If you want to major in ________, go to....

Parents Forum
21

<p>You mean to tell me that your daughter doesn’t have a preference of campus vs little campus? Columbia is in the middle of NYC (well, northern middle) with one green patch for it’s campus versus Yale which is distributed throughout New Haven but has much more of a campus feel, especially because of the residential college system. Princeton is more suburban although Princeton the city has grown tremendously in the last 20-30 years. Don’t know much about the others.</p>

<p>I also don’t know much about the athletics in any college anywhere but some good advice was given regarding that aspect.</p>

22

<p>Has your daughter considered what would happen should an injury or illness interfere with her athletics? Perhaps the two issues need to be separated.</p>

<p>How do the athletics compare?
Where would she want to be in school if she could never run another step?</p>

23

<p>In x-c and track, Stanford does offer athletic scholarships but on a reward system and thus mostly for the last two years. If you show you can win on a conference level, then you could get a 50% scholarship. If you can qualify for Nationals, then maybe you’d get 75%. And if you can win on a national level, then you’re looking at a 100%. This is the PAC10, so even winning at the conference level would be very, very hard. Also, given our financial status, it will likely make more sense to take the FA instead, since one can’t combine FA with athletic money there. For this reason, actually, Stanford will probably be slightly less financially attractive than the other schools.</p>

<p>D read two interviews with female runners from Harvard, and neither seemed to have almost any time left outside their athletic and academic commitments. One girl basically said she goes out from 11PM to 1AM on a Sat., and that’s pretty much her social life outside the team. A number of Ivy coaches told D that before they took the job, the team had been run like a social club, but that they’re changing that now. These programs are getting more serious each year. Columbia, Princeton and Harvard seem pretty intense, Yale less so (which is why she kept it on the list as a different sort of option). From what we can gather, Stanford might be more time consuming than the Ivies because of the travel, not so much from practice hours. Practice hours are governed by the NCAA anyway, though of course there are those supposedly optional “captains’ practices” which I guess some teams could add on. We haven’t heard that Stanford does. There’s only so much you can run, whereas with the field sports you can just keep practicing more. But it seems the Stanford teams have to fly practically everywhere to compete.</p>

<p>The Stanford coach says they have several former athletes now in top medical and law schools, and have had engineering students on the team as well. So that would seem to indicate it’s possible to be a strong student there???</p>

24

<p>amtc: Yes, there are campuses she prefers, but as I explained there are other things those schools have which counteract the negatives. For example, you’re right–Columbia’s campus is not its strong point but the coaches have been the the nicest, the most attentive, and the most organized of all. Does that compensate for its campus? I think she doesn’t have a clear idea of how to weigh all the factors.</p>

<p>Best academics: Harvard
Best campus/location: Princeton
Best athletics: Stanford
Best coaches: Columbia
Best residential system: Yale</p>

<p>So now what?</p>

25

<p>Those differences are really not all equal. Harvard may have the “best academics”, but I question how any individual undergraduate (much less any high school senior) can really tell the difference in academics among those five colleges, except for the effect of Columbia’s Core. Perhaps in one area or another one or two of them have a clear advantage, and that might make a difference if one was completely certain about wanting to major in that area. (E.g., in most engineering disciplines, Stanford/Princeton/Columbia would outshine Harvard/Yale; in math and economics Harvard/Princeton/Stanford have some (slight) advantage; in English literature Princeton is maybe a step below the others.) But there are hardly any fields where the academic distinctions would really affect an undergraduate.</p>

<p>Therefore, surprising as it is, apart from thinking about the Core at Columbia I doubt academics should factor into her thinking much.</p>

<p>Then, look at some other equivalencies. Yale DOES have the best residential system, but even the most devoted Yale booster would admit that Harvard’s is not that much different, and even that there are reasonable (if ultimately misguided) reasons why some people prefer Harvard’s system. And Princeton has been moving in that direction for years, and now offers something like an opt-in to the Yale model. So that factor really only distinguishes HYP from CS. And, notwithstanding the obvious wonderfulness of residential colleges, you don’t hear Stanford or Columbia students demanding any changes to their systems.</p>

<p>Campus: To me, Princeton and Stanford have very similar campuses and suburban situations. Princeton is East-Coast beautiful, especially in spring, and Stanford is golf-course beautiful year-round. Stanford really has unparalleled places to run, and weather to run in. But it’s really a choice of urb vs. suburb here.</p>

