<p>My dad went to Holy Cross. I toured it as well as BC, Brown, Amherst, Hampshire, and Columbia. I grew up in Worcester, so, even though Holy Cross impressed me, I wanted to go to a different city for variety. Having read the posts above, I am prompted to recall the two times I toured BC (once with my older brother who went to Wesleyan). I was shocked by how much of the campus tour was spent promoting the football program and denying that anyone had to be Catholic. I'm not overly religious, but I found the the vigor of BC's secular presentation kind of off-putting. I think only half of the tour, perhaps less focused on academics, unlike all of the other schools I visited. The freshman living in far off Newton was also a bad aspect. We never even saw that campus since it was so inconvenient. Also, I was told that all Juniors were denied campus housing and had to live off campus. Holy Cross and Columbia guarantee housing for all four years. Both encourage junior year abroad, but neither force you into an off campus apartment. I think all the schools I looked at stacked up better than BC. And lastly, after two wonderful years at Columbia, in exotic Manhattan, I still love to come home to Worcester which has so many features that go unappreciated by those who've never lived there.</p>
<p>"Also, I was told that all Juniors were denied campus housing and had to live off campus"</p>
<p>I guess you were napping through the tour. Only 30% of Juniors live off campus, about 40% on campus, 30% study abroad.</p>
<p>"I was shocked by how much of the campus tour was spent promoting the football program"</p>
<p>BC is the only major D1 football program in New England, why on earth wouldn't we want to show them off? Hell, I chose BC because it could provide a festive atmosphere when Saturday arrived.</p>
<p>"and denying that anyone had to be Catholic."</p>
<p>Funny thing, I remember the same thing on my Holy Cross and Georgetown tour</p>
<p>My conclusion: you either had a terrible tour guide or your heart was else where.</p>
<p>"Hell, I chose BC because it could provide a festive atmosphere when Saturday arrived."</p>
<p>Picking a college based on 7 Saturdays of home football games is probably not the wisest course of action but I am afraid probably not that unusual.</p>
<p>HC is only Catholic College in Prestigious Watson Fellowship program </p>
<p>The College of the Holy Cross is the sole Catholic and Jesuit representative of "47" LAC participating institutions in the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship program. The Watson Fellowship:</p>
<p>The</a> Watson Fellowship : Our Colleges : List of Participating Institutions</p>
<p>"Picking a college based on 7 Saturdays of home football games is probably not the wisest course of action but I am afraid probably not that unusual."</p>
<p>Three of my high school classmates applied to ND just because of their football team. They hated South Bend, but they wanted to be associated with the Fighting Irish (yes, yes, academics is a draw too). So no, it's not unusual at all. Beside my other choices were BU, Tufts, and Holy Cross...the academic deviations between those four aren't that great, so sport became the tie breaker.</p>
<p>i'd say theres a pretty noticeable difference between Holy Cross academics and Tufts academics my friend</p>
<p>Oddly the Princeton Review gives both Tufts and HC an identical academic rating of 98.</p>
<p>"The College of the Holy Cross is the sole Catholic and Jesuit representative of "47" LAC participating institutions in the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship program."</p>
<p>Holy Cross is the ONLY LAC of the top Catholic or Jesuit colleges. The others simply do not qualify due to their status as National Universities.</p>
<p>Reddune - UConn also plays major college football.</p>
<p>"Reddune - UConn also plays major college football."</p>
<p>The same UConn that got blew out by 45 points WV who later lost to UPitt? And whose best win was over South Florida on an a "fair catch" that the Big East commissioner has to apologize for? Don't get me wrong, UConn is major basketball powerhouse, but not yet in football (key word is "yet"). BC isn't a national powerhouse, but in New England there isn't a close second (ok, Umass gave us a scare, but we didn't let an App-State kind of upset happen to us).</p>
<p>I guess the key word here is "major" D1 football.</p>
<p>P.S. I really want BC to play UConn on a consistent basis so we can create something of a local rivalry. I know some older alumni who speak very fondly of the BC-HC/BC-BU rivalry back in the good old days; but those went down the drain when BU cut their football program and HC stayed with AA. I would not mind traveling to UConn and watch the game and would probably do both schools some good stirring up local bloods.</p>
<p>According to the CollegeData:</a> College Search, Financial Aid, College Application, College Scholarship, Student Loan, FAFSA Info, Common Application web site, Tufts, BC, and HC are very similar in stats:</p>
<p>Tufts:
Avg. GPA 3.72 unweighted 4.13 weighted<br>
Avg. SAT 697 (M) 688 (CR) 691 (W)<br>
Avg. ACT 30 </p>
<p>BC:
Avg. GPA 3.63 unweighted 4.07 weighted<br>
