilled cheese, chili (and challahs) came around, it had swelled to at least 35. The very open and welcoming Rabbi Rachel Gartner told us that attendance was lower than usual because Rush Week had just started and a number of regularly attending students couldn’t or didn’t come. </p>
<p>The kids there were all welcoming and outgoing, eager to talk to me and my daughter and another girl who was visiting from Indiana. They all seem to like the school a lot and were quite happy. Miami is not a diverse school, mostly white and Christian. (It was not though preppy as I’d heard which was a relief). Blacks and Asians walking on campus stand out. I’m sure Jews would too if they looked different. Although I’d read estimates of about 1000 undergrad Jewish students, most there felt it was more like 650- 750, though they said it might be more who didn’t identify as clearly . Still no one gave any indication or hint of ever being uncomfortable or feeling odd or uncomfortable on campus. During dinner a student Rabbi spoke about the Spring Birthright trip and later an Asian woman spoke who was running a program to bring an innovative art program to elderly nursing home patients with dementia to several nearby homes including a Jewish home. She asked for volunteers and a number of students seemed to be signing up (she also told them they could get one credit for the work). </p>
<p>Most of the students there (as probably in the whole university) come from Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin etc. When they heard that we were from NY they all asked surprised what brought us to Miami.</p>
<p>Afterwards my D hooked up with a camp friend and saw the opposite end of the Jewish spectrum at Miami: kids who rarely would go to Hillel or went once or twice and didn’t care for it. She went out to an AEPi (Jewish Frat) party and met some girls at AEPhi. Interestingly, SAMMY which used to be on campus a few years ago is also starting up again. Her camp friend ((from NYC) told her she went twice to Hillel but didn’t care for it, but nor was she going to rush for a sorority. She said most of her friends were not Jewish but she came to Miami in part to see and do new things. They did have a good time at the party, my D stayed til 1.</p>
<p>All in all my D really liked Miami and for now, I think it’s moved to at or near the top of the list of schools she’s been admitted to that she would attend. I think I’d be happy with it too, based on the academics, the commitment to teaching, the job placement etc. And there seems enough Jewish life for any student who wants it.</p>
<p>Wow! What a thorough report. I can’t wait to hear your reaction to JMU and Elon. I thought you were also going to Indiana this trip - did that change or am I confused?</p>
<p>RVM, we had planned on visiting Indiana, but on Wed afternoon Delta cancelled our flight out due to complications from the snow and rebooked us for Friday. I had to reschedule virtually everything at the last second. It would have been way too rushed to do both MU and IU, & drive back to Dayton to fly out in time so I gave my D the choice and she picked MU. Depending on how acceptances and the rest of this trip shake out, IU and maybe CofC will be on any next trip.</p>
<p>I skimmed through other posts to find my place here and saw a few references to manners in the South. I just wanted to say, for a New Yorker/ I95 Corridor dweller: midwest kids, are remarkably open, welcoming , curteous and unjaded. Both my D and I noticed it. It was very refreshing.</p>
<p>My son and I went to an Elon presentation last week. He was deferred in the EA round so we will see what happens next. They told us that the majority of students are from OOS. </p>
<p>Several posters mentioned the Southern culture and somebody mentioned small town vs. big city playing a part. Having lived in the South for a short while, and having had kids attend college in the South and mid-west, my experience has been that small towns plays as much a part in the friendliness as does the geographic location. We live in a small town in PA and I can’t get out of the grocery store without saying hi to several people and usually stopping to have conversations. The hugs though, are not typical greetings for everyday meetings up here. </p>
<p>We had a similar experience as RVM (I think) where we hosted some friends of my son, who was in college in VA, for just a night. I was quite surprised to receive a thank you note from one of the girls a week later - but she was from Maryland!</p>
<p>Congrats to emilybee and HollieSue with the Juniata acceptances (did I get that right??). A good friend of my older kids graduated from Juniata two years ago. While he did enjoy his experience there, the very isolated, rural location was not easy to get used to. He did a semester abroad and that helped. I visited there with my older son. Beautiful campus.</p>
<p>kathiep- thanks, yes Juniata is fairly isolated, but less so than where we live out in the countryside! We have to drive to go anywhere. At least at Juniata she will be within walking distance of downtown! This is one of the situations where D’s choices are different from what I would want for myself. she only wanted small schools in small towns. I wanted to go to college in a more urban environment. I am hoping that when she does the inevitable study abroad for a semester or two that she will experience some place more urban.</p>
<p>Congrats on the Juniata acceptances!</p>
<p>Thanks also, mhc48 on the review of your Miami tour. It’s a school I’m keeping in mind for S2 (although only a freshman, we know how fast that’s going to be here) in that it’s in driving distance for us, and his stats will probably (actually, who know 2-3 yrs down the road) make it a good option.</p>
<p>Actually, meant to include that I met someone who’s D graduated from Miami Ohio last year w/ a degree in accounting. She loved the school and had no problem getting a job in Atlanta. Met her jewish boyfriend there who also went to Atlanta (not together anymore, but that’s beside’s the point).</p>
<p>Also, the dreaded weekend before exams, I pretty much gave S2 the parameters I expected him to follow re time studying vs playing computer games, and 2 days in he’s been sticking to the program w/out the whining that I expected. I’ve backed off on the minutia and am trusting him to do what he needs to do. I’m hoping that all of the hard work he’s putting in pays off next week. If not, it’s going to be a lot of “why did I even bother?”</p>
<p>mhc, thanks for that detailed report! I’m glad that your visit went well and look forward to reading about your impressions of the other colleges that you visit.
