@EyeVeee Smiling is a sign of weakness in NY, NJ and certainly Philidelphia. They’re actually ecstatic, but have been
socialized to hide their emotions.
My daughter and I met two grad students while we were leaving campus on the “Princeton Express”.
They were both from Europe and offered the advice that the school “wasn’t for everyone”.
At the time there was construction everywhere, the engineering department seemed at least 50 years old, and the tour was otherwise limited to looking at the pretty buildings from outside.
The only exception to that was the new financial engineering building which which was super modern and impressive but sorely clashed with rest of the signature architecture.
No one seemed to be having fun.
Coincidentally Princeton was my daughter’s only bad interview experience. The interviewer, told my D that he wished that he had gone to Stanford instead and that no one that he interviewed had ever gotten into Princeton. I wondered why he volunteered?
Re smiling & being nice, one of my kids (raised in Midwest) was fascinated by the Northeast from an early age, and that was the focus of the college hunt. I had been raised in the Midwest AND the Northeast, & warned kiddo that interpersonal relations were a whole different ballgame in the Northeast (where smiling is a vice & gruffness a virtue). Of course my warnings were ignored, and the application list was heavy with half the Ivies and other usual-subject Northeastern elites.
Luckily, the rejection list was also heavily weighted towards the Northeast, & kiddo ended up at a Midwestern U – but one that has a quite a few students from the Northeast. Although at first there was disappointment not to be able to scratch the Boston-Washington corridor itch, eventually kiddo realized that a bullet had been dodged–the Northeast minority encountered at the Midwestern school was more than enough to demonstrate the accuracy of Papa’s warning.
And as long as Princeton is being bashed, it’s probably fair that Penn gets a few lumps. We visited dozens of colleges, and the only official tour we register for was Penn’s. Kiddo had attended a sports camp there & fell in love with it. So we went, and the admissions office was in total disarray–nobody seemed to know if or when a presentation or tour was to take place. We went where they eventually told us to go, & all we encountered were other bewildered out-of-towners–nobody from the admissions office. After an hour or so, we got tired of waiting for them to get their $#&+ together and bailed. I mean the place has been open for business for over 200 years…you’d think they would have the wrinkles ironed out.
Aside from the admissions snafu, I wasn’t at all impressed with the university or Philly. Both seemed too big, too disorganized & too impersonal. Say what you want about Boston – the traffic is ridiculous, the prices of everything are outrageous, and the people have the personality of a bi-polar rattlesnake, but at least it is of manageable size, stuff tends to work, and there is a New England coziness to temper the gruffness.
In the ridiculously obvious category, D declared University of the Arts in Philadelphia “too artsy.” It wasn’t entirely wasted time, as the visit made it clear to her that she was looking for a more varied environment.
@moooop Say what you will about U Penn, but leave Philadelphia out of it (especially if Boston is suggested as preferable!)
From a Philly girl, who grew up with annual school trips to the Betsy Ross house, the warm pleasure of soft pretzels, the bizarre spectacle of men in sequins and feather’s strutting in the Mummer’s parade, and the nirvana of the best cheesesteaks, ever.
@Old_parent wrote
Over the years I’ve learned the fine art of smiling at someone while hating their guts. The non-verbal version of “bless your heart”.
I suspect a meeting between new yorkers and southerners would leave me wondering who is really smiling on the inside…
There certainly seem to be campuses that are happier and less happy-you can feel it in the air sometimes.
Wow, Philly has pretzels & men wearing sequins? I take back everything I said about it.
@MotherOfDragons @moooop. Don’t make me turn this car around, because you know that I will.
She started it!!
Back to the original topic…
One school that is not often mentioned on CC that my S dismissed right after our visit was Stonehill in MA. I will freely admit that we got there on a bad day – it was the day before spring break and it seemed like people were leaving campus as quickly as they could (many in more expensive cars than I have). But even with that it felt that the campus was disproportionately big (300+ acres) for the small student population (2,500) and in some spots it felt kind of deserted. But the biggest turn-off was being taken by the guide to see a collection of old shovels – my S was done right there. The school had a lot of good attributes but just didn’t feel right to my S.
The Brown U info session was a turnoff. The student presenters seemed very superior when describing the flexibility in curriculum and taking classes Pass / Fail. The question period was dominated by parents who seemed to get up on their respective soapbox to humble brag about their children. We left before the tour.
D hated Sarah Lawrence. She said it felt fake, in a Potemkin Village sort of way.
S hate Johns Hopkins. It was oddly well groomed given the surrounding neighborhood. And the flock of field hockey stick bearing blonds parading by didn’t help (High School summer camp, but still.) Also, it was HOT! and no recycling, let alone compost!
Did not.
@PNWedwonk , no recycling! WTH? Now I hate JHU too. Boo hiss!
Speaking of Maryland, I can now be honest and say that I actually thought Goucher was pretty sad. I am sorry, because I know it’s one of the CTCL group and I know a couple of kids who love/loved it. But it was like a high school, and not a good one. Not that D was interested in science, but the labs were a joke. There were simply too many PHQ kids (purple hair quotient). It’s no longer cool when everyone has Easter egg hair. They gave us a bunch of free tchotchkes, which annoyed me after we saw the labs. Use that money for some new equipment, please. The library was very nice, but I was irrationally bothered by seeing too many PHQ heads there. I guess that’s a good thing, but it distracted from the loveliness of the library. All the buildings were a mishmash of not-wonderful architecture.
I have to say something good though, because I feel like the biggest meano in Meanoland, so I wll say that the food was excellent and the admissions office had a nice big fire and friendly admissions staff. Definitely not a place my D was interested in though.
Recently visited UPenn for Quaker Days - very organized and impressive experience - campus was very walkable and well maintained. Fair amount of dining options and Tour guide was not great but the experiences my son had as admitted student were all very positive. He also liked the fact that it is a campus in a city - he likes art, the Franklin Institute, music etc. Did not get to see PennovationWorks though.
Did not love Tufts - engineering & CS across the tracks from main campus.Some others not well liked were Harvey Mudd & CalTech.
@Lindagaf My DS felt that Beloit was too PHQ. Guessing Goucher would be an even bigger turnoff for him–at least the science building is top-knotch at Beloit. Still, Beloit remains his “never ever ever” place.
This sounds like it applies more to research universities than to small LACs. I’ve been on a couple of tours of small LACs where I felt like the admissions office might well have been the prettiest building on campus. At Lewis & Clark, the admissions office is located in a beautiful historic building, and you listen to the info session in a gorgeous 19th-century library with views of Mount Hood out the windows. At Occidental, when we walked out the back of the admissions office into the sunny garden where the info session was held, I felt like I’d arrived at a lovely Mother’s Day brunch or something. They even provided lemon-infused ice water and pastries, and we all sat around little tables under the pergola and enjoyed the sunshine. Best first impression ever (for me as a mom, at least!)
Dang! I should have made it to the west coast and done Occidental. That sounds really nice!
^ I second @Lindagaf on the Goucher visit experience.
The worst for us was RIT. My kid was really excited about the school and its programs. Couldn’t wait to see it. The tour guide had just completed her freshman year and was unable to answer 95% of questions asked by the group. Info session was in a classroom, led by a rapid-fire AO with a loud, grating voice – he could have been an SNL caricature of a used car salesman. It was painful! But the worst was the campus itself. Very little green, lots of concrete, enormous parking lots, and to us, it resembled a very large industrial office complex. We ditched the tour as soon as my kid said “I could not live here for a month, let alone 4 years.” For us it was a real letdown. We expected something very different!