<p>I suspect the real choices come down to these packages:</p>

<p>The biggest athletic platform, great campus, great distance: Stanford</p>

<p>The most comfortable coaches, but have to take the Core and live in the city: Columbia</p>

<p>The best all-around milieu and closest to home: Princeton</p>

<p>Which really means deciding between Stanford and anything else, and if not Stanford then coaches vs. best surroundings. (So of course, she’ll probably choose Harvard.)</p>

26

<p>If she thinks Princeton has “the best” location among the five schools, I’m surprised she is seriously considering Columbia or Yale, or even Harvard, for that matter. Princeton’s is the quintessential, cloistered suburban campus (although, son wondered when he visited, what exactly is Princeton a suburb of?). </p>

<p>And to say that Harvard has the “best academics” is an oversimplification. If, however, that’s your D’s sincere belief, I suspect that’s where she’ll land, unless she places athletic concerns above academic concerns.</p>

27

<p>LOL, here’s the family opinion breakdown:</p>

<p>DH doesn’t understand why anyone who can get into Harvard should go anywhere else. </p>

<p>D thinks she probably prefers Harvard so far because it has good everything (she hasn’t visited Stanford yet though), but doubts her feelings, worrying it might just be because it’s Harvard.</p>

<p>S doesn’t understand why D wouldn’t choose Stanford because it seems to have the best balance of both academics and athletics. I mean, she could become an Olympian!</p>

<p>Me: I think D’s primary need right now is to feel socially connected, and want her to choose the place that offers the best social environment for her… if only she knew which it was! I’m thinking Columbia?</p>

28

<p>GFG, your DH might be amused by our Harvard story. My daughter received a recruiting call from the Harvard track coach, but when I listened to the message on the answering machine I thought he said he was from Howard. I was surprised that a coach from an historically black college would be recruiting her. I finally checked the area code and figured out that it was Harvard calling. She did talk with the coach about making a visit but I could not convince her to go - she said that it’s too cold there and she didn’t want to take any SAT IIs. Oh well.</p>

29

<p>^ Funny story. My son refused to visit Havard too. Different strokes…</p>

30

<p>There’s no wrong answer here. Even if she chooses Harvard “because it’s Harvard”, she is likely to get an adequate education, to enjoy her college experience, and to think she made the absolute best choice. </p>

<p>Of course, the same would be true of any of the other choices, too. (I would worry about the additional intensity of Stanford athletics, though. If she is seriously thinking about anywhere else, it is probably an indication that her sport is not the most important factor here. Which is fine.)</p>

<p>As long as she doesn’t feel ambivalent about the coaches or the teammates, she should probably just let her heart decide, secure in the knowledge that there’s no real downside anywhere.</p>

31

<p>She should visit Stanford. It has the same upscale suburban feeling as Princeton but with much better weather and much more interesting places to run. Not nearly as socially weird (at least to a Californian) as the eating clubs. Every bit as strong academically, but not as much attention lavished on undergrads, which can be good or bad depending on one’s personality.</p>

32

<p>I suggest considering basics, things all undergraduates have to live with because of the university. </p>

<p>For example, as noted, Columbia’s core & life in Manhattan. Urban vs. suburban, with or without a car. How difficulty or easy is it to deal with the bureaucracy of the different campuses. Will the athletic dept smooth the way for her, e.g. will she have preferential treatment with housing or classes. (Practice times might limit when she can schedule classes.) Class size might be a concern. I’ve heard, but don’t know if it’s true, that it’s easier to be in smaller sized classes at Yale than at the other campuses. Does she want to be required to do a senior thesis or just have this as an option.</p>

33

<p>GFG- If this is the same child you’ve posted about before who had some social issues with kids in her HS and didn’t like the intensely competitive nature of your town, than if it were my kid I’d be encouraging her to take H off the table.</p>

<p>If this is a different kid- then sorry, but I seem to recall a lot of posts where you expressed some frustration about the Type A drivers who constituted the top of your kids HS academically. If your D is less comfortable socially with kids who exhibit that kind of drive and energy-- that may be a clue that she’d find her people more readily at the other schools.</p>

<p>My company recruits at Harvard (both undergrads and grads) and we chuckle every year that we can’t seem to find a kid who just participated in an EC or worked on a volunteer project or submitted a story or article to a newspaper or magazine. Everyone is starting up NGO’s; creating their own magazine or website; working with UNESCO to launch a non-profit in the developing world, etc. It is a stereotype of course- but there is a level of intensity that sort of hard to miss if you are a more laid back personality.</p>

