<p>His only other concern is making sure he has the 8 credits needed at the end of freshman year and that he has taken at least one credit in QR and WR since he will not have the foreign language distribution credit. See below:</p>
<p>At the end of freshman year (after 2 terms of enrollment), enrollment for one course credit in two of the three required skills categories: QR, WR, and foreign language. Credits for promotion: 8</p>
<p>Very true, Kdog. Looking at the schedule, he should have the QR and WR covered. We discussed the need to do very smart and thoughtful shopping in Jan. A big downside of his decision to drop the language is the lack of wiggle room for this semester ahead. No margin for error this time! Thanks again.</p>
<p>It is not uncommon for some students to fail to meet the distribution requirement some time in the first two years.</p>
<p>In DS’s suite in sophomore year, about slightly less than a half of the suitemates did not make enough progress in one area or another. They just did not plan it well and took classes in a wrong order. They are definitely not “bad” students in terms of academics.</p>
<p>If a student does not make a good progress in fulfilling the distribution requirement, I think the school may make them take summer classes as the classes to fulfill the distribution requirement have to be taken at Yale, not at any other institute. So if a student does not want to stay at Yale during summer session, he had better plan his sequence of classes well.</p>
<p>I think many students at Yale (and at other comparable schools) excel in foreign lanuages even before they set their foot on campus. I suspect that many students may have had foreign language learning experiences during many summers in their secondary school years, in addition to their AP foreign language classes. A local private elementary/middle/high school advertizes that their average 8th graders are better than most high school seniors in public schools in their skills of foreign languages because they provide more intensive language classes very early (since second or third grade?), including many summer immersion programs in a foreign country where that language is natively spoken.</p>
<p>BTW, I think the students really do not learn foreign language well by just taking AP classes, even when they have scored a 5 in the corresponding AP test. (As a comparison, a student with an AP 4 or 5 at many state universities already satisfies his/her foreign lanuage requirement. Ditto for many other core education requirements at many state universities. But this is not the case for Yale. In a sense, Yale (and likely most of other ivies) is a school that is better for a well-rounded student who values liberal-art-ish education, rather than a lopsided student whose interests is already very specific.)</p>
<p>Hope everyone is enjoying the Thanksgiving break whether you observe the holiday or not. When we lived overseas, we didn’t miss the day…since it was a regular day for everyone around us.
Now we are just glad to have everyone under one roof for a few days…meals, laughter, and a few games.</p>
<p>Over too soon…though the winter break is a month away.</p>
<p>The high speed rail service will not be available for some years. But when it is available, it could benefit the Yale students who fly into or out of Bradley International Airport.</p>
<p>“Initially, when the enhanced intercity rail service begins in 2016, there will be17 round-trips between New Haven and Hartford each day — with 13 trains providing continuing service to Springfield. Eventually, plans call for trains to operate every 30 minutes during peak periods and every 60 minutes during off-peak hours.”</p>
<p>And also (similar info, but with more pictures):</p>
<p>"Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on Monday officially accepted $121 million from the Federal Railroad Administration to turn the little-used north-south corridor that cuts through the middle of the state into a “high-speed” rail line.</p>
<p>The money, first announced in 2010 and officially disbursed Monday in a ceremonial deal-signing at the Meriden train station, will pay for the state to boost the “almost non-existent” rail service between New Haven, Hartford and Springfield, said state transportation Commissioner James Redeker."</p>
<p>Actually, there is Amtrak service between Windsor Locks and New Haven even today (I think you could take Amtrak all the way to Springfield, MA, as well as VT/NH, like where Dartmouth College is.) I wonder why it is never mentioned/used by Yale students.</p>
