<p>Hey all. To those who have any insight to my question or who are at college now, do you remember those college books, such as Princeton Review's "Best 357 Colleges?" When you visited the college, did you agree with the book's assessment?</p>
<p>For example, I'll turn to Reed College and it has this student poll that says "Almost Everyone Smokes" and of course that's not exactly an exciting prospect. Are these opinion polls accurate?</p>
<p>they seem to be pretty accurate...</p>
<p>...but for Cornell, i dont know how they could possibly sum up the academics in one paragraph. And for a school as big as Cornell, it's tough to make generalizations. A huge lecture class might be loaded with TAs for bio majors, yet it might be a very different picture if you're a student in the hotel school. </p>
<p>The "best 361 colleges" book should be used to narrow down a large list, but shouldn't really be used to create an exact picture of a campus. Use wisely!</p>
<p>What about the drinking scene? Just because the Princeton Review book mentions drinking at a school a couple times more than it mentions it at another school does it mean there's a huge discrepancy between two schools in question?
(I'm looking for a school that has a drinking environment that doesn't take place between closed doors, ie excluding non-drinkers. I'm fine w/ other people drinking, I'm just not a huge fan.)</p>
<p>I'm not sure PR's very accurate. A guide to the "top 361" colleges that fails to include Occidental, UC Irvine, etc. makes me wonder about its accuracy and methods.</p>
<p>That said, the description of Duke is TOTALLY wrong.</p>
<p>My PR "Best 361 Colleges" ed. has occidental and UC Irvine...odd. </p>
<p>could you elaborate on how the PR guide gets it wrong for Duke? Does anyone else have experience w/ the PR guide being off-base?</p>
<p>Oh, does it? I was basing it on this</a> thread. I haven't read the latest edition, so I trusted the Parents. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Reading the description on the PR site, it's is pretty accurate. Only a few minor points:</p>
<p>
[quote]
"Durham is far from a college town," Duke students agree, but fortunately "lots of activities occur at Duke," and Chapel Hilla great college townis only fifteen minutes down the road.
[/quote]
I wish people wouldn't hate on Durham. Ninth Street isn't that bad, and there's stuff to do. More freshmen head into Durham on weekends than Chapel Hill. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Duke students also love to sit around and shoot the breeze"the benches on campus definitely help the social scene"and point out that "conversations can range from a biology lab one minute to the current health-care debate the next, then eventually moving on to the difference between Protestants and Catholics and ending with a discussion of the next men's basketball game."
[/quote]
Did this come from the admissions brochure? :) The benches aren't that popular, and people tend to talk a lot about their work (esp. the engineers). People are really friendly, though, and you'll find someone who shares your interests. </p>
<p>
[quote]
"strict alcohol policies are pushing a lot of weekend activity off campus."
[/quote]
<em>laughs</em>
I'm not going to touch this one. :p</p>
<p>Overall, the descriptions seemed more accurate than I had thought- they're totally different from the one I read when I applied! What happened to description of the anorexic Duke girls with fashionable handbags in the previous edition?</p>
<p>The Fiske guide is an excellent book, if you haven't already read it.</p>
<p>I agree. Fiske Guide is the way to go for a quick overview of each school. Take your time and read their descriptions carefully. There's a lot between the lines.</p>
<p>is the fiske gude available anywhere online? i'd be interested on geting some info on some CSU schools</p>
<p>bump please...i'm curious too.</p>
<p>No, it's not. At least, I'm pretty sure it's not. Your public library should have a copy, though.</p>
<p>Fiske is a bit more useful than the PR books, and the PR polls are the least useful element of their books.</p>
<p>All those rankings are bogus. US News raved about Mount Union, and I'm too miserable up here to even go to the cafeteria some days.</p>
<p>I agree that Fiske is the best all-around guide, significantly better than Princeton Review. Another that I like that gives a great deal of insider information on social and academic trends is "Choosing the Right College." Although not available online, they do make several college reviews available at their website on a rotating weekly basis, so you can check it out for yourself and see if you like the style and format. This week you can see Northwestern, Chicago, Urbana-Champaign, and Wheaton. Last week's free reviews are still available as well--they are Spelman, Morehouse, and G.I.T. There's also a schedule that shows when other free reviews will become available. Of particular interest to anyone looking at the Maine LACs will be the week of Dec. 5, when the reviews of Bates, Bowdoin, and Colby will be available.
