Match me: Geoscience or Construction Mgmt or Urban Planning or Geography [VA resident, 4.0 UW, 36 ACT superscore, <55K if possible]

Just a few more:

Has anyone mentioned SUNY ESF? A small school but tied in with neighboring Syracuse University - and you can use their facilities (dining) and take classes, etc.

I think, personally I’d focus on the Construction Management over urban planning unless that’s truly his desire because it’s inter disciplinary, more policy and I can see it being a difficult career path vs. construction management, which will be more hard skill - at least looking at the academics, like the Pitt program as an example.

But here’s another couple with urban planning:

Another tween school with urban studies (3 concentrations) and a geogrphay minor is College of Charleston. I don’t think it’d have the academic focus he needs. Charleston itself is blue. . Likely not the pedigree he wants - but sometimes you find more depth than you think. For example, my daughter goes to Charleston and is a Charleston Fellow - which is a subgroup of Honors - with lots of enrichment.

Salisbury is another mid atlantic tweener - perhaps? Again, lack of pedigree but doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be right. The price would be and it has a solid rep.

UNC Charlotte - is one more to look at - up and coming but likely too large.

Academic Programs - Construction Management, B.S. (esf.edu)

About ESF - Our Relationship with Syracuse University

Urban Planning | Salisbury University

Concentrations for the Urban Studies Major - College of Charleston (cofc.edu)

College of Charleston | Charleston Fellows

Construction Management – Engineering Technology and Construction Management (charlotte.edu)

Have him check out the University of Florida. The Rinker School of Construction Management program is probably the best in the country. Job placement in the program is the highest of any major at UF. They have their own career fair and the Alumni base is off the charts. UF also has the other fields of study you have mentioned and he could double major in Construction and one of the others, like Urban Planning. Yes, UF is a tough admit but not impossible. He has a strong resume. If you decide to tour UF make sure you request a tour of the Construction Management program. They do individual tours out side the main campus tour.

Btw, Geosciences, Geography. and Urban Planning are one thing in terms of a career, but Construction Management is another as I will argue it much more demanding but also very lucrative.

If he ends up studying Geography, Geosciences or Urban Planning, but decides he might still want to pursue Construction Management. Most of the good CM schools (UF, Auburn, Purdue, Arizona State, etc.) have a one year Masters in Construction Management program.

Lastly, UNC is an excellent school with great school spirit and a very engaging Alumni base. Strong Urban Planning Department, but no Construction Management.

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Many good ideas so far. Adding Michigan State (has all his majors) and for something smaller, but good school spirit U Dayton (no urban planning major). Both are academic safeties, and I expect would be within budget too.

Oooh, I hadn’t looked at WCU - I’ll check that out. Thanks.

And yeah. So Much Hiking. And i’m old and fat. My quads and glutes were screaming at me by the end of the day and it did NOT provide the best start for the remaining days of our trip and the many many steps we walked on all the tours.

That said, I’m going to take it as a win because I really had a great time with my kid. He’s at that phase of life where he spends most of his time doing homework or at practice and I hardly see him. So I’ll take screaming muscles for the extra time spent talking and laughing with him.

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W&L might be an interesting option for him - I don’t honestly think he really has a good grasp of the benefits of a smaller college he just wants “bigger than highschool” because he doesn’t want to feel like he knows everyone he sees. I’d like him to see one and see what it feels like and this wouldn’t be impossible for us to visit given that it’s not that far away.

@tsbna44 and @aquapt - good suggestion re: Delaware. I don’t know how I forgot them, my older son had them as a safety on his list. They do offer a lot and would be pretty easy for us to check out as we have to drive right by when we head north to pick up my older son for the summer.

@AustenNut - all good suggestions. I think he really has no clue what a small school would be like and I want him to check out at least one before we totally write them off. I think he’d love the environment around Hobart William Smith, and I’ll definitely look into all of these more. Thank you!

@crakid24 - thank you for sharing your daughters list! He doesn’t want to be as far away as the West Coast, but this reminds me that I need to talk to him about Richmond and, if nothing else, I can look these schools up and see the “if you like this, then also look at that” comparison tool to see if anything a little closer to the East Coast pops.

@tsbna44 - construction management was his first thought, and only in the last few months has he added urban planning or geography or geoscience. He doesn’t want outright engineering (which is where construction management type stuff lives at some schools, notably VA Tech). Basically, if he goes in this direction, he wants less math-ing, more doing, and some management thrown in. (His brother is a double major - MechE and CivE and he knows he doesn’t want that route.) Some of the schools that have construction management in the engineering school felt a little less math heavy (NC State, for example) so he could go that route, depending on the classes required to fulfil the major (and to be clear - he’s good at math - he’s a junior taking AP Calc and doing well - he just doesn’t love it enough to want to do a ton of it.) He’s a more creative kid, and more movement oriented. He REALLY doesn’t want to be behind a desk or taking meetings all day (I think watching me work from home during the pandemic was scarring). I like a lot about SUNY ESF - I’ll float that by him too. I’m hopeful that the close tie with Syracuse would help him feel like it’s a bigger place. I think UNC Charlotte would be a good school to add - he’d likely get in, it has the programs he wants, and I think he’d feel good about it. Thank you for all this research and the links!

