As an international, should my son prefer Amherst over Middlebury (or even Tufts?) Just concerned the sheer travel time from Australia will be too much.
Thatâs a tough one for an outsider to answer. They both require connecting flights and a certain amount of ground travel once you land at JFK. Or is there a direct flight into Logan? I suspect weâre talking about degrees of difference, not a whole lot, for an international traveler.
Tufts would be the easiest for travel time (considering a direct or even connecting flight to Logan), but if your kid is coming from Australia, what difference would a couple of extra hours make to go someplace else? Amherst would be a little longer (a bus from Logan? Or from Hartford/Springfield?). Middlebury would be the longest trip (connecting flight to Burlington, plus a bus). But most of the travel time will be the international flight to the US, which would be necessary regardless of the final destination.
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Agree with @Shelby_Balik . Yes, the easiest travel will be to a school near an airport with non-stop service to your home airport. The next easiest will be a school near any airport with frequent connecting service. Of your 3 choices, thatâs Tufts because of its proximity to Logan.
But this trip will probably only be made twice a year, and the school year is almost 9 months long. And the trip will cost a fraction of tuition and board. It just doesnât make sense to prioritize ease of travel â especially as ANY travel is going to be looong- over the right fit day in and day out. Remember too that any school that isnât close to an airport will be solving that problem of getting to the nearest major airport for many/most of its students, whether they are flying to Newark, Chicago, Sydney, or London.
(As a point of reference, when my kid was at Colby, the school arranged for the bus company that had frequent service to Portland and Logan to stop on campus on several runs before and after breaks. Kids also carpooled, etc. This is an issue that feels big when you arenât yet plugged in to a school. There are multiple solutions later.) Iow, pick your favorite school and kick transportation down the road.
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100% agree. My kid is at Bates, with similar transportation issues to Colby. The kids figure it out. Even coming from Colorado, travel to and from Bates is a long day, with connecting flights and ground transportation (bus/taxi/Uber/friends with cars). Weather sometimes complicates matters (professors have been understanding about this on the few occasions when canceled flights have caused my D to miss class). Itâs not a big deal, and we make it work. Coming from Australia, youâre already signing on to long travel days. A few hours more or less at the beginning or end shouldnât sway your decision. Your kid will work it out.
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Hereâs one:
There are others.
What I think you will find is that there is a % of the STEM STEM crowd who grossly overestimate how good they are at other things. In fact, somewhat ironically, some of the participants in some of those debates demonstrate that overestimation.
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Under the topic of âbrandâ and the NESCACS (along with some other LACs), stumbled across this one on IG. I count six NESCACs and 12 LACs in total, not accounting for one I canât read in Tier 3 right above JHU. Where are the skeptics of LAC career placement now? 
Thatâs as good a guess as any.
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Thatâs Colby college! Go NESCAC!!
The source doc is here:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DSqbsIgmMd7/?igsh=MWFyeTl5cWoyaGc4Zw==
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Thank you, @Mwfan1921 !
Make that seven NESCACS and 13 LACs!!!
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âŠ
and here is one of the better responses from that thread, lest you think I might be exaggerating:
I subscribe to the âGood Will Huntingâ view of liberal arts education; if you want to study philosophy, history or art history you are better off paying $1.50 in late fees at the local library than paying a fortune for college.
I had forgotten about that one.
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I know zero about Wall Street, but expected Amherst to be in same tier as Williams and impressed to see Wellesley as the only other LAC in that tier.
Whose rankings are these? What is the source of the categorizations?
Funny coincidence, as we are in the midst of binge watching Boston movies for Family Movie Night during vacation and just watched this. Love the line.
In a world where people make a living off YouTube and podcasts, Iâm not sure I co-sign with the premise.
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I didnât bother to dig into it but it is some career counseling organization called One Strategy Group.
Well, though it may seem to be the case, there is in fact no requirement that Amherst and Williams be joined at the hip for everything. We have to remember that there are some other LACs that not only match those two fine institutions in various pursuits but also excel beyond them in some. And I say that with no axe to grind with either of them as they are both stellar colleges.
With that said, I donât really disagree with you and found their placement a little surprising knowing that Amherst does pretty well sending kids to Wall Street who want to go to Wall Street. The greater surprise for me, though, was seeing Middlebury in a tier below Wellesley or any other LAC really because I know for a fact that they excel in this area and have a pretty loyal alumi base on Wall Street.
Take it with a grain of salt. I donât know who these people are, and even assuming they are tracking the data, we should also remember that these things can be cyclical. And it may also just be reflective of their client base. IDK
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You really ought to take a few minutes and read the whole thread. I had forgotten how much I had participated in it. Lol. There are some real doozies on that topic.
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Will do.
Amherst and Williams are âfitâ schools just like all the other NESCACs. Just my own opinion, of course, but Amherst has always been a bit stronger in the humanities (their main library bears the name of Robert Frost, a longtime faculty member; the Dickinson family lived down the street, not to mention, the Beechers and Stowes.) I also think it not unlikely the influence of the Anthony Marx presidency of some years ago, separated it even more from Williams in terms of feel.
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This fairly detailed analysis of Wall Street and IB feeders placed NESCACs in the order of Amherst, Williams, Middlebury, Hamilton, Bowdoin:
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