Candid/Learned Opinions on These Choices Please?

<p>"She's most proud of her Carleton admit but when she visited she found the students more sporty, mainstream, and generally less friendly than Grinnell."</p>

<p>I think the "less friendly" observation is likely an error based on small sample size, though the first two observations are correct. Regardless, if that is what she found I'd definitely favor Grinnell. With the possible exception of a department or two, there is not much difference academically. </p>

<p>Nothing the matter with being a star performer at Wooster, either, though at equal money I'd only favor C.O.W. if she was a bit more mainstream herself.</p>

<p>You are so lucky to have a top contender like Grinnell come up with the attractive package. It's a nobrainer. dd also applied. Like pattykk's, she applied Uchi. Since an EA admit, she only had to apply to where she absolutely loved and Grinnell was the only remote LAC (and only LAC in the end except Wellesley.) Now she is in at Brown and that is dominating the action. I am holding out for another week or so of open mindedness.</p>

<p>Interesting that your daughter also applied to Brown. Congrats on the acceptance. It's funny but we're almost relieved that our daughter didn't get in, and sometimes we think she is as well. She would have felt compelled to go because it's Brown, but after visiting she wasn't all that keen on the place. From the beginning she's favored Grinnell, and you can't argue with the price. While money really isn't an issue, we told her that if she wanted to go private over U-Va or William and Mary -- our excellent in state options
-- that she'd have to split the difference with us. Getting $12,000 a year from Grinnell fulfills her end of the bargain.</p>

<p>One thing that stuck out to her when she visited Carleton and Grinnell was that the Carleton kids were quick to bash Grinnell but the Grinnell kids did not return the favor.</p>

<p>What are her academic interests? With these excellent choices, I would look at those again with reference to the offerings, special programs, and departments, and refer to the catalog for department size, number of staff, poke around to get an idea of the reputation factor of those departments.</p>

<p>If USNews rankings are not one of your top priority factors, I will say right up front that I am a shameless troll for St. Mary's - my son really liked the school and was accepted with full tuition but wants an environment of greater size. Does your daughter sing as well as act? They have marvelous singing opportunities - for instance, there is a student/faculty chorus that tours Europe for a month every year giving performances. The poster above mirrors my impression about the theatre department - think of the interships available in the DC-Baltimore-Annapolis area. If she likes the water (contemplation, sailing, canoeing, etc.) more than the cornfields, she could consider it over Grinnell (having spent one year at the U of Illinois, I must say that that flat farm landscape depressed me - I want to see some variety in the terrain around me). St. Mary's is also a small town and isolated but the cities are reasonably close for weekend trips. As small town environments go, it is beautiful and very gracious.</p>

<p>To further assist in your decision, I suggest that you call the admissions offices and ask for details about their grad/prof school placement record in a few areas in which your D might major. Once again, you may be pleasantly surprised by St. Mary's. The down side of St. Mary's for your D is probably that a large number of the kids are from Maryland, but our school system prizes tolerance and diversity and friendliness - I believe she would find that they are, by and large, an open and accepting, egalitarian group of students - she would not be 'an outsider.'</p>

<p>Parent 2009:
I had to blink for a moment because I thought maybe I had written your posting in my sleep! Exactly my thouhgts! I do think Grinnell will be the perfect choice for my D ( we go there tomorrow). She is more stuck on the fact that Californians don't know where Iowa is, much less Grinnell. And she is miffed that she didn't get into Amherst or Brown. If I had known that she wanted more names to throw around, I would have had her apply to more safe LAC colleges. I just had her apply to the two: Grinnell and Kenyon,the ones that I thought might fit best. And a reach, Amherst. What rattled her is she didn't get into Middlebury. She got waitlisted at Claremont Mckenna, but is not interested at all now ( she thought she wanted a water polo school for awhile) She can bandy about her acceptances at UCSD, UCLA and Cal but in California they are still UC,'s not Brown or Harvard. In retropsect, she probably should have done some research on EA to see what her choices were. Oh, well.</p>

<p>Yulsie, her academic interests are varied and as yet undefined. The social sciences, maybe, or maybe political science. Her interest in science and math has waned a bit. As for theatre, she's more interested in directing than acting and singing, although she's done it all. At this point she really just wants to keep her options open. </p>

<p>She visited St. Mary's and was impressed with the students but turned off by the location. Way, way too isolated -- literally nothing off campus within walking distance. And even with her scholarship it would cost more than William and Mary, which would be tough for us to swallow.</p>

<p>Mizsic, I hear you. Admissions at schools at this level are unpredictable. Our daughter and a close friend both applied to St. Mary's, Grinnell, Carleton, and Wesleyan. He got into St. Mary's with $6k a year merit aid, into Grinnell with $10k a year merit aid, and waitlisted at both Carleton and Wesleyan. She got $7500 at St. Mary's, $12,000 at Grinnell, accepted at Carleton -- and flat out rejected at Wesleyan. It thus appears that three of the four schools considered her the stronger candidate, while the fourth liked him better. While we were not at all surprised by the Brown rejection, we were miffed at Wesleyan, but only for pride reasons, which of course is silly.</p>

