college for a weirdo

Parents Forum
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agree with UMCP. My eyebrows did an involuntary raise when I read the above statement. Most of the kids I know of who went to W&M were more traditional.

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<p>Maybe, not in my experience and it does have a reputation for being "quirky". It's not UVA, we'll put it that way, and it's certainly not "worse than UVA" (I assume this means more traditional, not really sure). I'm not really sure what points to make here, honestly, I didn't realize that WM had such a traditional reputation around this board (it doesn't really on the UVA/WM boards here). The general feeling among the kids I know in Va (myself included) is that some are choosing WM over UVA because it's a lot less conventional. That's what they have over WM and they definitely play that up. Including reciting the "weird" things their application pool has done at admitted student day, etc. In that respect, if you do fit the quirkier profile, your chances at WM OOS are probably better than UVA OOS. It's not impossible, but it is hard. Also I have no idea where you are from, PA, DE, NJ, and such are hard, lots of OOS from those parts to VA. Not as much from the midwest. </p>

<p>In fact WM facebook group had a discussion entitled "weird" about how everyone chose WM because of the weird/quirky people. It was four pages long. </p>

<p>Search William and Mary quirky on google and a first link from a review confirming that comes up...</p>

<p>If she finds it too traditional, that's fine with me, I'm just saying that's not the reputation it has in the circles I travel in.</p>

<p>Strong liberal arts education, strong spirit of activism that is visible on campus. - Sharpe Scholars program <a href="http://www.wm.edu/sharpe/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.wm.edu/sharpe/&lt;/a> combines the classroom and the community in an interesting way. When I visited there were people everywhere with their fliers about getting fair wages for workers, volunteer organizations set up at the activities fair (more than one, and specific organizations too like the Humane society). That was different from other schools I visited where you mainly saw sports clubs and singing clubs, and WM has all that too but I was impressed by how much people genuinely cared, and cared about things that wouldn't benefit them and weren't just trendy causes. Half the kids passing out fliers were in full clown makeup and the longest performance was the juggling club dancing to "Ghostbusters". I did WM and UVA in two consecutive days and it was night and day as far as I'm concerned. BTW there is nothing wrong with UVA, I love it and a lot of my best friends will be going there, but it wasn't for me. </p>

<p>A friend of mine is going to Reed. She is kind of like me I guess, not exactly outwardly quirky but because of how we think and feel about things the people who fit the kind of lifestyle we would want are usually kind of quirky. I like what I've heard about Reed, it's a great school, I wouldn't have gone across the country though personally.</p>

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<p>Glenn Close is a W & M graduate too. One thing I will say is that D was rejected (OOS -- NY) from W & M and it had the nastiest rejection letter. Brown's was the nicest. Happy to say D got into first choice school so no real gripe. Just point of interest.</p>

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<p>Evergreen State, University of Washington...this is really anecdotal but our uber smart goth-y god daughter got into Lewis and Clark and then decided she was jazzed about a program only offered at the University of Washington..ironically she had decided not to consider UW because of it's cloistering home-town provinciality. She had to chill for 18 months waiting for a spot because the school is generally over enrolled.</p>

<p>If you have a reasonably cosmopolitan and decent (note I do not say "elite") state school then just send her there. Creative kids need some time and space and latitude to figure out their niche, and unless you are a millionaire, it's hard to do that when the meter is running. DO NOT make the mistake of some faboo niche libarts school only to be told the only thing that can possiblly satisfy is Egyptian Studies...and that is only available at the local 30,000 students plus state flagship.</p>

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<p>Princedog - I live in central/southern Maryland; W&M and UVa are really popular schools here. Actually, W&M DOES have the more quirky/geeky "reputation" even in MD, but the truth is that is kinda a myth/not the whole story. UVa is the jock, party prep. W&M is the studious prep. At UVa, the frat boy/sorority girl look was in. At W&M, the clean-cut, traditional look prevailed. Because W&M is less of a party school, it is hailed as being "quirky" or "geeky", but, again, I would describe it more as "quaint". You would not find a huge crowd of punks or goths or gay kids (well, gay MALES at W&M are in no short supply) or Super Pocket Protector Nerds at either school. I guess if a "quirky" VA student were choosing between the two, it would really be more of a case of which was the lesser evil. As a unique student myself, I felt totally uncomfortable at both schools, but far more freaked out at W&M, maybe because it seemed like more of a "bubble" due to its size/Williamsburg.</p>

