<p>Worrywart: maybe that should be a complaint about Tufts…the kids are encouraged to be in too many extracurricular activities! We liken it to putting a kid in a candy factory… Also, may say something about the kids who choose Tufts. I think that is the more likely explanation since they purport to seek out kids who are very active in “tikun olam” or repairing the world.</p>
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<p>Actually, aren’t the Pembroke dorms supposed to be the nicer ones? Makes you wonder about the others. With the housing lottery system after the first year you can’t always get what you want. My daughter as a sophomore was able to snag a single, albeit on a floor of freshman. But by the time her number came up, that was what was available. She has always wanted Pembroke, due to the rep and the proximity of the OMAC.</p>
<p>She’s a vegetarian and manages. (Actually she tries to stay vegan, so this is even harder.) Maybe the options have improved since you went there or summers have slimmer pickings? But she went there two summers also … She always checks the online listings for the V Dub and the Ratty (the nicknames for the dining halls probably indicates something about the quality of the food, huh?) and tries to be imaginative in putting things together.</p>
<p>calmom "Another gripe from the kids’ perspective: do you know that it gets miserably cold and wet in New York during times of the year that we still have sunny warm days in California? But I warned my d. about the fact that cold, cold rain is far more common in NY than fluffy white snow. "</p>
<p>My son is a senior in HS. My gut tells me that this issue (cold and wet while it is still warm and sunny in hometown) will be a big issue if my s chooses a northeast school.</p>
<p>Weather is one of those things that not many agree upon. Many of us north easterners LOVE the winters. Not always wet. But refreshingly crisp. I’m always disappointed with a winter that doesn’t bring plenty of good snowfalls. Summer is my least favorite season. </p>
<p>Maybe your son would grow to love the cold. Who knows?</p>
<p>Summer = construction season. A reason why Northeasterners dont’ like summers because winter shuts down construction activities whereas other parts of the country, construction can happen at any time.</p>
<p>While I love winters- IF they have snow. Isn’t that the whole point?</p>
<p>That’s just really the general attitude of NYers. </p>
<p>Well… for your son, jlauer, it depends how the college will keep him occupied in the winter…if he gets to learn how to ski, snowshoe, build a fire, skate, etc, he might actually enjoy winter a little more than if he just hibernated. There’s those hockey games too!</p>
<p>Bluecroo:</p>
<p>Not all off-campus housing near Tufts is horrific! I lived in a great place for a semester. But then I’ve seen the Animal House-esque places some of my guy friends live in… 12 kids in a house? Spells trouble and unwashed dishes and showers. 
In any case, upperclassman housing at Tufts has gotten a huge boost with the construction of Sophia Gordon Hall, the greenest dorm on the Eastern seaboard. Also, Stratton Hall provides great singles that only seniors can get in the lottery, and it’s right next to Sophia, creating a whole new “senior residential” area in the downhill part of campus.</p>
<p>Oh, and by the way, your D can’t live off-campus til she’s a junior. Sophomores are required to stay on-campus.</p>
<p>And I agree – Tufts kids are always overloaded with ECs here. I know I am!</p>
<p>My son reports from UC Berkeley:</p>
<p>Life is good, classes are as hard or harder than expected, he will not finish all his reading for this semester by May 2010.
He always thought of himself as “really smart,” now he wonders what he was thinking.
Social life??
Berkeley is a much more user friendly campus than he expected. Far less bureaucracy than he was led to believe.
It is humbling and quite exciting to be taking Physics from someone that just won the Nobel Peace Prize.
Students are friendly, easy to make friends… professors are available and encourage interaction and office hours. They make themselves “very available.” Students are very engaged and involved.
Dorms are great, he is in a new building. Great views of the Bay Bridge!
Food is better than he expected. Off campus food is the best.
