My daughter is making her final college choice in less than a week and is leaning heavily toward Lafayette for its academics and school spirit, among other things, (with Dickinson as a backup), but she is concerned about how social life might trend on campus given the strong presence of Greek life (which she thinks won’t participate in) and the wealthier backgrounds of many students. Will someone of moderate middle class means and who doesn’t participate in varsity sports or Greek life feel left out? Are most students pretty friendly or do they trend cliquey?
Also, how are the dorms and how is food for vegetarians?
My D graduated from Laf a few years ago and had an absolutely wonderful experience in every respect (academics, socially, ability to do research, involvement in ECs, etc.). I’ll try to answer the questions that I can…
–D did not participate in any varsity sports and had no problems finding friends. She was involved in other ECs on campus which added to her experience at the college.
–She had friends from every different socioeconomic background (ranging from full pay to full scholarship) at college. She remains close with many of her college friends today.
–Dorms seemed mixed – some nicer than others. That was not an area of focus to her. She did move into a living-learning community for her last two years and that was lovely.
–She was not a vegetarian so can’t comment. Food seemed typical college fare. She took less and less of a meal plan as time went on (but that seems typical at many colleges).
FWIW we also looked at Dickinson which is another lovely college – my D felt Laf was a better fit for her academic interests and she preferred the overall vibe at Laf – but you can’t make a bad choice among those two schools. Congrats to your D.
FWIW my D found the academic demands at Laf to be quite fair and reasonable (and she was a STEM major who at times had two lab classes a semester). She organized her time well and and found ample time for meaningful ECs and plenty of fun. At Laf students (other than engineering majors) typically take four 4 credit classes a semester.
D knows students who enjoyed Dickinson as well but I have no first-hand knowledgs of the workload there.
My kid plans to choose Laf.
She is vegan and based on our visits and what they show on the site for food, she feels comfortable with the options.
We are “upper” middle-class, aka we are getting decent grant aid.
My kid will not likely participate in greek life.
My daughter is not a party person and plans to stay in Watson Hall which is a substance free dorm.
My daughter was interested in skiing (rec) and swim club (competitive) of which there is none. But I think she chose Laf for other reasons over schools that had them - feeling comfortable, food she can eat, relationships with teachers, more colaborative than competitive, nice people and staff (she didn’t like that at some schools people were generally negative).
She plans to join clubs and will be looking for people to hang out and ski with and will get involved in dorm/campus activities.
My hope is that she will implement some of the things she liked at other colleges there at Laf like dive in movies. We are big on strategy board games so I suggested she bring one or two with her every time she travels back and forth from school.
Maybe our kids will meet and get along!
I have a current Laf freshman and it’s been great. Mine will not be going Greek. Has made friends in different clubs and through theater and dorm, as well as in classes. The kids I met seemed regular, not uber wealthy. There is such a variety of things to join. One way to meet people early is to do the pre orientation service week, I know a student who absolutely loved that and made friends though it. We’ve been very happy with the school.