Just curious - it doesn’t sound like the Hillel dinner was kosher (unless matzo ball soup and chili were vegetarian, which I suppose is possible). Was that the case?
My oldest daughter applied to Miami but we never made it to visit - it looked like a great place from the literature that she received.
hollisue, did I miss a Juniata acceptance? If so, congratulations!</p>
<p>mhc: so glad you had a great trip to MU; my daughter’s very good friend (not Jewish) is planning on attending next year…have always heard VERY good things about it…</p>
<p>also, hope Elon/JMU trip is productive…it may be a little bit quiet there this week since it is Winter term (mostly freshman), but you should be able to get a feel…PM me if your daughter wants to talk to a junior girl at JMU (Jewish) who is very happy there from here in NJ</p>
<p>Congrats on the Juniata acceptances!!</p>
<p>mhc - thanks for the Miami review. It’s on D’s list of schools to look at. I have a question, you said it’s a large campus. Is it too large for the kids to comfortably walk from the dorms to where they need to go? D doesn’t want to have to take a bus to go to class, but doesn’t mind a bus system for really cold or rainy days. So far two schools we looked at had bus systems, but kids really only used them on bad weather days. </p>
<p>I have a general question for everyone, since we are trying to put our spring break college trip together. Most of the schools are not near each other, so I really can’t put it together by a geographic area trip. Which schools did you pick? The ones that your kid seems most interested in regardless of whether they were reach, match or safety? Or did you target the reach, match or safety schools?</p>
<p>So far we have visited 4 schools, 2 reaches (she loves them both of course), 1 match (she didn’t like and won’t apply) 1 safety (she really liked it). But these trips just worked out, based on timing, location, where we were, etc. </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>P.S. congrats to all of the kids who have received recent acceptances.</p>
<p>mdmom: we targeted schools that had ED/EA application options first; so that IF she was going to go that route, our daughter had enough time to get her act together; we did not visit any schools that did not care about demonstrated interest (figured we would visit those after acceptance if it came to that)…</p>
<p>we also tried to avoid any real super-reaches…never wanted her to fall in love with a school that wasn’t going to happen, even with an ED bump…plus she decided early on that she didn’t want to be at the bottom of her class (which she would be at any super reach)…</p>
<p>otherwise, we eliminated as we went along by preferences realized on the first few trips (eliminated big city schools, very large schools etc…)</p>
<p>The only school that she really wanted to apply to that we nixed was Tulane; it was very reachy, far away, very expensive (she wasn’t going to get merit) and we honestly did not think she would be successful there from an academic perspective…</p>
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<p>We did start early to fit in a bunch of schools. That said, we considered which ones looked like the best fit in general (not just r, m, s), as well as a logical way to fit in the most schools in one week of driving around. As it turned out, our son chose one of his safety schools to attend (he was admitted to reach and many match schools, so he was not short on options), and he is very happy with his decision. We never focused on whether a school was a reach or safety when visiting (our son really did not have a handle on which schools would be reaches vs. safeties until I pointed it out to him when applying).</p>