<p>Hi, I've never posted on here but I'm going to be a senior next year and am starting to figure out where I should apply for colleges and need some suggestions.</p>
<p>I would like to study either engineering or business in college. The size or location does not matter to me nor does cost. I would like a place though with good professors (I've heard terrible things about professors who don't speak english), where students are serious about academics, the library is great, has a good study abroad program and where I can get a good job after college.</p>
<p>I'd like a diverse college. I'm also a Christian so I would like a school with a strong Christian community. The school can be a religious college but it does not have to be (no catholic schools though, I'm a baptist! haha). In addition to that, I'd like a place that has few drug or alcohol use. I want to abstain from use of drugs and alcohol till I'm at least 21 years old (as the law says) so I don't want to be peer pressured (since I don't handle that very well)</p>
<p>As for the surrounding area, I think I'd like to have either a great college town or a city, not somewhere in the middle of nowhere with no town next to it that supports the college. I lean to the right politically and I'd love to have a student body that cares about the issues politically. As for social activities, I love playing sports so intramural sports are a must and a competitive college sports team to watch and cheer for would be great. I'm also involved in theatre and writing for my high school newspaper and I'd love to get involved with a college radio station.</p>
<p>As for my stats, I have a 3.9 GPA on a 4 point scale, I've taken the most rigorous curriculum available at my high school which includes 4 AP classes so far (and I am planning on taking 3 more this year). I took the SAT this past spring and got a 2330. I am pretty sure that I rank in the top 5% of my high school class. I am very involved in extracurricular activities at school, have completed 100+ hours of community service every year and work part-time at a local farm.</p>
<p>Thanks so much for your help! Let me know if you need me to provide any more information.</p>
<p>Sounds to me like you should look at some of the Southern flagship universities, such as UNC. Or Virginia Tech or Clemson. Some of your desires are going to be very difficult to find in one package.</p>
<p>^ I think Consolation made some great suggestions and I would agree that it might be difficult to find a school that meets all your requirements. If you did not mention Engineering, a lot of options would open up including some southern LAC’s like Davidson and Furman, which would meet most of the things you listed.</p>
<p>Look into Cornell University. It is not as far left as most universities and has an active Christian community. Great engineering program. Ithaca is a charming small city.</p>
<p>I don’t know if your Catholic school comment was tongue in cheek but U Dayton qualifies (though there is definitely drinking on campus). They have good engineering and business programs.</p>
<p>Harvey Mudd has much of what you want, but not all. It’s a hardcore engineering school, though, so if you aren’t sure it’s a very bad choice.</p>
<p>[ul][<em>]I would like to study either engineering or business in college. - Mudd is an engineering school.[</em>]I would like a place though with good professors (I’ve heard terrible things about professors who don’t speak english), where students are serious about academics, the library is great, has a good study abroad program and where I can get a good job after college. Mudd seems to have all this - if not the library, there are other schools within walking distance; there IS study abroad but I don’t know how good.[<em>]I’d like a diverse college. - Not so much, I think, depending on your definition of diversity. [</em>]I’m also a Christian so I would like a school with a strong Christian community. - this is bound to exist somewhere in the consortium.[<em>] I’d like a place that has few drug or alcohol use. - This has it, like most schools; however, the school is so hard that drugs and alcohol by necessity take a back seat.[</em>]I’d like to have either a great college town or a city, - I’m not sure about this, but it’s not in the middle of nowhere since it’s an hour from LA.[<em>]I lean to the right politically and I’d love to have a student body that cares about the issues politically. -** I don’t think you’re going to find much activism at any engineering school, but there is a business school and a tree-hugger school in the consortium, so you can find people to agree with or to argue with, depending on your mood![]**As for social activities, I love playing sports so intramural sports are a must and a competitive college sports team to watch and cheer for would be great. - There is lots of intramural sports. The external teams are division 3 and probably not very good. [</em>] I’m also involved in theatre and writing for my high school newspaper and I’d love to get involved with a college radio station. There’s theatre in the consortium and I have no idea about newspaper and radio.[]As for my stats, … I am very involved in extracurricular activities at school - you’d fit right in at Mudd.[/ul]</p>