<p>There is a lot of silliness out there right now. What I have been telling my D is that she has the next month to brag about where she is going, but then she has to live throught the next four years! My S has had a hard time at Cal, it is so bureaucratic and impersonal. Only as an upper classman, has he started to engage in more discourse withhis fellow students and profs!</p>

<p>Let me put a plug in here for Wooster. It is a college that my son researched, visited and applied to. Though in the middle of Ohio, it has a lovely campus. We didn't go into the town of Wooster but I gather that there isn't much there to attract students. The several faculty members we met were exceedingly nice and engaging and the same could be said for the students too.</p>

<p>But on to academics!!! Though it is not the most selective of colleges its graduates seem to be overachievers. Why do I say this? Here is what my son discovered. Among all LAC's, since 1986 Wooster is ranked 19th in the number of its graduates to earn PhD's; about the same number as Colgate, Williams, Grinnell, and Amherst and more than Bowdoin, Colby, Bates, Middlebury, Davidson, Hamilton and many others. It is also among an elite group of 20 LAC's whose graduates are among the top 50 in the categories of science(PhD's), business leaders(Standard and Poor's data), and internationalleadership positions(USDep of Ed data). This puts Wooster in an elite group which includes Bowdoin, Amherst, Williams, Wesleyan, Swarthmore, M'bury, Haverford and Swarthmore. </p>

<p>The thing that fascinated us about Wooster is that they produced these remarkable academic achievements with admissions statistics significantly below the LAC's they were keeping company with.</p>

<p>So how does Wooster produce grads who exceed expectations. I suspect a big factor is it Independent Studies program requirement. The P'ton review rated it the second best IS program in the US behind only Princeton. Wooster has set aside one of its three libraries(Gault) for its IS program, equipping it with 280 assigned study carrels and the college also provides grant support for off campus IS study.</p>

<p>In my opinion it is a remarkable college, quite possibly offering an academic program on a par with the best in the country. Wooster also offers generous amounts of merit aid. However I believe it generally caps out at about $18k. The college seems to prefer spreading its merit aid to as many students as possible rather that offering any full tuition merit scholarships.</p>

<p>I have a high opinion of Wooster also. I tried very hard to get my neice to attend. But, right or wrong, when I think of Wooster, I do not think quirky. I do when I think of Carleton.</p>

<p>Parent2009, being miffed for reasons of pride may be silly but it's normal. At least that what I tell myself a year later. The best balm in the world is how happy your S/D is where they wind up.</p>

<p>I agree. And it's funny how these things work out. We weren't convinced that Wesleyan was a good fit for our daughter, and apparently they agreed. We feel differently about Grinnell.</p>

<p>I'd go with the rest: visit Carleton and Grinnell and hope she likes Grinnell, because it's actually better known outside of the midweat than Carleton (because of its writers' workshops), and that's a great deal!</p>

<p>You're thinking of the University of Iowa's writing workshop -- not Grinnell.</p>

<p>No, Grinnell. <a href="http://web.grinnell.edu/english/Creative/2000-2001%20conference.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://web.grinnell.edu/english/Creative/2000-2001%20conference.html&lt;/a> (Not called Workshop (that is U of I) but Conference.</p>

<p>Thanks -- my mistake -- although I have to say that in the East at least Carleton is still better known regardless.</p>

<p>LOL "visit Carleton and Grinnell and hope she liikes Grinnell"
I have that happen with many decisions.</p>

<p>Having been to both Grinnell and Carleton I'd say Grinnell is far better for the less conventional student.</p>

<p>Agreed. Even if it's less of a "name."</p>

<p>Parent2009, Grinnell has been more of a name here than Carleton, which is not saying a whole lot in the Midatlantic since not that many kids go to either. But I have tutored kids for the College Boards for years, and given a group of midwest school, the name recognition goes in this order: Kenyon, Macalester, Grinnell and Carleton. Now at my son's prep school, there are kids who applied to Carleton along with AWS, and would put Carleton "ahead" of Grinnell. But these are all tiny details when it comes to picking a school. Grinnell is an excellent school and anyone here who knows Carelton will know Grinnell. And since she seems to have a slight preference for Grinnell, it seems to be an easy choice. It would be more difficult if she preferred Carleton, because then the economics would weigh in heavier. But if I had a kid who preferred Grinnell to Carleton even ever so slightly, I would not hesitate in recommending he go there, even if the cost were equal.</p>

<p>Thanks, jamimom. Interesting how your order of name recognition is precisely the opposite of how I'd rank the schools in terms of academics.</p>