So Cal weather is better. Berkeley weather is better than his friends at schools in NY, PA, MA, NJ, etc…
Originally SIR’d to an Ivy; decided to stay in CA because of a family members health. Glad he stayed, Berkeley was a good choice.</p>
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<p>I wonder if my parents wondered about this for me? I was so sure that I’d love the seasons in the East, blah blah blah. Well, I loved fall and spring–all 5 days of them! </p>
<p>I still hope my children will go somewhere with seasons so they know what it’s like. I certainly have plenty of California-bred friends who adore the East. There are no constants in this weather debate–for some it is an issue and for others not. I did ski, and ice-skate, and played squash indoors, etc. etc., and loved reading in the libraries, but the bone-chilling cold air and the general sense of discomfort (overheated rooms, smelly cold wet clothes, etc. etc.) left a lasting impression on me. It’s great to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there! Still, SO glad I had the experience.</p>
<p>I’m also glad that my kids have had the opportunity to spend time on the east coast… and doubly glad that the west coast climate (both physical and social/political) is a pretty strong lure to bring them back when they are done.</p>
<p>I rented Love Story -which takes place in Boston and NYC and in the movie its pretty wintery and rainy all the time (my Ds both want to do Northeast schools- Boston, NYC) and lving in SF, I thought seeing all the snow and drizzly weather would give me the chance to say, see what you want to go to (I grew up partly in upstate NY, Montana and Alaska- so I know winters)</p>
<p>THey both commented on the clothes- the chance to wear boots, and jackets, and big sweaters and scarves and gloves- </p>
<p>As for what people don’t like, this thread is great- you may not like everything about a school, but seeing some of the :icky" parts posted here, it gives people a heads up on how to navigate the difficulties</p>
<p>We had a school meeting last night talking about kids and stress, and it kind of turned into a “&itch” session, a chance to talk about what at the school makes us crazy, and if they changed somethings, would actually bring down the stress level</p>
<p>So, of course afterwards, we was all wound up!!</p>
<p>citygirlsmom</p>
<p>I always thought I’d rent Saving Private Ryan for my son if he thought of going into the military.</p>
<p>This is not a political statement on my part, though I do those too, but a reality statement. We so much want our kids to know what they might be getting into.</p>
<p>Small request, everyone,
This is a great thread- helpful as we look into colleges for#2 son. My request- please give the name of the school you are talking about. Most of you are, but a few are saying LAC or NE college.
As for me, the few negatives about Rice have been mentioned- though the drinking policies have tightened up this year significantly. What I dont like (and this is my issue, not s’s) is that they are now cranking up fees for lots of stupid stuff (parking, etc) that is adding up to more than I’d expected. This is on top of the tuition increases. I also wish they hadn’t let the bookstore be (albeit possibly termporarily) taken over by a national bookstore chain. They are less user friendly when it comes to getting the ISBN #s of the books ahead of thime so you can buy the books used elsewhere. Rice does have a great student swap deal with books, though, so my s has had ample oppty to get books way cheaper. I also wish they guaranteed housing all 4 yrs, but thats uncommon on most places.
OK,done.
Anyone have negative info on Vanderbilt, Pomona or Claremont McKenna? Anything further on Emory, UNC- CH Hill, Tulane,or UGA?</p>
<p>Pomona and Claremont: will need a car to do anything as public tranportation is not much; very, very small schools; air quality is horrible on warm days unless the santa ana winds are blowing; Pomona - the culture is “study all the time”. It’s a fairly intense school compared to neighbor schools Claremont and Pitzer. Harvey Mudd is more intense and definitely for the math/science minded.</p>
<p>jym626 – I have no kids at UGA. S1 was going to go there till we visited. Our tour guide made a few comments that let S know it wasn’t the right place:
- He asked what sport my S played. (none, and we were bothered by the fact that it was assumed everyone did – and they made us all “bark” at the end of the tour)
- He bragged about how easy classes were. (some of our friends who go there, though, would beg to disagree.)