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<p>My goth niece went to Columbia College in Chicago--which I had never heard of-- but she adores. She was a classics, writer kid when she started the college search--but has found her niche at Columbia. <a href="http://www.colum.edu/Academics/English_Department/index.php%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.colum.edu/Academics/English_Department/index.php&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I think Penn State made a pretty decent impression on her too. <a href="http://www3.la.psu.edu/cams/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www3.la.psu.edu/cams/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>She didn't have money worries but I believe both of these were less than the standard $40K year.</p>

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<p>We're in NYC and I know she does and will want to go away, so that's a factor. I believe that we will be able to pay $25k in cash per year and pretty much no more, so she will have to take some loans and earn some. We would be willing to take approximately $10K in loans if she does what she's supposed to do between now and then.</p>

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<p>You could afford Evergreen State with no loans and money left over. It didn't float my son's boat, but it is a VERY interesting place with lots of unconventional students. Matt Groening, for instance, is a grad.</p>

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<p>The LACs people have been naming here are all really good choices, but will tend to be on the expensive side. Hampshire is part of the 5-college collective in Amherst, so it's a lot less isolated than it looks. </p>

<p>One of my son's best friends -- a little goth-y, a great Classics student, and cost sensitive -- will be going to the University of Toronto. Great city, large and diverse university, great academics available (but the student has to be a little bit of a self-starter), and your $25K would almost cover it without aid. You might want to look at McGill, too -- similar, but a little smaller, and in Montreal. Tres cool.</p>

<p>I also second Evergreen State, and raise Western Washington State University in Bellingham, too. A niece is about to graduate from there with a double major, one of which is effectively in nonfiction writing. It has been a great place for a kid who had a lot of difficulty finding an academic home for herself (including 3 semesters at Bard).</p>

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<p>""William and Mary is worth a look."</p>

<p>I agree with UMCP. My eyebrows did an involuntary raise when I read the above statement. Most of the kids I know of who went to W&M were more traditional."</p>

<p>I go to W&M the "alternative crowd" is actually quite strong. Its centered around the Meridian coffee house and most people volunteer to run the house. It makes it really easy to make friends similar to you because no one is going to turn down free labor and then you just hang out with similar people to yourself all day. We also have the Tidewater Labor Support Committee which consists of many of the same Meridian kids and they are very politically active (a little too unrealistic in my opinion, many of my friends are in it though).</p>

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<p>ZM: I didn't realize that you were in NYC. Take a ride up to New Paltz for a day (and enjoy the town too.) You may be pleasantly surprised.</p>

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<p>Isn't there a surprisingly big alternative culture at University of Georgia?</p>

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<p>Got to agree with what gadad said earleir about larger schools - I know that my alternative D had a much easier time finding her cohort at publics or large privates. We're looking at University of Toronto, too (great city!)</p>

<p>If price is a factor, those Chicago schools like DePaul and Loyola run in the mid-thirties, and the rep from Loyola mentioned that scholarships start at a 3.5 GPA and a 27 on the ACT. I know that "Catholic school" and "Goth" doesn't sound like a match, but DePaul is surprisingly edgy.</p>

<p>Mombot, we visited UGA. There are definitely alternative kids there, but my D thought they weren't "alternative" enough (whatever that means- she's not tattooed or pierced, so I'm not sure how alternative she thinks SHE is.) I loved the school, although my D was a little hesitant about the small number of out-of-staters (15%) and the bigtime college athletics (not her cup of tea.) To each his own!</p>

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<p>How about Earlham? One thing my daughter really likes about it is the diversity in the kinds of kids who go there. She says there's "someone for everyone" there. They have a Classics department and a Museum Studies major, and off-campus study opportunities in Philadelphia and NY (and lots of other places too). Also, your D would probably get some merit money from them.</p>