<p>In the past few years, we were trying to find alternative land transportation to CTLimo, between BDL international airport and New Haven. As regard to the BDL airport, in the past few years, it (esp. its expanded terminal A) has indeed been improved greatly.</p>
<p>^knock on wood, but so far we’ve had great luck with CT Limo. This past week DS signed up to take the 6:15 am shuttle to Bradley. He got to Phelps gate and discovered he was the only one going. They sent a Lincoln town car and he got a private ride to the airport, all for $61 round trip!!</p>
<p>That said, I’m slightly sad he won’t be there when the high speed rail kicks in- that sounds fabulous!!</p>
<p>I live in New Haven, and my high school son (who will be applying to Yale) and I are planning a trip to visit U Michigan and U Chicago. We will be flying to Ann Arbor and returning from Chicago. We discovered that United Airlines flies out of Newark with an included Amtrak connection from Union Sation in New Haven to the station right at the airport. In other words, Amtrak becomes your free limo to the airport, an airport that many pay CT Limo to get to. </p>
<p>I’m not sure if airlines other than United do the Amtrak thing. But when you’re looking at United, choose New Haven Rail Station as your departure or destination. Trains are more civilized than highway transportation, and the time to Newark is two hours (about the same as getting to any other NYC airport, with no concerns about traffic) versus circa one hour to Bradley.</p>
<p>latichever, Thanks for sharing your info. I really appreciate that some local parents could come here occasionally to share with us OOSers some info that only locals would know. DS visited U Michigan once. I believe he still flied out from BDL.</p>
<p>DS had never taken train before he went to Yale. He learns to love Metro-North M4/M6/M7/M8 Metro-North commuter trains:</p>
<p>I think he told us that, during off peak hours, it only costs ess than 20 (or just about 15?) dollars to get to Grand Central Station in NYC. To get to NYC, it is cheaper, safer and more relaxed when taking the commuter train than when renting/driving the car yourself.</p>
<p>Sadly, not many states/cities in US can afford train/public transportation, likely because our population in most states/cities is so spread out over a large area (e.g., LA in California) due to low ridership.</p>
<p>It has some link which shows the internals of the cars and it looks pretty nice.</p>
<p>I heard about the delay. Just curious, as of today, roughly how many percentage of the New Haven Line commuter cars are the new M8 cars? one-third?</p>
<p>Metro North is great to get to NYC, but it’s a hassle to use to the airport. The best option from there is a shuttle bus. Some are as cheap as $10, but for convenience to NYC, Amtrak to Newark is the way to go if it suits your flight. </p>
<p>I’m a local parent, and I wouldn’t mind if my son went to Yale. (“We promise to pretend you’re thousands of miles away, not only a ten-minute walk.”) But he wants to go away. His mother would love him to go to her alma mater, Williams, but “that’s in the middle of nowhere,” he says. He’s more inclined to go to my grad school, Chicago. “I can take my trombone and play in blues dive bars.” (Kids really know how to needle.) A serious math type, he jokes, “If I have to go to Yale, I’ll settle. It’s not Harvard, Chicago, or even Michigan math, but it is top ten.”</p>
<p>One of the perks of being a local is free tuition courses at Yale for qualified high school juniors. He’s hoping to take Math 230 at Yale next year (its version of Harvard’s Math 55 or Honors Analysis at Chicago), so maybe he’ll change his tune.</p>
<p>Rats. After a great thanksgiving week, flight delays are really wrecking havoc with our kiddo getting back to New Haven. West coast fog delayed this morning’s flight from Cali into Phoenix, missing the connection that would have arrived in Newark at 4:30pm. Scheduled Amtrak train from Newark to New Haven at 6:33pm will now be leaving with one less person. I called Amtrak and that was THE last train to New Haven. Worse still, every train between Newark & New Haven for Sunday is sold out, except the 6:15 am train. So, Amtrak graciously rescheduled for the 6:15 am tomorrow, but if there are any hiccups at all… I don’t know, it could be really bad. So, we had to book her into an airport hotel in Newark for the night, so at 5:00am tomorrow she’ll be pretty close to where her train departs.</p>