Avg. SAT 679 (M) 674 (CR) 673 (W)<br>
Avg. ACT 30 </p>
<p>HC:
Avg. GPA 3.71 unweighted 4.08 weighted<br>
Avg. SAT 670 (M) 683 (CR) 658 (W)<br>
Avg. ACT 29</p>
<p>yup, theres really not point in arguing about which one is the BEST college because its clear that theyre all wonderful institutions. its really up the the student.. let them go visit the campus and decide which one feels the best to them. itd be rediculous to say that someone didnt want to go to BC because it only has a 4.07 avg weighted GPA instead of HC who has 4.08.</p>
<p>How do you calculate these weighted gpas? My school uses a wierd system where my weighted gpa is 8.5, no idea how it is that high. I always have a tough time comparing my weighted gpa on this site. We had the normal W gpa system freshman year but i forget the weighted values for honors and ap classes.</p>
<p>There was a time when the academic reputations of Tufts and Brandeis were much higher than those of BC and Holy Cross. While I'm not a cheerleader for the US News rankings, the fact that in the 2008 issue Tufts, Brandeis, and BC ALL have a 3.6 Peer Assessment ranking shows that these 3 are in the same academic league now (this must be a particularly painful shock to the Tufts folks, who always seem eager to say they are really close to Harvard quality). </p>
<p>And like all BC grads I know, I'd say Holy Cross has always been AT LEAST as good as BC for an undergraduate education, often even better. So to say Tufts somehow towers over Holy Cross is a real stretch.</p>
<p>TourGuide I am from the Boston area and I agree completey with your last statement.</p>
<p>Thank you Boston12. Much appreciated. I grew up in the Midwest, moved to the Boston area at age 16, and finished high school there. Then to BC, after which I went back to the Midwest and then lived all over the country and in several foreign countries. So I think I see the whole college scene in Massachusetts fairly objectively. There's NO doubt that Flutie singlehandedly pushed BC from a very good Northeastern regional university to an excellent national university. Northeastern U. has also stepped it up considerably. But places like Tufts, BU, Holy Cross, and Brandeis have been pretty stagnant over the past 30 years. They are still excellent schools, but their positions relative to BC and Northeastern have changed.</p>
<p>I have lived in Michigan, Seattle area, DC as well as Boston and I agree with your analysis. BC which was seen as a commuter school back in the 60s and 70s for B+ students has moved to parity with the more traditionally elite schools like Tufts, Brandeis, and HC and the latter have changed little. The Flutie effect and the increasing positive press for Boston as a city has helped as well as the move to the ACC. I am happy to see Northeastern also surge in the rankings. It was even more of a commuter school and not as competitive as BC. Its COOP program has always been superb.</p>
<p>"Georgetown, Tufts, Brandeis, and Holy Cross are a little resentful that BC has now joined their exclusive little club"</p>
<p>The first three schools I understand, but Holy Cross? I never have the feeling that HC was on par in term of prestige with the first three until the recent decades. And relax HC fanboys and fangirls, I'm not bashing your school. Living in Boston for 13 years or so, most of the people I know who went to BC or HC in the 70s applied interchangeably to each other and their choices were usually those two. BC and HC had been rivals in a lot of thing, students, football, who has better Christians, who has more insane Jesuits (Sorry HC, we win out this one by a landslide), so I can't imagine HC resents anything since it has always been on par with BC.</p>
<p>But then again, I haven't been alive in the 70s.</p>
<p>You are both right. Up until the 1980s (The well known "Flutie effect") Holy Cross was more selective and consequently prestigious than BC. Since that timeframe HC and BC have been relatively on par.</p>
<p>When I check the recent fact book 2006-2007, Holy Cross isn't mentioned as BC's main competitor. HC's size of course is a factor.<br>
On the local front only Harvard, Tufts, and BU are major competitors with BC.</p>
<p>With the changing nature of high education, I don't imagine BC will compete with HC anymore, nor will they be on the same competing league. BC is launching a $1.6 bil building campaign over the next 10 years to prepare itself for some sort of Holy War (borrowed from football terminology) with ND and Georgetown (two major national competitors). Tufts is fund raising like there is no tomorrow and its endowment has doubled! And it, too, has plans to expand academically and build more. BU is having its own strategic plan known as "Choosing to be Great," which plans to, what else, build, build and build. And let not forget Harvard 50-year behemoth of a building program involving billions and billions of greenback. </p>
<p>Unless HC plans to become a university (which I don't think it wants to) and have some insane building projects, it will have to compete on a lesser scale with other colleges.</p>
<p>Bc is triple the size of Holy Cross. I don't think it has triple the endowment. There is no "lesser scale" at all.</p>