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<p>If zoosersister doesn't view the midwest as toxic, perhaps Beloit would be worth a look! Definitely for the independent thinker (quirky kid) who loves to read (and read and read) and write!</p>

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<p>"If zoosersister doesn't view the midwest as toxic, perhaps Beloit would be worth a look! Definitely for the independent thinker (quirky kid) who loves to read (and read and read) and write!"</p>

<p>She definitely doesn't view the midwest as toxic. Exotic, maybe! She is a reader and writer, for sure. She's not in the least liberal and has zero patience for hippies, so that's going to have something to do with her choices. I am absolutely convinced that finding the right personal fit for her is going to be tough.</p>

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<p>A non-liberal alternative sort--this changes everything! (jk).</p>

<p>I would say that the big diverse universities might be her best bet--not that a non-liberal is not welcome at the "quirky" LACs, just that she might have a tougher time finding a quorum of like-minded folks; it's tough swimming upstream all the time, and most of the quirky schools will have their share of hippy types, which would try her patience!</p>

<p>She sounds like a most interesting young woman!</p>

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<p>"just that she might have a tougher time finding a quorum of like-minded folks; "</p>

<p>Garland, please don't think ill of me, but I'm not completely sure that there ARE like-minded folks.</p>

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<p>Older D graduated from UGA as an OOS. There is a great music scene there and I guess that carries over to other areas, but I really saw it as a mainstream big college football/sorority/fraternity school. My D loved the place, although she was not a greek. How about BU? I'm not that familiar with the school, but just from walking around the campus, it seems like a welcoming place for those who like to take a path less traveled. It seems to be a fun urban campus.</p>

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<p>Zooser, to be honest, she doesn't seem fully baked enough for you to worry about fit.</p>

<p>If it were my kid, I'd worry about her continuing to read a lot, even things out of her current comfort zone, make sure she's exposed to a lot of politically or artistically provocative things (Economist, New Republic, an occasional editorial in the Wall Street Journal, strange performance art, book and poetry reviews in Commentary or the Forward) and leave it be for now. I know several kids like yours-- some of them end up in a college selected solely for its wierdness (or at least the presence of lots of other wierd kids) and it is a terrible fit. Turns out the kids most distinguishing feature isn't being wierd... it's being interested in microcredit or early music performed with original instruments or in public health issues in Alaska among native populations. Since the college doesn't get picked with these things in mind... the kid ends up being a serial transferee or bounces around.</p>

<p>Your kid has many qualities and needs. For all you know, by Freshman year, she could be a happy camper at Georgetown or Denison or Lehigh or U. Delaware (none of which in my mind have a particularly large cohort of "wierd" but have many other fine things going on.) I think it's a mistake to start worrying about fit when you've got a ways to go, and once you start to plant the wierd seed into the college equation, the GC's, the teachers, and your daughter start to use that as the defining filter through which every college related question gets asked.</p>

<p>Wierdest kid I know right now is at Princeton. He's got the wierdest group of friends you'd ever want to meet; they're all fun and charming (well one of them probably has Asperger's-- he's not charming, but he sure is interesting) and none of them chose P for that reason.... each one had other options with a more compelling counter-culture climate, but Princeton was the best fit academically and financially (gotta love their fin aid!) so off they go. And guess what? The academics are just as mind-blowing as they were advertised-- even more so for some of these kids who are exploring fields they've never even heard of- and they've found a niche both socially and in their extra curric pursuits. I don't think anyone worries about what they wear or what they pierce-- even among the eating clubs and the Lily Pulitzer handbags, they've found a hugely receptive group of peers and colleagues.</p>

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<p>" think it's a mistake to start worrying about fit when you've got a ways to go, and once you start to plant the wierd seed into the college equation"</p>

<p>We're definitely not worried about it! We are, however, going to have to do the visit planning a little earlier than most people or even than we'd like, so my hope is that she could get some idea of general locales that we might visit. I'm also completely out of my element here, so I'm looking for information for myself. She will never know about this thread or about CC for that matter. I just want to have information to have a frame of reference if she comes back to me with school names, if that makes any sense.</p>