<p>Just back from Central New York and Vermont, and my oh my , how interesting. Jacked up pickups with loud flowmasters. Overalls as evening wear. Stunningly provincial thinking at every coffeeshop and convenience store. <em>sniff</em>. Lots of yard cars , and stacks of “stuff you’ll use someday” made us feel mighty welcome. It was just like being back home.;)</p>
<p>Cur:</p>
<p>S’s roommate is from TX. S has not reported any funny talk (not even humorous one) 
Since both are anime freaks, I expect they speak mangled manga Japanese. :)</p>
<p>Stunningly provincial thinking is ubiquitous! And certainly not limited to the “rednecks”! On the other hand, one of the most insightful thinkers I know is a high school drop out, truck driving, warehouse working apple farmer from Michigan. :)</p>
<p>They may have had jacked up pick ups with really loud flowmasters, but I’ll be really impressed if they had a roll of toilet paper on the dashboard!</p>
<p>well, alongfortheride. I’ll admit -you do have me there. I did NOT see the “portable toilet” on the dashboard. </p>
<p>To everybody: Do y’all realize what rarified air we breathe here on this internet mountaintop of ours? This place where a mention of “Hamilton” immediately draws to mind a vision of a college , not a President, or the first name of a blender? What percentage do we make up of the population? One percent? </p>
<p>Talking with the locals, the people who service or at least live near the campuses of these schools we revere, aspire to, argue about always impresses upon me how narrow the spectrum of visible light is for us. It is , in equal turn, amazing how invisible some of the schools our kids are considering are to the locals. </p>
<p>“What do you think about that place on the hill?” The college? “Yeah. The college.” I don’t think about it, really. I know some folks who work up there." Don’t some of the local kids attend? " Nope. None I ever heard of." Why not? "I really can’t say. No one ever thinks about it, to be truthful . " Don’t the students frequent the local stores and businesses? “Yeah. They come in . They seem nice enough. Most of them.That’ll be $9.50.” But why don’t local kids think about going there ? It’s a fine school. "Can’t really say but most of the smart kids around here go to Oswego (fill in name of local state school), now that’s a good school but it’s so expensive. That’ll be $9.50. "</p>
<p>Cur:</p>
<p>Across the hall from S is a kid who is the first in his entire county to attend an Ivy. S’s roommate comes from a town that is 90% Hispanic and whose median income is half of the national median. It is a wonder that they did hear of H, and that they got in!</p>
<p>Marite, that is because we have to look up Hispanics in the encyclopedia -every time a new goverment form come out. Starting with H … A… we stumble onto Harvard. We also wonder why it is not spelled HarBard. </p>
<p>On a more serious note, Harvard is simply synonymous for the best school one could dream of. It is a given that every smart Hispanic will be told countless times that he COULD end up at Harvard. The biggest problem is that between the mighty H and the local community college, there is a huge vacuum of knowledge about colleges.</p>
<p>I totally agree, Xiggi. Where I live the kids think Harvard, Yale, Princeton. They don’t know about Stanford, Dartmouth, Duke or many others. They think UC and USC are part of the same system. But just today, My son said he met a new student from our hometown just on the other side of the disputed border. He is two rooms down the hall! So some kids do look farther afield. I speak and explain and cajole until I just give up. </p>
<p>Cur, I have spend some time in New England area esp. Vermont and NH doing family research and I was so taken aback by the culture out in the sticks…just like Brownsville or any small town, USA.</p>
<p>Xiggi:</p>
<p>You have a good point. I was more impressed by the fact that the two guys had received a good education in their towns that qualified them for admission into H. My S seems to be hitting it off with his roommate, btw.</p>
<p>I pulled my hispanic boy out of south Texas before he had totally developed speaking English with a Spanish accent. The culture there is so intense that the kids don’t want to leave home. It is another country unto itself. Parents don’t want them to as well. South Texas has good schools for top students specializing in sciences and medicine, the arts. They bus their top students to these public schools. They have an excellent university system so the thinking goes “why leave home?” I had one friend who pulled his daughter on full scholarship to U of Mich back home to the valley in her second year. He couldn’t stand her to be away from the family. So it is a very big deal to get kids to take the risk and leave for Harvard.</p>
<p>Cur- did you say Oswego?? I went to Oswego. It is a decent school within the SUNY system. Sometimes I think this website gives an extremely distorted view of college admission. In my area of Long Island, I’d say 60 % of the kids attend a SUNY school, Nassau Community College or local schools like Hofstra-Adelphi and Molloy. It’s only a handful of kids who make it to a very competitive college. You may have also gained some insight into the environment of NY State. There is a big difference between NYC/Metro folk and the rest of the state. Upstate NY is probably more like anytown USA (only colder).</p>
<p>marny, please don’t think I was “dissing” Oswego ( or anyplace else, for that matter). I wasn’t. </p>