<a href="http://www.isi.org/college_guide/index.aspx%5B/url%5D">http://www.isi.org/college_guide/index.aspx</a></p>
<p>The following principles underpin the mission of ISI, the organization whose college reviews are recommended on the above post:</p>
<p>T H E P R I N C I P L E S O F A F R E E S O C I E T Y</p>
<p>The Intercollegiate Studies Institute works to instill an understanding and appreciation for Americas founding principles. These six values represent the core beliefs inherent in ISIs mission and its activity.</p>
<p>Limited Government
The rightful functions of government are to guarantee individual liberty, private property, internal order, the provision of national defense, and the administration of justice. When the state exceeds this proper role, it accumulates power and becomes a threat to personal liberty.</p>
<p>Individual Liberty
Individuals possess rights to life, liberty, property, and freedom from the restrictions of arbitrary force. They exercise these rights through the use of their natural free will.</p>
<p>Personal Responsibility
Personal responsibility is central to the idea of a free society and to the concept of self-government. Because each individual is morally responsible for his acts, citizens in a free society have an obligation to educate themselves to further the common good through the political process: this is the proper and necessary function of self-government.</p>
<p>The Rule of Law
Laws, not men, rule a free society. The Constitution of the United States, with its division of powers, is the best arrangement yet devised for empowering government while preventing the concentration of power.</p>
<p>Free Market Economy
Allocating resources by the free play of supply and demand is the single economic system compatible with the requirements of a free society, and also the most productive and efficient supplier of human needs.</p>
<p>Moral Norms
The values, customs, conventions, and norms of the Judeo-Christian tradition inform and guide a free society. Without such ordinances, society induces its decay by embracing a relativism that rejects an objective moral order.</p>
<p>For a look at the fair and balanced ISI Board of Trustees, here is their webpage:
<a href="http://www.isi.org/about/our_leadership/trustees.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.isi.org/about/our_leadership/trustees.html</a></p>
<p>In other words, ISI is incredibly biased. St. John's is the paragon of collegiate excellence, but liberal schools are blasted (especially Duke lol). Even U Chicago is criticized somewhat for reducing its Common Core. </p>
<p>
[quote]
In some ways, Duke is an Ivy League wannabe, intent on riding the waves of academic silliness to complete respectability among right-thinking (that is, leftthinking) sorts.
[/quote]
How unbiased and informative, lol.</p>
<p>Note that ISI does not extend its belief in "Individual Liberty" and "Personal Responsibility" to college distribution requirements. They preach (issue fatwahs?) that colleges should have a mandatory core curriculum incuding all students being required to take Economics courses (but only if they are not of the socialist Keynesian variety).</p>
<p>The only "outstanding" Alumni of this "Non-profit" organization mentioned were all involved with the Reagan administration! Yup - this is a completely unbiased, inpartial, non-partisan, open minded, informative group! :)</p>
<p>I have to confess--one of my favorite guilty pleasures is mentioning "Choosing the Right College" on CC. It always riles somebody.</p>
<p>The issue of "bias," though, is specious. CtRC doesn't pretend to be anything other than what it is, and although folks such as Reidm feel the need to spoon-feed information to those of you who might otherwise be led down the "right" path---it's all there at the ISI website, readily accessible to anyone capable of clicking a mouse button. I'm curious what Reidm finds so objectionable about ISI's precepts though....I mean, OK, they're a little traditional, but so what? You sound like someone standing before a congressional committee saying "I have here, in my hand,....." But I digress.</p>
<p>This gem--written by the guide's editor-in-chief-- appears in the introduction to "Choosing the Right College":
[quote]
The New York Times, with its usual perceptiveness, has called this guide "biased." We'll go further: it is absolutely prejudiced. That is, it advances from a preconceived judgement or opinion--not with regard to any particular school, but about the purposes of education and the responsibilities of educators.
[/quote]
I find that refreshing, and useful. Others may not. But, as I said, the very informative website provides pdf. files of complete college reviews on a rotating basis--so everyone is free to read complete examples of CTRC's college reviews, instead of the little teaser bromides available at the websites of other college guides. You read, you decide. An above-board approach, before you buy the book.</p>
<p>The idea that CTRC trashes "liberal" schools and extolls "conservative" ones is also false. They do approve of St. John's curriculum (as do many CC parents), but the university described by them as "the gem of the nation" is in fact Columbia. Yes, it's because of "great books" and "core curriculum" and all that, because that is the CTRC bailiwick--academic rather than social conservatism (although they certainly provide lots of political and social commentary about schools in detail not found anywhere else). CTRC also gives very high marks to schools such as Reed, Swarthmore, Grinnel, and Oberlin. Where a school (as is usually the case) has no core curriculum, CTRC examines the course offerings and lists what it considers an acceptable core so that anyone wanting to attend said school can devise his/her own core curriculum. A "fatwa?" Please.</p>
<p>Many people posting on CC have mentioned that CTRC was more conservative in general outlook than they themselves tended to be, yet stated that they found the guide useful in providing information not available elsewhere. Each school gets three sections after the introductory paragraph: Academic Life, Political Atmosphere, and Student Life. I don't think any family should rely on a single guide when going through the college selection process, and I think that "Choosing the Right College" provides a unique perspective that is useful to anyone with an open mind, even if the people who put it out have already made theirs up. I value clear, unvarnished opinion about colleges.</p>
<p>I found the detailed college profiles in the ISI book to be much more helpful than some of the other guides.</p>