<p>LonelyFishbowl - Just reading your wonderfully thought out, concise post, tells me you are not going to have trouble ANYWHERE you decide to go. Although it sounds sort of corny, I would take a sheet of paper and write out the pluses and minuses of each and see what you come up with. Write down everything. That is how my younger D finally made a decision between 4 schools. Just seeing it on paper sometimes causes the truth to hit you between the eyes. Also, we have come to decide that a place is often what you make of it. They ALL have negatives - just which of the negatives would you better be able to tolerate.</p>
<p>My nephew is a freshman at Northwestern. He is freakishly smart - 2390 SAT on his one and only sitting, Presidential Scholar semi, NMF, etc. etc. and he says the quarter system at NU is just a constant deluge of difficult work. That being said, he does like when your break comes (winter holiday, spring break) you have no homework. THAT being said, he had no friends around during Spring Break and he will not get home until nearly mid-June. I always wondered how that would impact internships and summer jobs. I am sure many NU students do those things so I am guessing they have worked it out. He chose NU over CalTech and Harvey Mudd because he was not sure that science would ultimately be the way he wanted to go and NU would provide more choices. He seems happy at NU. I don’t personally know much about this topic, but if you DID happen to decide on Journalism, I remember reading articles about unhappiness among students regarding the cirriculum - <a href=“Chicago News - Chicago Tribune - Chicago Tribune”>Chicago News - Chicago Tribune - Chicago Tribune; (this is the best article I could find - I know there are better articles out there).</p>
<p>A friend of my D’s is a journalism student at Mizzou and is very happy there.
She came from our mediocre public high school and was an average student there, so she finds the coursework challenging (she is also an athlete at the school). You concerns about having like-minded peers is very valid. There would be a few - just not in the numbers you would find at NU and Wellesley. The town of Columbia is actually very nice - a great area with shops, restaurants, etc. We often stop there for a meal when driving to younger D’s school.</p>
<p>Another suggestions would be that you copy your original post and start a thread on the NU and Wellesly forums. Of course their responses would be one-sided, as you would expect, but you would get peole who are very tuned into those schools.</p>
<p>Best of luck to you - you have some fabulous choices and are probably the envy of many students on this site.</p>