<p>I think my sleep deprived brain was trying to be humorous. “Blender”? “President”? People are funny. I was just commenting on what the public must think of “us”, and reflecting on what we understand of “them”. The divide is great and really not that regional, as some may expect. Heck, as I may have expected.</p>
<p>Please understand me. I am not ranking on the rednecks of NY and New England. I identify much more with the muscle shirt wearing, just a beer or two away from a “Cops” episode , open bow “family ski -ster” boat pilot in Vermont than with the Bentley Coupe’ driver in Saratoga who couldn’t parallel park.</p>
<p>Another observation: Harley riders look the same everywhere. Accountants and dentists with do-rags and 2%-ers that look like they can rip your arm off and beat you to death with it. Especially if you were driving a Bentley Coupe’ and having trouble parallel parking.</p>
<p>As far as getting kids out of their comfort zone to go to another part of the country for college, it doesn’t just happen with kids who’s parents are lower or middle income. The students at my kids’ school could go anywhere they wanted ($$-wise) but their parents encourage them to stay near home and their friends all stay, so they’re often reluctant to leave the area. I guess I have rocks in my head. I told the kids they HAVE to go somewhere new and interesting and make new friends from all over…</p>
<p>Curm, I had no idea you were coming to Vermont or I would have met up with ya…even if I am a hick from VT. Which school did you see here? Was it Middlebury? I’m not that far from there. Actually quite a a number of kids from rural VT go to Middlebury, including two from our class last year. </p>
<p>Hope you liked VT…the weather was gorgeous. We have an interesting mix of the redneck type you described as well as out of staters who have settled here for the lifestyle, many of whom are quite educated. But the life here is very different than in metro areas, to be sure. And yes, kids from our neck of the literal woods can make it in a selective school and fare just fine. </p>
<p>I am familiar with Saratoga as well as my husband grew up there and my inlaws live there. I gather you looked at Skidmore. My inlaws take courses there! Maybe you ran into them! 
Not the typical Skidmore student, mind you.</p>
<p>Glad you found our way of life here so much like home. Your D might like it then. My kids like their Vermont lifestyle and environment, but opted to try a completely different environment for college…and different it is…one in Providence, one in Manhattan! Worlds apart. Glad they are trying something new. It sure is different.</p>
<p>Did your D like the schools you saw? </p>
<p>Susan</p>
<p>Hahahaha, Curm! It’s the tank top/pushup bra wearing, jean shorts up the wahzoo, rubber flipflops, tatooed, toe ring wearing, giant alligator-clip on top of the head, chain-smoking, Bud drinkers that I miss most from my old neighborhood. I’m talking about the women, now. And, that roll between the top of the pants and the bottom of the tank top is called a “muffin top.” Nowhere near the East Coast, it’s fashion - it’s a lifestyle - it’s my home state of Nevada! :D</p>
<p>Cur, I had the same reaction when we visited Cornell, Hamilton, Colgate, Williams, Dartmouth, and others. A real part of real America, as I see it, with no aspersions and no apologies. I recall James Carville’s famous statement about my home state: “Pennsylvania is Philly on the east, Pittsburgh on the west, and Alabama in the middle.” I’m OK with that. Keeps things real. A double-wide with a great view and spare parts readily available in the yard isn’t necessarily a bad thing.</p>
<p>“muffin top” oooh, slugg, you do have a way with words, I never knew there is an official term for it.</p>
<p>I must admit, having grown up in SoCal, where the lower socioeconomic crowd is generally hard-working immigrants- living crowded, working hard, every one trying to better themselves and the family, it was a real cluture shock when I moved to a more rural region- to escape the city and met those people you described. The most startling aspect of the “white trash” Phenomenon was that no one wanted to “better themselves” So many immigrants in the OC, working hard under adverse conditions to improve their lot, vs. people entirely content with thier lot in life and, yup, dressing exactly as described. Had neighbors who went in together to have all their teeth pulled- 2 fer 1 deal, and then had to go many weeks toothless before the dentures could fit comfortably. They were hard-working, salt of the earth, but not like any one I knew in the OC (before it was with a capital “The”)</p>
<p>Yes, Curm, we are a very small percentage of the world. I am in touch with many parents (from my D’s private high school) of kids off to university to see how the kids (and parents!) are faring. In our small town public school, very few of my friends have kids off to university, they’re all hanging out locally. It really pointed out to me the difference in family expectations and how unique we are here.</p>
<p>When I lived in Orange County there was no “the” at all. Do people really say that?</p>
<p>Marite, I had to read your post twice! The first time, I read, [MISQUOTE] Across the hall from S is a kid who is the first in his entire country to attend an Ivy [/MISQUOTE]</p>
<p>and I’m thinking… “Wow! Where could this kid be from???”</p>
<p>I think only people who never lived there call it that, but is has become a runnning joke arounf here- before we had to tell people “by Disneyland,” now they know where it is. My D’s will not watch that show, they are very blase, “been there, done that” about the things that their friends think are so cool. The “been there, done that” would be the locations- not the sex, drugs, murder, etc :D</p>