Colgate questions

Parents Forum
1

<p>This is my first post on CC, I am a parent of a international student. Unfortunately we will not able to do the college visit before my S applies US universities. </p>

<p>Colgate is one of my son top choices after he talked to the admission officer at his school, and read all brochures/emails Colgate sent to him after the visit. I have to admit that Colgate did really good job promoting their college. </p>

<p>I have two questions:
Q1
Son is not a sporty, although he plays golf and tennis regularly but never a fun of any sport. He does exercise because he wants to keep his body in good shape, not because he loves it.
He is a sociable guy and enjoy do things together his friends, but he doesn’t like drinking and party. Will he fit in Colgate? </p>

<p>Q2:
How well are Colgate graduates employment prospect in Asia?</p>

<p>Appreciate if anyone can give some feedback</p>

2

<p>Colgate has great facility for tennis, golf, and a lot of other sports. It is a sporty school, but most people do it recreationally. In the winter, it is easy and fun to do cross country ski or snow shoe. But not everyone is a jock. </p>

<p>Colgate has Greek life, but the administration is making an effort in providing other social events. During our recent visit, I was surprised by the dance and drama program for such a small school. The school is also promoting town and gown relationship. The students seem to be very integrated with the town.</p>

<p>I was there 30 years ago. We have visited with our kids in the last 5 years. I have to say that it is a better school (programs) today than it was when we were there. It’s program seem more global focused, maybe that’s due to the world we are living in today. </p>

<p>Colgate is a small liberal arts school in the middle of no where. Due to its size and location, it has it’s plus and minuses. Students and professors get to know each very well, students stay on campus and are focused on their studies. The negative side is it could get boring sometimes, especially in the winter. This could be the case for Asian kids from major cosmopolitan areas. I would say forget about Asian food, unless your kid learn to cook.</p>

<p>Students from Colgate go into finance a lot. But it also has a very good geology department, many kids end up working for oil companies. Colgate was ranked one of the colleges with highest career salaries. Unfortunately, like many small LACs, it is not well known in Asia, even though it has very strong alumni support. You are going to find that even with highest ranking LACs, like Williams, Middlebury, Amherst … they are not as well known as Ivies, and sometimes not even as well known as large state schools. I think it really depends what your kid wants to do after graduation. If he wants to go back to Asia right after college, a bigger and better known school maybe better. If he plans to get a graduate degree then a school like Colgate would be very good for him, because it is very nurturing with excellent academic program, and good placement rates to various graduate programs.</p>

3

<p>My daughter is an 08 college grad, so my info is not absolutely current, but I do not believe the campus culture at Colgate has changed significantly since she was there. She went to Colgate for one year and transferred to a mid-sized research U. Her chief complaint about Colgate: it was an alcohol-fueled party scene. The combination of rural isolation, Division I athletics, and a robust Greek system contribute to a campus culture in which alcohol plays a starring role. And because the school is so isolated, there is no escape. And I want to point out that my kid is NOT a non-drinker; she liked a good party in college. But she found the drinking scene at Colgate excessive and depressing. </p>

<p>Are there non-drinkers at Colgate? Sure. But unless your non-drinking son is quite comfortable being part of a minority social culture, I would encourage him to look elsewhere.</p>

<p>On the plus side, it’s a stunning campus and my daughter had wonderful, caring professors there.</p>

4

<p>Oldfort, WJB</p>

<p>Thank you for your time writing this detailed info. It is really helpful!</p>

5

<p>As far as the drinking culture, it is no better at a school like Williams and it doesn’t have Greek presence. There are schools in the states where there is not as much drinking, but they do other stuff. Coming from Asia, where drinking age is 18 or non existent, it may not be a big deal to your son. I am sure he could handle few drinks at parties and feel perfectly comfortable, without having to get completely trashed. </p>

<p>I think due to Colgate’s size, there may not be as many campus events outside of parties sometimes. Wjb’s experience maybe more current than mine, but I would encourage you to look at Colgate’s website to get a sense what of events the school sponsors. I had very good 4 years there.</p>

6

<p>My older S graduated from Colgate in 2009, and had a wonderful 4 years there. Colgate continues to play a large role in his life as a large percentage of his class now lives, works and hangs out together in NYC. Oldfort’s post # 2 above is a great summary; I also agree with oldfort that the campus culture at Colgate is very similar to Williams (which I attended) and other small liberal arts schools in rural locations. The Colgate administration has made a real effort to change the culture of the school and to reduce the influence of the Greek community, and has made noticeable strides in this area. There’s a lot going on on campus, and the academics are top notch.</p>

