first-year experiences at the mid point

Whistle_Pig
Fri, 23 Jan 2009 09:54:23 +0000

no personal knowledge beyond scuttlebutt. Spoke with an older student (probly 24 or 25 year old young man) who was in honors program and lived in the honors house. He spoke very maturely and highly of both the residential and academic experiences, noting that he did not particularly “fit” into the traditional dorm scenario very well (he’d been in service, etc. …clearly a very focused, self-motivated student). Honors courses are also available to other students when space allows. My own impression is that there are many honors level students and generally small classes with tenured faculty and so the difference between honors and regular courses is not so great. Just some very superficial, anecdotal observations and comments.

btw, I had to smile on the comments above re: Granville. My own perspective is it’s a “glass half-full” place with enormous advantages over say Kenyon, Oberlin, Greencastle, Richmond (IN), Meadville, Hiram, Wooster, and a whole bunch of others. Granville was founded and laid out by a bunch of Massachusetts Presbyterians (sent out from Granville, MA as “missionaries” to the wild western front which would eventually become an eastern bedroom community of Columbus.) We find it a spectacularly picturesque town, with wide streets, beautiful churches. Possibly a town that “seems” wonderful and might become a bit less so when one lives there? But what a New England college town is “supposed” to look like. And they have the advantage of being readily commutable to a very large metro area. This is a critical component in hiring top flight young faculty who have spouses often seeking professional positions and/or disinclined to want to live in Yellow Springs or Mantua Corners or Grinnell Iowa or Northfield MN or other rural, often run down communities with few professional opportunities in reasonable proximity. So our view is that Granville may not be downtown Philly…thank God…and has enormous strategic advantages for an aspiring LAC. Best of both worlds …live in a neat, attractive, economically vibrant place with easy access to the symphony, museums, professional job placements.

I guess in the end, it’s just the old story about beauty being in the eye of the ogler …