<p>None of my kids could stand the place, although it is a wonderful and special institution for thousands of reasons. And all of the kids from their HS and from the surrounding towns who ended up at H fit the stereotype to a T- except for the slacker who was a multi-generation legacy-- brilliant, brilliant kid- but a quiet and unassuming personality with a modest resume of EC’s.</p>

34

<p>I’ll add two cents (with an athlete at Yale, who has friends at most of the schools you’ve mentioned).</p>

<ol>
<li>The residential college system at Yale makes up for two things: New Haven, of course, and the tendency for D1 athletes to spend every moment with their team. It is NOT possible at Yale for the team to room together (unless an unusual stochastic event occurs) as the students are sorted randomly into 12 different colleges prior to freshman year. This has added a good deal of diversity and social breadth to my daughter’s life. It also provides a safe haven away from the daily soap opera that is any team’s existence.</li>
</ol>

<p>Every other school you mentioned (I don’t know about Columbia) tends to have more social clustering - either in dorms or eating clubs - for the athletes. I view this as a downside of the athletic experience.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Do not ignore the comments about free time - particularly in a year round sport like track. Ivy practice limits are a real benefit. Limited travel is a real benefit.</p></li>
<li><p>While she should not pick a school she wouldn’t be happy at without her sport, recognize that she will spend a tremendous amount of time with her teammates and under the direction of her coach. If this is not a fit, it can be a tremendous emotional drain. She should talk to other kids on the team about their experiences. Riverrunner, a mother on this board, might be able to answer questions about the freshman track experience at Yale if you pm her.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Good luck. It’s a wonderful choice to make.</p>

35

<p>My D attended Barnard and was very involved with life at Columbia.</p>

<p>One advantage NYC has for an athlete is that it is open 24 hours a day, so if the athletic schedule is rigorous things will be available for her whenever she has the time.</p>

<p>D did not take the core (Barnard has distribution requirement.) However, she took many upper level Columbia courses, She said that the core allowed discourse on a very sophisticated level because everyone has the same background knowledge.</p>

<p>She spent a lot of time at Yale, too, because friends were there, and she thought Yale was very intense, not so much in work load, but in learning “the Yale line.” That’s a good thing or bad thing, just like the core.</p>

<p>I would say not to go to Columbia unless NYC is a draw. The education really is a partnership between NYC and Columbia and Barnard.</p>

<p>That said, a nice coach is very, very important I’m sure, for a young woman with these aspirations.</p>

36

<p>Our D is a freshman at Stanford and although she is not an athlete so I don’t know for sure, it didn’t appear that they grouped the athletes together in her dorm. (I could be wrong) One of the boys across the hall from her is clearly an athlete and his roommate doesn’t appear to be. She attended a Harvard summer program and found the vibe hyper-competitive and in-your-face. She noticed the “we’re Harvard” attitude. None of this bothered her since she has never been focused on classroom competition- just the work.That being said, she had the best summer ever at Harvard. The undergrads and Resident Fellows she met were awesome. The fellow program participants were wonderful. She worked her butt off in class but wouldn’t have changed a thing.</p>

<p>She loves the laid back vibe of Stanford. We’ve heard it described something like a duck. Calm and floating above the water but paddling it’s legs like crazy under the water. Plenty of social opportunities in between the intense academic requirements. On a scale of 1 to 10, she gives it a 25. (She is a huge fan of the athletics at Stanford- all sports). </p>

<p>I’m sure your D has already done this but I recommend meeting some non-athletes and doing some non-athletic things while on campus visits.</p>

<p>Best Wishes on this exciting and stressful decision process.</p>

37

<p>Mythmom, could you please explain what you mean by “the Yale line”?</p>

38

<p>My first-year son at Columbia is in a quad with a recruited track athlete. There seems to be no segregation of athletes at Columbia, for what it’s worth.</p>

39

<p>To clarify - segregation of athletes is not typical in these schools freshman year. Most use a random lottery for freshman roommates. It’s after that point that one tends to see athletes cluster together.</p>

40

<p>Niece just went through the same thing with Stanford, (UCLA full ride), Boston College (full ride), Harvard and I forgot the 5th school. Even though UCLA had the best team in the PAC 10 and the coaches were ODP and Olympic coaches, she chose her #1 School which was Stanford (#2 team) over her #1 team, UCLA (#2 school). She did this because ultimately, if the coaches leave or she gets injured, the school she wants to be at is Stanford. Stanford was able to get her tuition down to UC level.</p>