My daughter is looking at both these schools. Can you provide a list of pros and cons of each? To narrow the scope, in not looking to compare honors colleges and admittance criteria. More like campus life, size and ease of getting around campus, Greek life, class size, how many auditorium classes, likelihood of TAs teaching instead of professor, quality of professors, etc…
Greek life seems stronger at Ole Miss, which has a more “southern” feel.
Ole Miss is prettier.
I’ve been on Auburn’s campus 5 times within the last 8 weeks. There are a few pretty spots, but too many plain/unattractive areas. The main part of campus is poorly laid out…no real central quad. There is a popular off-campus area where kids hang-out between and after classes. many good restaurants nearby.
Auburn is also the Ag school, so campus property size is huge, but you don’t really get that feel while on the main parts of campus. You’d see it when driving around.
Why isn’t she looking at Alabama? Gorgeous campus. If she likes Greek Life, then you can’t beat Bama. The honors college classes are limited to 15 students each. Tuscaloosa is a cool city.
UAlabama has much better merit scholarships!
As for “auditorium” classes. All schools will have “auditorium classes” for those basic Gen Ed lecture classes (i.e. American History, Psychology 101, and so forth). If the lecture class is big, but the class requires a lab, then the lab class will likely be small 20-25 students)
Courses that require a lot of writing (frosh comp, literature, Writing Intensive upper division courses) are generally small because the prof has to be able to read/grade essays in a timely fashion.
If your DD is coming in with AP credits, she’ll stip many/all of those classes. My kids came into Alabama with 45 AP credits and didn’t take those big lecture classes
You mentioned not comparing honors colleges, but Auburn’s is harder to get into and isn’t well-developed. That said, honors classes at virtually all schools will be smaller.
Please visit both campuses. My husband is an Ole Miss graduate (was in a fraternity) and my son goes to Auburn (not in a fraternity, was in marching band). We go to Ole Miss for a football came every year and visit Auburn for every home game in the fall and a few baseball/softball games in the spring. My husband disagrees with Mom2collegekids regarding her opinion of the campus…and so do I. Auburn is in the middle of a construction boon but it’s still lovely campus and just the right size. It is a very bike friendly campus with a popular bike share program. At Ole Miss, the Grove is a very pretty area of the campus and a lot of fun on game day but the campus (imo) is not as nice or laid out as well as Auburn and they have crammed buildings into every nook and cranny of open space and didn’t keep the same theme in the building architecture.
As my husband put it, Greek life at Ole Miss is serious stuff and that is one campus where you really do want to be in a sorority/fraternity. Auburn, oth, is much less obsessed with Greek life. It is very popular but doesn’t segregate Greek/non-Greek relationships.
Not sure what she means by the Honors College is not well developed - my son was in it for 2 years and dropped it because it was pretty tough on his gpa - its not just segregated more rigorous classes you also devote a number of hours to seminar courses (although time consuming, as an IB kid he loved these).
Give both a visit and Alabama as well if you have time. War Eagle!
This daughter is going to transfer out of UK. We have visited these 2 plus some more. Been to Alabama and decided that was too much. The nursing building is at the farthest corner in campus and the new dorms are just too much. Love Clemson where her cousin just graduated, but they don’t have chapter of her sorority lol. Phi Mu. Wants to stay away from the bigger schools (30k+) and the urban locations.