<p>So many views, so little commentary. So, is anybody else frequenting this forum coming, or have kids coming, to Willamette in the fall?</p>
<p>Our daughter will be going to Willamette. Selected school over Occidental, Redlands, and U of O Clarks Honor college. She's excited and we think she made a great choice. Will be driving up from New Mexico in Aug. for opening days.</p>
<p>Congratulations to All - our S will know tonight if it will be Willamette or Grinnell. I personally loved Willamette.</p>
<p>Ou dd will be there for opening days, too: selected Willamette over a Presidential Scholarship at Centre, National Merit scholarship at Austin, and a spot on the waitlist at Davidson. We're delighted with her choice!</p>
<p>Hope it's WU over Grinnell--let us know!</p>
<p>Yes, I'm going to Willamette. It came down to WU, UC Davis, and Pitzer but I think I made the right choice. Is anyone else going from Southern California?</p>
<p>My S chose Willamette today over Grinnell - it was a long tough decision but he feels very good about it. I for one am exhausted :).
Diane</p>
<p>Congrats to you and your son, Diane! Great to hear more and more people recognizing all that Willamette has to offer. In the course of our college searches (for two kids), we've visited Willamette three times and met kids who turned down Stanford and Pomona to go there, kids who won Truman Scholarships, sang at Carnegie Hall, and whose parents raved that they couldn't have been happier with their experiences with it.</p>
<p>So, here's to all our kids--and hope you recover soon :)</p>
<p>I guess it is ok to say now, on her last day at Tulane, that dd is transferring back to Willamette , to which she was Katrina'd as a freshman in September.</p>
<p>She really found her college home there. What were the odds? In a matter of 48 hours she had completely revamped the college admissions process that had consumed the previous year. She arrived after freshmen orientation was over and classes had been in session for a few days, her dorm and roommate and course selection were luck-of-the-draw, she had left all her belongings behind in New Orleans, and within the same week had gone from the Midwest to NOLA to the Midwest to Oregon. The fact that she was able to succeed academically and socially should give you an idea of how welcoming Willamette is. </p>
<p>She has had a good semester at Tulane too -- academics, music, 9th Ward clean-up, friends and a social life. But it became clear that she had left her heart at Willamette.</p>
<p>DCZ, I wanted so much for one of my older sons to choose Grinnell. And dd's counselor thought it would be a good place for her. We had not heard of Willamette until he mentioned it when he found out we were making a college trip to the PNW. I hope your son is as happy with his decision as my dd is with hers.</p>
<p>Geena,
Our son had two separate trips to Willamette - one last fall and one this winter. After the winter visit he told us he'd "be OK" at Willamette. It was his 'back-up school'. I think the pressure to go to a prestigious school is very hard for kids. After his trip to Grinnell he was quite torn - didn't really feel comfortable there but really felt like he should't pass up the opportunity. It was a conversation last Sunday night with the head of admissions at Grinnell (a very classy man named Jim Sumners) that helped him make up his mind. Mr. Sumners, ironically, had been head of admissions at Willamette for many years. He graciously told Rob that he would not be taking a 'second best' choice and encouraged him to pick the school where he would feel most comfortable. All I can say is that my son seems to feel comfortable with his decision.</p>
<p>Geena,
Forgot to add - the very best to your daughter next year, and welcome to the NW!</p>
<p>Collegeprep11 -
I don't know what your experience with Willamette is, but from what we have seen on several visits it is a very good LAC. They have had a steady number of national scholars the last three years, their President was previously President of Dartmouth and they had, by far, the best food of all the colleges we visited :).
I think that the US News and World Report ratings have skewed how people look at schools. Willamette's biggest down fall at the moment, relative to Grinnell, is most likely the difference in endowment - which is subtantial. But Willamette has its' location to balance that out a bit, as I'm sure it helps to attract excellent teachers.</p>
<p>Woops - substantial -not subtantial</p>
<p>Collegeprep11-
I am not the one who knew the students who had chosen Willamette over Stanford (that would be les_traveled), but we met kids who had nearly perfect board scores at Willamette. There are many kids who, for one reason or another, do not want to go far from home, or who want a smaller setting or who simply like the school, that would have had opportunities elsewhere. It simply is not always about how prestigious a school is.</p>
<p>My 3 children have chosen different levels of "prestige" for a variety of reasons despite offers that were higher and/or lower on the US News scale. There is no doubt some truth to the "competitive classmates, challenging professors, limited resources, etc." argument -- but not nearly as much as one might imagine. My husband and I are both Ivy graduates and work and are friends with people of hugely varying college backgrounds -- people are bright, curious, committed and hardworking everywhere.</p>
<p>How nice for you college prep that you do not have to make college decisions based on money. I mean that truthfully; it is a great privilege and benefit to you. However, I hope that you will not carry that arrogance and cavalier disregard of others' priorities into the workplace where people will care much more about your competence and ability to work with others than about where you went to college.</p>
<p>BTW, my dd went to an intensely competitve and rigorous private high school, where her college counselor suggested Willamette as a terrific college. (He was somewhat surprised, I think, to encounter a set of parents for whom the decision was not about the eastern elites or staying close to home, the 2 usual priorities in a school where money is not much of an issue for most families, but about where their child would find their right "fit.")</p>
<p>Mediocre: Moderate to inferior in quality; ordinary; collegeprep11, I would in no way use the above to describe Willamette. As I mentioned, my D turned down Occidental for Willamette, but then maybe you consider Oxy to be a "mediocre" school as well. The one problem I have with CC as a whole is it seems to be heavily frequented and posted by people such as yourself who only view a college or university as worthwhile if it is in some way "prestigious". My D's decisions as to where to apply were based on the college visits (after she had already eliminated several schools on paper, such as Pomona and CMC). She was heavily courted by both Reed and Cal Tech but in no way found either of them to be her type of school. With over 3500 colleges in the US, each is right for someone and NONE should be called mediocre because they are not right for you.</p>
<p>collegeprep - We may have to agree to disagree, however perhaps first we should talk about different types of intelligence. My son for example is dyslexic and therefore does not board test well. Grinnell had no problems with that nor does Middlebury which has waitlisted him. He recently had the highest score in his biochem class by around 5 points, above several National Merit students including one finalist who is going to Brown and one who is waitlisted at Harvard.
Trust me - whereas he does not board test well (the golden standard still for many Ivies even though it does not seem to correlate with anything worthwhile) his natural intelligence and perhaps more important his creativity is equal to many 'Ivy' students.</p>
<p>OK, Willamette is not good enough for colllegeprepp and his/her ilk. The rest of us seem happy our kids are going there. I think my D will enjoy meeting your kids.</p>
<p>Here's to the fall - happy graduation to all!</p>
<p>College Preppy,</p>
<p>I'm the one that mentioned the students who turned down Stanford and Pomona for Willamette. We actually know the young woman who chose WU over Stanford pretty well--and no, it was not about money. In fact, her father was pushing for her to go to Stanford, but she knew after visiting WU that she would be happier there. She's since graduated, and with her Truman Scholarship, is heading to law school next year, after having spent time as the personal assistant to the First Lady of the state where we live.</p>
<p>As for the student who turned down Pomona, we only met her briefly at the campus, but for all Pomona's academic reputation, she found the moral compass of the students she encountered there somewhat broken. She was also drawn to WU by how happy her brother was there.</p>
<p>Sorry to hear that perceived prestige means so much more to you than the realities of any given school. Like csleslie51, you remind me of why I originally opted to spend so little time on CC. Good luck.</p>
<p>wow what a waste of time.</p>