<p>Texas A&M or Georgia Tech will have much of what you are looking for. But as GeekMom63 points out, all schools have some contingent of students that use drugs and alcohol. It is up to you to join with those who do not.</p>
<p>If you’re interested in both engineering and business, you should look into schools that have joint engineering and business programs. Here are some schools that have that:</p>
<p>UPenn (Jerome Fisher M&T)
Lehigh (Integrated Business and Engineering)
Georgia Tech (Technology & Management Program)</p>
<p>There are more like this, maybe others can give some suggestions.</p>
<p>Let me suggest that you prioritize your criteria. Is engineering more important than business? Is no business a deal breaker, if so, then Harvey Mudd is out because none of the “5Cs” have a true business school. Is a Christian school imperative or will a strong community be enough? After doing that the posters here at CC may be better able to come up with a solution for you.</p>
<p>As Consolation pointed out, finding a school that meets your social requirements along with a strong engineering and business program is going to be difficult. Given your strong academic profile, you should be considering many of the top engineering schools in the country, yet I can’t think of one that matches your religious/social needs, (maybe Texas A&M or Vanderbilt, maybe). </p>
<p>College campuses almost by definition are more liberal than the rest of society. Every school has party issues; I lived two blocks form Wheaton College in Illinois for 4 years and in spite of its rigid policies on drinking and drugs, I witnessed the students consuming plenty of both nearly every weekend. If you don’t want to drink or do drugs, then don’t; I guarantee that at every school there will be other students feeling the same way - you just have to find each other. </p>
<p>I would encourage you to broaden your search to include some of the larger programs, places like Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin for example. Large schools are like small cities, they will have communities of students with similar religious and political interests. The world is a diverse place filled with numerous, occasionally conflicting, peoples and opinions. I would encourage you to get the best academic experience possible and to take advantage of the education that comes from being around different ideas, philosophies and attitudes.</p>
<p>P.S. You can get a undergraduate business minor at Rice but not a BS/BA.</p>
<p>vinceh, thanks for listing some possible problems with what I want:</p>
<p>After thinking it through, I think I would want engineering AND business since I’m not quite sure what I want to do yet (that would take harvey mudd off the list). As for the Christian part, I think a strong community will be good enough. And as for parties, I don’t want to go somewhere where I will feel pressured to drink/smoke. I know that there will be parties everywhere I go but if I can find a school where a large group of people do not participate in the party scene that I can hang out with, that would be perfect. I went to a high school where I didn’t really make many friends because I didn’t go to any parties. I want to go somewhere where that’s not the case.</p>
<p>Ok so a refined list of possible schools:</p>
<p>Trinity University (TX)
Baylor University
Cornell University
University Of Dayton
Georgia Tech
Texas A&M
Clemson
Virginia Tech
Rice
Carnegie Mellon
Northwestern
Michigan
Illinois
Wisconsin</p>
<p>Just to be clear. All schools have a party culture, some more so than others. The bigger the school the more partying you’ll notice - it’s a numbers game after all. The peer pressure you’re going to feel to party is not going to come from the school in general but from floormates and friends. </p>
<p>Just about every college has housing options like quiet floors and substance free living. Combining those living options with tapping into appropriate campus religious organizations and I think you’ll quickly find a group of people you’re happy to hang around with. My recommendation is to create a list of schools that meet your academic needs and challenges first and then cull the list accordingly. Personally I feel that colleges and universities that create “bubbles” for their students do them a disservice. It’s a cold, hard world out there, the sooner you learn to navigate it’s potholes, the better off you’ll be - to use a biblical analogy, Daniel walks into a lions den, not one filled with kittens.</p>