<p>I can’t speak to how Colgate would be viewed in the Asia job market. I thought the career counseling office at Colgate was pretty good (although I think the director - who I met at an event at my employer - has now moved on to Amherst). My son and his friends found that the Colgate alumni network really does look out for recent grads.</p>

7

<p>My D graduated in 10, she did have a difficult time finding kids who weren’t heavy drinkers at first but she did. I think these days at any college campus, the culture is drinking, your choice whether to drink or not. There are always kids at the drinking parties who don’t drink a lot. There are cultural events, there are kids who don’t drink, there is other stuff to do. If your son is looking at small schools, it’s a numbers game of the percent of kids who don’t drink and at a smaller school, that number is smaller.
I don’t know about employment in Asia, I do know that almost every person in her class was employed by summer or got accepted to a great grad school.</p>

8

<p>Internationals should attend name-brand Unis, which pretty much excludes all LACs, IMO. (Pedigree/prestige is much more important overseas than it is in the states.)</p>

9

<p>Two of my nieces who are LDS( * Mormon*), graduated from Colgate in the last 10 years. Being involved with sports gave them another peer group besides religious groups on campus.
They seemed to like it, happy with their professors and loved the beautiful campus.
( both came back to the Pacific Northwest, one is working @ microsoft, other is in pharmacy school)
Don’t know about employment in Asia.</p>

10

<p>One last thought from me before I help out the US economy, if OP’s son were then go to a more recognizable grad school then he should be ok for the Asian job market.</p>

11

<p>I’d pay a campus visit to Colgate and talk with current students or alums who have been out of school for 2 years or less to get a decent approximation of the situation they’ll face as prospective freshmen.* College campuses/cultures can change greatly within 10 or even 5 years…especially if we’re talking small LACs. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Depending on what that other stuff is, it may actually be more tolerable than alcohol. At my LAC in the '90s, weed was the most commonly used drug. Compared with mainstream campuses where alcohol is the substance of choice and majoring in beer is highly popular…I’d rather deal with stoned potheads than belligerent drunks looking for a fight or those who can’t hold their liquor and make a mess on sidewalks, hallways, bathrooms, and dorms. At least with the former, they mind their own business and don’t make a huge mess all over the place. </p>

<p>Moreover, this is also dependent on the type of drinking culture present on a given campus. If it is the frat/sorority “Animal House”/beer major type…I’d strongly urge most students who are remotely academically minded to steer clear.* </p>

<p>However, if it is the more calmer drinking culture where people are more “live and let live” and they take their studies seriously…I wouldn’t rule the campus out necessarily.** Granted, if a critical mass of campus students are of this type…it can get quite boring for the more socially active students. </p>

<ul>
<li>A major reason why most HS classmates’ parents were wary of sending their kids off to Big-10 schools that were not as academically renowned as Northwestern, UMich, or UIllinois(STEM only)…especially if their motivation is mainly driven by visions of college football and frat/sorority parties.<br></li>
</ul>

<p>** That is, unless the kid in question already has had serious issues with alcohol, self-control, and/or an addictive personality.</p>

12

<p>I think it is a total copout to say that alcohol abuse is the same at all schools. It’s not. In fact, it isn’t even close, sometimes at schools which stat-wise look very similar. A school like Colgate (or Williams) has a 50% self-reported binge rate. That is, half the students report that in the past two weeks, they drank at least five drinks in one episode at least once. A little under 60% of those did so three or more times (or drank at least two drinks nearly every day - which is the definition of “heavy drinking”).</p>

<p>However, we know from experimental data that this is an underestimate. We know that the average five-drink drinker underestimate the number of drinks they have by about one - which means they would state they aren’t binge drinkers, since they only thought they had four. Furthermore, when asked to measure out the size of an average drink, the average college student measures out one that is 1.8X the standard drink size. What this means is that the median NON-binge four-drink drinker on average had NINE drinks in a sitting, and half had more.</p>

<p>So, you can fiddle with the numbers, but you’ll end up with the reality that 60-65% of Colgate (or Williams) students are binge drinkers, higher among men, athletes, whites, and Greeks. And more than half of them will be heavy drinkers. Since at both campuses, between 15-20% are total abstainers, the percentage of true moderate drinkers, is only 15-25% and vanishing. (Of course, ALL of our children are among those. LOL!)</p>

