Hey there, @4MyKidz, welcome back. I was just commenting to another person that time does indeed fly!
Just a clarification from a few pages back: you don’t have to send all your scores to Harvard or Princeton. You can choose. You do have to send all your scores to the UC schools and Stanford. And you have to send all your scores from either the ACT or the SAT to Yale, Rice, and many other schools but if you use the SAT (for example) you don’t need to send any of your ACT scores and vice versa. There are a few websites that you can google if you want to see who requests all SATs or ACTs or both.
When d19 last chatted 1-on-1 with her gc, he asked her what major she was thinking of and what schools she was looking at. She told him, he said they were good choices and then recommended another—-that doesn’t have her major. #thanksgc
Does anyone know anything about these schools or been on a tour… we are going to an IB College Fair next weekend and our IEC recommended that my son keep an open mind and talk to the reps of these schools… (they weren’t on his initial list due to size and location).
Dickinson
Colgate
U Conn
She also recommended Colorado College but I can’t see him going to school in Colorado.
He is looking to major in Neuroscience and wants to do research.
We are going to see Binghamton the first weekend in May and UNC CH, NC State and Tulane in July and then Virginia Tech in August. We may go see College of Wooster and Miami-Ohio in August too but I need to be sure he would really consider going to school in Ohio before I spend the money to visit.
I live about 45 minutes from Dickinson. It’s a small LAC. It’s a very good school. Similar in vibe to the also very good Gettysburg College. My nerdy, marching band participant, D&D playing kid thought both were a bit too “preppy” for him. But he thought the academic programs sounded great. Not that his assessment should influence anyone else’s. His “preppy” will be someone else’s “perfect fit.”
Seriously, I wanted to attend Gettysburg when we visited. So, whatever S19.
Like many small PA LACs, Dickinson is located in a small central PA town. While sort of near Harrisburg, it is not near a major city. Washington DC is two hours to the south. Carlisle is a nice, small PA town and the main drag is right near campus. There are restaurants and a few bars.
@Kona2012 I grew up in CT. UConn is an excellent school. It is a large, public university. I, of course, didn’t want to go there because I wanted out of CT.
S19 has Dickinson on his list for sure. We have not visited though. I’m really hoping to see both Lafayette and Dickinson either in the summer or fall. Everything I’ve read about Dickinson sounds perfect for him and it’s a little easier admission than some of his other schools. He met with the AO when he came to our high school. No other students showed up so he ended up with a one on one meeting with him for an hour. He really liked the rep and the school seemed to offer everything that the higher ranked schools on his list offer. Read the Dickinson threads on CC. There are a lot of very happy parents and students who chose it.
The location isn’t ideal for us. Not super easy to get there. I think Southwest has two non-stops a day to Harrisburg so that’s probably how he would get there…
We went to Bucknell today and loved the campus as well as the downtown area, which is very accessible to the school. The campus has an “uphill and downhill” layout which I wasn’t the hugest fan of but I wouldn’t be the one trekking. The buildings are of a similar architecture which I prefer. The Greek life was evident but I think that’s becsuse it was their rush period. I guess students cannot participate until they are sophomores.
I was a bit disappointed in the engineering program although it is one of their focuses there. There’s no interdisciplinary coursework beyond the first year and they have no Co-Op program. The engineering building has a new wing with some CS type labs and faculty offices. Many of the other labs were older and in the lower level. The general sciences building was very nice and new. I’m guessing that program-wise it will be similar to Lafayette and we’ll see that on Monday morning.
@Kona2012 I was at Colgate recently for the 2nd time. Like it very much. Beautiful campus, friendly, upbeat vibe, very strong alumni network. It’s a LAC, but at about 2900 students, is a bit bigger than most. Academics seemed very strong, particularly for pre-med track and economics. It’s one of those schools that seems strong in a lot of areas, does a lot of things right. It is in a very small town, and not close to much else, so you have to buy into that.
We toured Dickinson and Colgate. Unfortunately both came off our list.
Loved the grey stone buildings at Dickinson. But absolutely hated that two main and 3 normal roads run through the campus. There is also a train that passes through the corner of it. It made the school feel like it was split into different separate sections. There were a nice amount of students out and about sitting in the red Adirondack chairs. Liked the quirky little superstition about not graduating if they step on the seal, and the story behind the mermaid instead of the Triton. Also loved the high focus on the sustainability. But sadly just couldn’t get passed the streets!
It has been a year since we toured Colgate, but I recall it being very hilly. It felt preppy, rich and sporty all mixed together. I believe the Juniors and Seniors dorm down the hill and across the street- which my D didn’t care for. The food was probably the best here then at any other school. I also remember thinking there wasn’t much diversity there. Overall my D just didn’t connect with Colgate.
@toomanykiddos Thanks for the Dickinson review. I have definitely heard about the streets! I went to Northwestern and Sheridan Road is a pretty major road that runs through the middle of campus. I wonder if the main road through Dickinson feels like that. I’ve learned by now that there’s no substitute for an actual visit to campuses. It’s just too hard to see how a campus feels unless you actually walk around it.