@Balance63 - thank you, we’ll look at University of Florida. That sounds like an interesting program. He originally wanted just construction management, then, not finding that at too many schools that fit his original parameters, I asked him to consider other things figuring he could go from geoscience or geography (he’d focus mostly on GIS and physical geography, not human) to a masters in CM if he really wanted. My main worry is that I don’t know if he has a solid idea of what CM entails - my spouse and I both are very basic desk jockey type workers, and most of the people we know are the same. I really want him to get a feel for what CM might look like, but haven’t quite figured out how to do that. Anyhoo, I’ve heard Auburn and Purdue mentioned enough that I want him to take a look at them, thank you for all the suggestions and insights.

@Mwfan1921 - thank you for the suggestions! I’ll look into both.

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I haven’t read all the replies, so apologies if this has been mentioned. Is your son set on a large school? If not, a good option for geography/geosciences with an urban setting might be Macalester. One of the few smaller liberal arts schools with a geography major. Urban setting, small but not tiny (about 2000+), plus U of M is nearby and has good geography options too and a lot of cross-pollination. I don’t know about cost, though they do give merit aid.

I just realized that though UTC was mentioned, U. of Tennessee has not. Knoxville’s access to the Smokies is pretty excellent, so he’d still get lots of outdoors opportunities. There’s tons of school spirit here too. Some of the majors offered include:

  • Construction Science Management (located in the College of Agriculture, not engineering)
  • Environmental and Soil Sciences
  • GIS & Technology
  • Geography (which includes an Urban Studies concentration, among others)
  • Geology & Environmental Studies
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@AustenNut - thank you for the UTK recommendation. I’ve added that to the list. I’m guessing he ends up liking it more than he likes VaTech. I heard that their OOS admissions went way down this year after upping the mandatory percentage of in-state students, but I’m thinking this is still a solid match or likely for him, which is the area of his list that I want to grow. I’m also hoping that if he does construction science here, the application to College of Agriculture makes him unique enough coming from Northern VA that it helps balance out that increased in-state requirement. (Although it he ends up liking this as much as I think he will, and it’s down to this or Clemson, am I then doomed to a lifetime of Orange Things? I hate orange…)

@VAParent2528 - I like Macalester a lot, he won’t. His high school is just under 3000 students (2800 maybe?) and he is ADAMANT that he wants something appreciably larger than that. I want to show him a small college, just so he gets the vibe, but it has to be more of a “hey, we’re here, let’s just check this out” rather than a “I want you to seriously consider this”. I’m going to try to get him to look at Washington & Lee since that’s not TOO far away and en route to one of his travel track meets.

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He might be doomed to orange, but who’s to say you have to be? If you go to any sports games you can wear maroon or white and leave the orange to others. :grinning:

P.S. And at least he’s not thinking about Syracuse!

I’ve read many of the comments on this thread to date. I’m going to suggest something completely against the tide of the other comments. Consider applying to various schools based on the strength of the major in that school. And don’t worry about whether they have one of the other majors to “change into” later. All of these majors are so small at every school in terms of both size of student population as well as number of faculty.

My absolute favorite resource to share is this interactive data set maintained by a college admissions director at Oregon State: The College Finder
We used this heavily when looking for schools for my son (geology major graduating in 2025). The goal was to find a college that had a “larger” program and then we also used other resources to find which programs were more reputable in that field. We also did alot of looking at the web pages for the departments, faculties, and research centers in that major at each school to see if the things they are doing were interesting to him. As one college counselor once said “it doesn’t do you any good to go to a biology program that is small and led by the guy who is only interested in bugs when you want to study human anatomy”.

And now I will give you my plug for Texas A&M if he is interested in geology. An amazingly friendly campus, big sports and the faculty in that department have opened doors for my son even beyond our wildest dreams of what might be available. Best of every world in that he gets to have the very large school rah-rah environment but is home in a department where all the faculty genuinely care about these students and the geology advisor is the absolute best! Also…if you receive $4,000 in competitive scholarships you then are also provided with an OOS tuition waiver. They also have majors in urban planning, geography and construction science.

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You should really look into Texas A&M if he wants Construction Mgmt. Phenomenal program with a STRONG network. Certainly checks all the boxes for big college atmosphere. If VT and Clemson are your vibe it’s very similar, only bigger.

Also, if he can get $4k in scholarships there he qualifies for in state tuition.

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