<p>Now look at a school where the binge drinking rate that we know about is 30-35%, and do the same numbers. All of a sudden, moderate drinkers are the plurality, and non-binge drinkers are a majority. It makes a HUGE difference in campus culture.</p>

<p>Don’t let anyone tell you that “all campuses”, or “all-LACs”, etc. are the same. It isn’t even close to being true.</p>

<p>(And it has nothing to do with “intelligence”. As someone who works in the drug and alcohol field, I can tell you that alcoholics (and drug addicts) are not lacking in intelligence. They are just alcoholics and drug addicts. And take a school like my alma mater, which publishes a 29% “heavy drinking” rate (it’s likely higher, but okay). At that percentage, some 6 in 10 of those will have a serious alcohol problem or alcoholism later in life - that’s 1 out of every 6 Williams (or Colgate) grads, again higher among whites, men, athletes, and (in the case of Colgate) Greeks. And yes, I believe both are great schools, with amazing, committed professors, extraordinary resources, fantastic settings, and administrations that, when it comes to this, don’t want to figure it out.)</p>

13

<p>

</p>

<p>That, and so odd considering alcohol abuse wasn’t a major issue at Oberlin. In fact, my LAC was so far removed from the stereotypical college Greek drinking campus culture that most college applicants/parents who viewed drinking as an inherent part of the “college experience” tended to steer themselves/their kids away from my alma mater during the late '80s and throughout the '90s. </p>

<p>On the other hand, many Oberlin classmates did partake in weed and psychedelics…drugs more commonly associated with hippies and the '60s counterculture.</p>

14

<p>I would love to know where one gets self reporting binge drinking data–mini, where do these stats come from?</p>

15

<p>They come from three sources: the Harvard School of Public Health under Dr. Henry Wechsler conducted them for 14 years (with funds from the CDC, NIH, and National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism). I believe the Wechsler surveys ended in 2009. Some schools, including Williams, continued to conduct their own surveys based on the Wechsler survey, sometimes in more depth… Now the most common survey is that developed at Southern Illinois University.</p>

<p>In addition to these campus-specific surveys, the University of Michigan/CDC Monitoring the Future Survey onducted surveys nationwide every year, and has been doing so beginning in 1976.</p>

<p>While each campus is different, the national data have found that alcohol use and drug use generally are found together - high binge drinking campuses are also high drug-using campuses, with highest rates to be found among “Greeks”.</p>

16

<p>Thanks mini. While I have not found a breakdown by college, I think this is a pretty useful premise (from Wechsler’s studies):
The strongest predictors of college binge drinking were residence in a fraternity or sorority [and] adoption of a party-centered lifestyle . . . from “Correlates of College Binge Drinking”</p>

17

<p>Wechsler’s agreement with the colleges was to leave it to the colleges to release the data if they so chose. Because of an articulation agreement with the federal government, each campus has a “college alcohol and drug coordinator”. Usually it is a dean. They have to give you the data if you ask for it. They don’t, however, have to publish it. Many, including Williams, have (in the past). Some publish it as part of social marketing campaigns (especially when the data show that frequency is less than what students often perceive - if the data are high, social marketing campaigns are largely ineffective.</p>

<p>If you look at all the studies, you find nine “correlates” of binge drinking campuses (higher than average): They are: rural, mostly residential, coed, non-religious, higher than average income, mostly white (and, especially, few African-Americans), big on spectator sports, higher than average percentage in fraternities/sororities; few controls on drinking on campus/surrounding community. So you really don’t need to know the rate for an individual campus (as I noted, they are almost always underestimates anyway). If you see 7 or more of these characteristics, the college is likely to have greater than average binge drinking (frankly, I don’t know of any exceptions, but I’m sure they exist). Five or fewer, the opposite.</p>

18

<p>I really do wish not every discussion about college turns into a drinking lecture.</p>

19

<p>Thank you everyone for your input. It is very useful for us.</p>

<p>We personally think the LACs are better for him. Close interaction with professors, focus on his study. Stay on campus, so he doesn’t need a car to get around everyday, plus Colgate has wonderful study aboard programs.
We do concern about heavy drinking sense Mini posted.<br>
I know friends from work who are graduates of Williams, Middlebury, they told me it is not that bad in their colleges, it is part of college life; most of kid know how to stay away from the problem. </p>

<p>Thanks again everyone!</p>

20

<p>What oldfort said.</p>