<p>She’s still a frosh so we don’t have a LOT of experience with the ins-and-outs of getting to Yale. But this experience takes away some of the appeal of the Newark airport to the train connection. We didn’t go with Bradley this trip because the flight got in late, and the CT Limo website appeared as though there were no evening shuttles. Well, I called them today (after being on hold 20 minutes), and come to find out CT Limo has both a 10pm and 11pm shuttle tonight. Honestly, their website is THE worst! Since her bags are going to Newark with or without her, we booked the hotel and she’ll get into Newark around 8pm, if the 2nd leg of the flight goes as scheduled.</p>
<p>What have I learned from this? I think I’ll be leaning more towards Bradley in the future. Even if in the worse case, a flight is super delayed, and there is no CT Limo service, a taxi from Bradley to New Haven ($130) is cheaper than 1 night hotel in Newark ($150). But better still, the travel day is over and your kiddo is back in their dorm and can hopefully sleep in the next morning. The way it stands now, she’s got to get up tomorrow at 5am, and hustle over to the airport Amtrak station with her suitcases, somehow get them in the overhead (always a pain), and that 1-way Amtrak ticket was $80. So, with food & New Haven taxi to Yale, that will put puts the whole Newark to New Haven run at well over $250 1-way, not including airfare. On her outgoing flight to California we booked her on CT Limo to Bradley for $40, and they were there, right on time at Phelps Gate.</p>
<p>I hope everything goes more smoothly tomorrow. It was so wonderful having her home for the the first time since she headed off to college. I hate to see the trip end so badly for her.</p>
<p>I actually found my question from the first link I have provided above:</p>
<p>“As of October 14, 2012, customers have the opportunity to ride one or more of the 651 M8 weekly trains (511 weekday and 140 weekend) operating in scheduled New Haven Line service. The new M8 trains represent 47.7% total weekly New Haven main line service, with 45.3% on weekdays and 59.1% on weekends.”</p>
<p>So it is almost one half of them that are new M8 cars.</p>
<p>tugtraveller, I feel for what you and your D had to go through. Been there, done (suffered) that. My past experience is that it is more likely it is the return trip (to Yale) that tends to give us more hiccup, for some unknown reason.</p>
<p>BTW, before DS went to Yale, some other parents told us that I had better have a plan B (especially during winter) just in case “something unexpected happens.” One specific advice he gave us was that we need to locate (in advance) a couple of hotels near every airport that my S could potentially stay overnight due to some unexpected event.</p>
<p>BTW, BDL has a hotel that is attached to the airport (Is it a Sheraton?) DS stayed there at one time. (At that time, we thought he could only pick up the key to his room before 6 pm at the beginning f fall semester, and his flight arrived very late. So he flied to BDL one day earlier.)</p>
<p>I heard that many students from California or west coast fly red-eyes to NY, so that they arrives at JFK (or the other one) early morning. But it is still quite tiring to go that route because it takes longer to travel from the airport to New Haven.</p>
<p>There must be some reason why DS “stucks” at the BDL route. At least I have a lot of troubles in convincing my wife that other route would be “better” in her opinion.</p>
<p>tugtraveller, we live in NJ and are very familiar with transportation options. What your daughter could do in the future is to take the NJ Transit train, which also stops at the same airport station. She would take it to the terminus, NY Penn Station (not to be confused with Newark Penn Station, another stop on the way). Then she would need to take a cab or subway from Penn Station to Grand Central Station, where she can get the Metro North into New Haven.</p>
<p>Admittedly, the Amtrak is better, but this other method is not so bad. My daughter did it once or twice as a freshman without any problem.</p>
<p>Thanksgiving is a particularly bad time for booking on Amtrak. You may not always find it so difficult to alter your train reservation. Still, if I were in your situation, in the future I’d either have her fly into Bradley, as you have stated, or do the NJ Transit/Metro North combo.</p>
Are there always taxis waiting for customers at Penn Station? (I would guess the answer is yes so you do not need to learn how to hail a cab like a New Yorker does.) When does the last Metro North train leave Grand Central Station for New Haven? And when is the last NJ Transit train? (This may be a greater concern for a late arrival flight.)</p>