- He commented that most kids who come there already have their roommate chosen in advance, and if you were “one of the unlucky ones who didn’t, your name would be thrown in a hat.” Not what S was looking for.</p>
<p>Okay, that’s three, and it’s not my kid’s school, so I’ve broken two rules. And I have to admit that UGA is the #1 goal of most of the kids in our high school, and they love it when they get there. Just trying to help.</p>
<p>Thanks all. UGA is not his choice either- more likelyu his safety. Saw Harvey Mudd with older son (of the 5 school, that campus is UGLY). Didn’t think about tha air quality, though. Thanks! Did see the “cute” (albeit not college-oriented) shops near (not walking distance) the campuses. Fine for lunch and shopping, but didnt get the sense it was for the kids. Are most all activities for the claremeont schools focused on campus?</p>
<p>Since cost has come up repeatedly on here, I’ll add that son at Columbia does complain about costs in NYC. We pay for school, but he pays for social life, which includes his love of fine dining. Aside from the steep tuition, sending a kid to college in NYC has involved expenses we just didn’t think much about. Travel (it’s hard to say no when we see him so rarely and sometimes we like to go there), clothing, a decision to take a summer internship there that didn’t cover expenses, etc. </p>
<p>On the flip side, NYC offers a lot of ways for a college kid to make money. Internships, tutoring, bartending, etc.</p>
<p>Here’s something that might surprise you about Harvard - no student center. More money than most of the nations on the planet, and they’ve yet to find a way to create a campus living room for students. They’re renovating the old student fitness center, developing a basement pub and a few other loungey places that are spread about, but no centralized student facilities. There are two possible reasons for this - the sophs and above are placed in residential colleges which each have their own facilities, and the center of the campus geographically is the Harvard Square business district which in itself is one huge student gathering place. But my D is a freshman, and would benefit from additional gathering places.</p>
<p>“Here’s something that might surprise you about Harvard - no student center.”</p>
<p>But that’s because they wanted life to center around the houses. Made even more sense when houses had distinct personalities very much influenced by their masters. Memorial Hall was supposed to serve as a student center when they renovated it. But a basment is still a basement.</p>
<p>S attended UGA for his “Katrina” semester as an incoming freshman, and is currently a student at Tulane in New Orleans.</p>
<p>UGA–negatives according to S:
He calls it a "massive jock-acracy’. Way too heavy on the football culture for his tastes. He got straight A’s as 1st semester freshman, even though he started his classes 3 weeks late…this ISN’T because he’s a genius. He says the classes are really pretty easy compared to Tulane, that the “professors at Tulane just expect alot more”.</p>
<p>Negatives according to Mom:
Too big</p>
<p>Tulane–negatives according to S:
-Administrative red tape
-Food sucks (a real irony in New Orleans, in my opinion)
-Housing not great
-Streetcars on St Charles Ave not currently running
However, he’s very glad to be there and in New Orleans.
Negatives according to Mom:
-Worrying about hurricanes, post-Katrina impacts (although other than the streetcars, he’s very happy with NOLA)</p>
<p>Brandeis: academics are up to expectations, as are the number of social events, entertainment, general atmosphere and student life as well, though there seems to be a bit more alcohol use than I had expected (accompanied by the expected student suggestions that while they understand they university must comply with the state drinking age of 21, they feel that the administration ought to accept that students will drink anyway and therefore put more resources into trying to educate students about responsible drinking rather than punish some of those who get caught overdoing it; which sounds about the way I felt when I was in college in a state where the age was 21).</p>
<p>What I find the school lacking is in having a clearly dysfunctional financial services office. When you get someone on the phone, they’re very helpful, but our experience has been replete with late-mailed tuition bills, incorrect bills and statements (that has gone both ways, with credits being given where none are in order but not given where they are), and issues about student insurance. But don’t worry, they assure you on the phone, it’ll all be corrected (and it usually is, eventually).</p>
<p>This is compounded by the college’s policy that the university account is the student’s not the parent’s, so notification to the student that something is amiss or needs to be done is all they have to do. However, in our case, and I believe in most every case, it’s the parents, not the student, who pay those bills, and if your kid forgets to tell you about something he received from that office, guess who pays the late fee!</p>