<p>I’m not a collegian yet, but I’m wondering which is more important: a college in an interesting town (like UCLA with Westwood, or UC Berkeley with Berkeley), or an interesting college (like the Claremonts).
While I find small LACs to be appealing–and Claremont is only sixty miles away from me–, UCLA and UC Berkeley are in more interesting places. I mean, face it, what’s there to do in Claremont?</p>
<p>So my question is: when you guys were choosing colleges, how much did you take into account the surroundings?</p>
<p>It should be kind of a big factor. But in the end it comes down to the school. If the surroundings impact your image of the school, then you probably would fit better at a different school. You’re stuck there for (maybe) 4 years, make sure you like it.</p>
<p>It certainly played a part, but also take into account that the vast majority of your time will be spent on campus. Unless you have lots of extra spending money stashed away, you can usually expect to not be able to do as many things off campus as there are free events on campus.</p>
<p>There are also LACs such as Lewis & Clark, Reed (both in Portland, OR), Haverford, Swarthmore (both just outside of Philadelphia), etc.</p>
<p>To me, both are important, but school is slightly more important because that’s, unfortunately, where you’ll spend the majority of your time. But don’t disregard the town either, do you really want to be stuck on school bored out of your arse with nothing to do and nowhere to go?</p>
<p>While right now going to a school with a good campus may seem important, in 2-3 years, you will probably not live on campus and not spend as much time as you did there, and in 4, you may be searching for a first job near campus. A town with more opportunities may seem more appealing then. I don’t have any personal experience with this, but I’ve heard several stories about older students “outgrowing” those smaller LAC’s that looked so appealing as high school seniors.</p>
<p>Interesting college, hands down. You’re going to be spending most of your time on campus, so it’s more important that you like the school. It’s interesting that you mention the Claremont colleges, because I attend one of them and actually faced a decision that came down to this exact issue. </p>
<p>I’ll put it this way: I chose Pomona over Columbia. Manhattan is my dream college town (city), but I felt that Pomona was the more interesting school. I don’t regret my choice for a second.</p>
<p>I don’t think its necessarily matters as long as one or the other offers you a lot to do. One of the colleges I looked at was in the middle of nowhere, but their athletic events were free and they had tons of clubs and activities to get involved with ALL over campus. I don’t think I’d have had a problem there, just like people don’t have problems at schools like NYU where the city IS the campus.</p>