<p>I heard sometimes the cars in NYC could barely move during certain time of the day. So subway may sometimes be a more reliable transportation option than taking the cab. Then, you need to learn how to take subway. I believe DS learned how to take subway only after he had been at Yale for 3 years (and he has a suitemate from NYC, who knows how to get around in NYC very well, but for some reason, his suitemate still does not learn how to drive and it seems he does not want to learn to drive.)</p>
<p>mcat2, I have not needed to worry about when the last trains are, but the information must be online. If my child were to arrive that late, I think I’d also be concerned about what Union Station in NH would be like at that time of day and how easy it would be to get a cab or the night shuttle there.</p>
<p>There is a line for cabs right by Penn Station, but the last time we took a cab there quite some time ago, we needed to get it on the main street next to Madison Square Garden, which is right next to Penn Station. I suspect that the cab stand has not been moved back to its more convenient pre-9/11 location between the station and garden.</p>
<p>Thanks CCParent. It is good to hear about the New Jersey transit options. It’s all still pretty new to me, although D has gone into New York City several times since being at Yale using the Metro North & likes it a lot. I knew the PATH tunnel has been flooded so I wasn’t quite sure about the available transportation options since Hurricane Sandy. You’re right of course, that most of their travel dates won’t be Thanksgiving weekend which is probably one of the worst travel weekends of the year.</p>
<p>I feel like the Amtrak is way overpriced. But she’s travelling back with one 49 lb. rolling suitcase, a smaller carry-on rolling suitcase full of heavy books, plus her personal backpack with her laptop & electronics. I just don’t want her trying to hustle that much heavy stuff alone and adding in Penn Station, Manhattan taxis or subways into the mix would be a recipe for disaster with 2 heavy suitcases to load/unload each time. Actually I am probably most worried about the personal backpack with all the expensive electronics.</p>
<p>Will they make her put her 49 lb suitcase in the overhead on Amtrak, or do they have luggage space in the back of each compartment? She can usually find someone to help her, but its always harder when trains are running full. She came home with only carry-ons, but she’s returning fully loaded down with snow boots, rain boots, winter coats, heavy wool sweaters, etc. I guess it’s gotten cold & snowy much earlier than she expected. </p>
<p>Thanks everyone for all the help and advice. This forum is truly a godsend for new parents like me who are just learning how things work. I read much more than I post, but I am so thankful for all the information I have learned on the Yale parents thread. Definitely one of the things I’m very thankful for this year!</p>
<p>Latichever,
Thanks for the information about the United airline Union Station New Haven option. Considering we’ve done that twice now, once $70 1-way, and now $80. That would be a nice savings. Unfortunately, flying USAir this time, but will look more closely at United next time if the airline prices are similar. Very cool that your HS Junior can take Math classes at Yale. I think that would get him much more excited about college than taking a community college math class.</p>
<p>Mcat2,
Thanks for your suggestion to always have a good plan B. That was definitely something that was lacking this time. As we all know, last minute scrambling during a holiday weekend is expensive, indeed. I am so glad that long ago I read somewhere on this board, “have your kid fly back on Saturday, not Sunday”. This has already proven to be very sage advice. I will now add to it, “and always have a plan B, just in case.”</p>
The last train departs at 11:22 PM and arrives at 1:14 AM. My son always flies out of LGA. It’s a short bus ride (M60) from the airport to the Metro-North station. Tonight he arrived in NY around 6:30 PM and was able to make the 7:07 PM train to New Haven. From there the Blue line gets him back to campus. It’s usually a lot cheaper for him flying out of LaGuardia even with the cost of the bus and train. Here’s the link to the schedule.</p>
<p>Another solution is to have your daughter befriend Yale students who live in New York City (there are quite a few). My son is a sophomore at Yale and we live in Manhattan. Last year, coming back from Thanksgiving break, Christmas/New Years, and Spring break, I drove to LaGuardia, which is 25 minutes away, to pick up my son’s friends and drive him, and them, back to New Haven.</p>