I am an international student and I got accepted into Colby and Davidson this fall. I have never visited either of these institutions, so I am facing trouble to decide which one to attend. It would be very helpful if my following queries were answered. Thanks in advance!
How do the Math, Economics and CompSci departments at these schools compare?
How accessible are research opportunities as a freshman or sophomore?
Does Maine's weather significantly affect Colby's social life?
Do fraternities significantly affect Davidson's social life?
I will just comment on weather because some students are obsessed with this.
You arrive in August and finish in May. Perhaps as an international you stay the summer and work somewhere. Summers in New England are beyond compare, not to hot and you have the coast and hundreds if not thousands of lakes to have fun at.
From mid August to late October it is Autumn in Maine. It is one of the most glorious places to be for this season. Then comes Winter. You wear different clothes and get involved in outdoor activities like Alpine skiing and maybe Cross country skiing, etc. Your life changes, it doesn’t get worse and for some it gets much better. You may actually like Winter.
Spring arrives in mid April and the trees and flowers bloom. A very nice time for the 6 weeks you are in school.
You get a small piece of summer, all of Autumn, all of Winter and a good sized piece of Spring.
Look at Winter as a time offering other activities, not something to hate. Don’t lose site of the fact you will experience almost all four seasons in Maine, not just Winter.
In the Charlotte area there is much less variety in terms of climate and it can be very uncomfortable in terms of humidity.
I can’t help with Questions 1 or 2 but we did tour both schools last year and came away with markedly different impressions of them. Neither we nor our D liked Colby; it seemed to be a very sterile place to us. (Some context; we toured over 20 schools, mostly for fun, not because we felt like we needed to, and Colby was one of just 3 that we didn’t like.) To be clear, this viewpoint is based solely on the look of the place and the vibe. I have no doubt you could get a fine education there.
Davidson by contrast was fabulous, a beautiful campus in a great little town. Plus Davidson is close to Charlotte which would offer ample opportunities for internships, employment, entertainment, etc. There isn’t an equivalent urban location in Maine, let alone near Colby. But whether this is important or not is very student-dependent.
Regarding climate, unless you think it likely you would spend the summers there, I think Davidson would be great. I’m a huge fan of Maine, been there in the summer many times but I’ve never lived there so I can’t speak to the winters. However, I did go to school in North Carolina and I would characterize the weather during the school year as mostly awesome. Septembers could be hot but the fall was fabulous, winters were mild with February being the worst because of rain, and then there was Spring, oh-so glorious Spring: really just Heaven-on-Earth. And to be clear, Spring starts in March. I was out of school each year by the first week of May so I didn’t have to deal with the hot, muggy summer weather.
Regarding Question 4, our D did not particularly want to go to a school with Greek life (fraternities/sororities) so to us, Greek life was perceived negatively. Davidson was one of just two schools we looked at that did have Greek life. We did come away from our tour thinking it would be fine there. Greek life did not seem to be an overwhelmingly presence in campus life. So if you’re looking for Greek life, it is available and if you’re looking to avoid it, that seemed entirely possible.