Rollins people out there....anyone?? Anyone??

Visirale
Wed, 06 Jun 2012 03:37:32 +0000

As a recent Rollins alumni, I feel like I can shed a little bit of light onto this.

Rollins is a party school, through and through. The administration has been making solid attempts at changing the culture. However, they’ve also been trying to push through detrimental changes with the faculty at the same time. Rollins is a school where you truly can’t have both. Our president has been pushing to make us a legitimately considered liberal arts college… while doubling (or more) the MBA professors’ salaries while making slashes to other departments.

The campus security has become much more militant in recent years. Instead of teaching responsibility, they have been focused on becoming a military-state where the least infraction of any policy (especially regarding alcohol) can seriously jeopardize a student’s academic career.

This would be fine and dandy if it was accompanied by a call for more rigorous academic standards. Instead, social science departments are being refused the funds for new professors when current profs retire.

Greek life is very strong on campus. I waited until my senior year to be involved, and I don’t regret it. After a semester on campus, your children will have an idea as to which organizations are really about personal improvement instead of the ones that are about organizing parties exclusively.

I will always look back fondly on my time at Rollins. It was much more like the schools I really wanted to go to (top LACs). Professors in your department KNOW you by the end of your time at Rollins. If you miss class, they will call you or email you to make sure you’re alright. Classes are very interactive and you won’t succeed if you don’t put in the work before class. My honors thesis (and consequently) my honors status was canceled after my advisor and I had a disagreement on the topic of my thesis. Despite this turbulence in our relationship, he still wrote an awesome letter of recommendation for grad school that I’m sure helped me get into my current program.

Make sure your children know Rollins is only what they can make out of it. It is entirely too easy to coast through and graduate without getting real world experience that can place them into a career after graduation. AS SOON as your children have an inkling of an idea of what they want to do, have them talk to profs and career services. I wish I had taken more advantage of the internships available on and off campus, but by the time I realized this, i was late in my coursework and my schedule wouldn’t allow it. Despite being a great school, students have to network their way into a job after Rollins. Our alumni base is spread across the country, but only having a BA (or AB as all Rollins grads get) simply won’t cut it these days.

I started coming to this site in HS to get an idea of what I had to do in order to secure scholarships and succeed in college. After graduating and remaining underemployed for a year, I realized I had to make myself more marketable than only a college grad–even if it was form a decently respected school. Rollins is capable of offering unprecedented and amazing opportunities, but students have to actively seek them out on their own. I couldn’t imagine a better place to spend my four most formative years, but I know if I could go back I would do things a lot differently. While it’s no Amherst or Williams (by any stretch of the imagination) Rollins is capable of offering a LOT of chances for success. Just know these won’t come knocking at your childrens’ door, they have to actively seek them out on their own.