Wow, I find the comments about the roads in Carilsle, PA to be interesting. It is a really small, PA town with a one main intersection and one main road running through a few blocks. I consider the fact that the Dickinson campus is integrated into the small town area to be a plus. It is definitely a YMMV thing.
@homerdog Carilsle is nothing like Evanston. I’ve been to both. Evanston is a city compared to Carlisle. Sheridan is most definitely not High St.
But again, I live in central PA. If anyone is interested in a school located in a remote small PA town, I’d suggest visiting if at all possible.
@toomanykiddos Yes- i forgot to mention the hill at Colgate- that’s part of why it’s so scenic. And also agree with the sporty comment. Kids there seem very active and fit. It’s funny about the diversity comment, because in looking at the common data set it wouldn’t seem as diverse as other schools, yet the day we visited recently, we saw more diversity than at practically any other school we visited.
@InfiniteWaves any interest in giving us all a short review of Lafayette and Lehigh then? How are they viewed by PA residents? I’m assuming that they have different vibes. From what I can garner on websites, Lafayette is more of a match for S19 but maybe kids who know the schools better think they are pretty similar? Why would a student choose one over the other if he is undecided on major? (S19 still undecided- leaning towards Econ, math, poli Sci, history but isn’t ruling out philosophy or even environmental science.)
@homerdog We didn’t visit Lafayette or Lehigh because S19 is not interested in greek life. And both schools have what he considers a higher rate of greek involvement. Again, that is his assessment so YMMV.
That said, both are excellent schools and very well-regarded. My grandfather attended Lafayette (went on to become a lawyer) and I have family in the area where both are located. Lafayette is a LAC that has a much smaller student population than Lehigh which is a university. So they are not similar in that sense when it comes to vibes. If Dickinson appeals, then Lafayette would be in a similar category. That said, academics are good at both.
The thing about Pennsylvania is that it is a big state and understanding the landscape might help with decisions too. Lafayette and Lehigh are an hour north of Philly and an hour west of NYC. Lafayette is in the first town over the NJ/PA border due west of NYC. Easton and Bethlehem are not booming towns and can appear somewhat depressed. But the truth is that they are typical of many PA towns. They are near Allentown though, which has an airport and train service. Traveling TO Lafayette and Lehigh would be much easier than traveling to Dickinson. I would imagine that one could fly into Newark or maybe Philly too.
@InfiniteWaves hugely helpful. Thank you! The NE is confusing for me unless I go to a map. I mean, you fly into Albany (NY) to get to Williams (in MA) and Newark (NJ) to get to Lafayette (PA)!
Plus, I find the Greek life thing hard to figure out at LACs. For the ones we’ve visited that even have Greek life, it’s downplayed quite a lot. They say it’s pretty inclusive, parties open to everyone. And I have no idea if S19 would pledge. I mean, he’s not an Animal House kid, but he likes his close knit group of XC friends so maybe he wouldn’t like belonging to the right kind of frat. My gut says he wouldn’t pledge but it’s impossible to know. In general, we are staying away from heavily Greek schools.
@homerdog Happy to help. In my area of south central PA, we are closer to the Baltimore/DC area than anything in PA. Lots of people here commute to jobs down there, Mr. InfiniteWaves and I included. And we fly out of BWI in Maryland. ;
I’m enjoying a quiet relaxing weekend in the NE—far from home and all the chores of home and the roof which H has reported is leaking during the monsoons that are now hitting our region. It is so relaxing here and I am bracing myself for the return to routine.
I am also planning out the next stages of the college search now that I have a much better idea of what S19 wants and is attracted to. His top 4 were Dartmouth, Harvard, Stanford and UCSD, which made me laugh a bit as this was quite different than D17 who was a similarly strong student but not at all attracted to those kind of schools. He’s not opposed to LACs, but would like a bigger school. He’d rather not a huge school (30K), but sees that there are ways that those schools can feel ‘smaller’.
So now I am turning my attention to schools where getting in is not a lottery for him. He has strong stats, but the odds are that he is not going to a school with a sub-20% admit even if he applies ED—just like the majority of other students like him. He knows the odds too but wants to try. I hate that he would feel ashamed to attend our flagship (Univ of WA) because his peer group at school considers this their ‘safety’. Grr. Makes my head explode. Well, I have 6 months or so to work on him and I lay good odds on him ending up at UW. But I know he wants to go out of state and be in a more rural, outdoorsy place. Right now my list of universities for him to check out (online) are: UBC, Univ of Utah, UC Boulder, and maybe some eastern Canadian universities.
@liska21 I’mm surprised that if he likes outdoorsy,rurual places that he is even considering Harvard. That’s like the total opposite. If he wants Ivy/Rural look more at Cornell and Dartmouth. If that’s what he really wants I wouldn’t even bother wasting the time and money to apply to Harvard, unless he just wants to see if he is one of the 5 percent of kids that get in now. If he gets in, would he be happy there? There are also a LOT of schools that aren’t in the Ivy League that fit his wants/needs of out of state, outdoorsy, rural. . Especially if he is a good student.
UBC looks awesome, I think both of of my kids would’ve liked it there. Anyone in here ever been there?
