<p>My kids is a geek and makes friends best with kids who like anime, Magic card games and cosplay. What are the colleges, preferably east of the Mississippi, with the largest geek culture? Thanks.</p>
<p>Is this a senior, applying for next year? If so, what are his or her academic chops? The brainiac-techy colleges will all be geek-friendly, but they are very competitive. Most large public universities will have their own geek sub-cultures, for the students who aren’t into Greek life, but some kids who want the geek scene might not be comfortable at a huge college. The advantage of larger schools is the pool of students that can support these activities, even if it’s small in relative size to the rest of the campus. A few other small, liberal arts colleges are known for eccentricity and nerd-friendly cultures. On East Coast, they might include Bard, Bennington, Warren Wilson, Goddard, New College of Florida, St. Mary’s (Maryland), Eugene Lang/New School, and even hipster havens like Emerson where you’ll find filmmakers interested in these activities. What are this kid’s academic interests? More arty or more techy? </p>
<p>Start by looking at the big factors – size, location, selectivity, and cost. You can narrow down from there.</p>
<p>Once you’ve made a list of reasonable length (say, 30-40 colleges) with the above four factors, start looking through the list of clubs at each school to narrow down further. Are there clubs devoted to Quidditch, SCA, D&D, etc.? If so, how many, and how popular do they seem to be? Are there themed dorms that would appeal to him/her? (For example, Reed has a gaming hall and a sci-fi/fantasy hall.)</p>
<p>■■■■■■■■■■ is another potential resource, especially for larger cities with lots of colleges. You can browse to see how many geek groups are in a college’s vicinity and how well-attended the events are.</p>
<p>My son is huge into MTG and he is a junior in highschool. He plays 2-4 times a week and there is a club at the high school. Through his friends we have learned that Ohio Wesleyan, case western and stevens institute of technology all have clubs. As I look ahead for him, I google MTG with the name of the town, to find active stores. One campus located all the “table top” games together in their clubs. It is sooo important to him, that when he finalizes a short list, he will need to make sure that there are ACTIVE clubs.</p>
<p>My son is a big MTG player and also plays some DnD. I can’t help you with looking for schools with a heavy % of geek culture people. But just about any large U will have an adequate number of geeks, especially if they have lots of engineering, STEM, and design majors like my son’s large state U.</p>
<p>For any university son was interested in, we use Google and looked for adjacent or very nearby gaming stores that have Monday Night Magic and FNM, comic books, etc. Had to be close enough for walking, biking, or an easy bus ride. His university has 3 nearby options for MTG playing. Any school without that was eliminated.</p>
<p>His university also has an MTG club that meets weekly but the big tournaments and events are at the local stores so he does that instead. They also have a cosplay and anime club on campus. Just make sure that the clubs are active, lots of colleges and universities list clubs on their websites that either no longer exist or do very little.</p>
<p>Is he interested in girls? </p>
<p>Girls can be fun to be around but a large percentage of them are allergic to these pursuits. Many tech schools that are gamer friendly have distorted male/female ratios.</p>
<p>Just a potential counterbalancing factor to consider. Large schools should have both active clubs and more balanced M/F ratios, if that is of interest.</p>
<p>My kid has learning disabilities and is not an academic superstar. But he is a hard worker and wants to succeed. We are looking at colleges like McDaniel in Maryland and Curry in Massachusetts because of their support. So, the brainiac schools will not be good for him. Any thoughts on schools?</p>
<p>But, yes, he is interested in girls. The kind of girls, though, that would not like the geek culture would not like him for other reasons, so we are not afraid of that issue. Thanks for all of your help.</p>
<p>There was a similar thread that may be helpful.</p>
<p><a href=“Best colleges for geeks, NOT nerds? - College Search & Selection - College Confidential Forums”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1550443-best-colleges-for-geeks-not-nerds.html</a></p>
<p>Try
Rochester institute of technology
It sounds like a perfect fit for him </p>
<p>How into it is he, and how immersed in that will he want to be in college? Most colleges - even small colleges - will have a geek sub-culture, no matter how unlikely it may seem. I went to a historically black women’s college and found a thriving (small) anime club made up of students from the consortium (so co-ed) who liked cosplaying and going to conventions; they overlapped with the Japan Club, who studied Japanese language and culture, and these were my J-pop heads who traded new J-pop news and music. (Admittedly, though, my college had a Japan studies minor and that was one of the reasons I selected it - so that might have had something to do with it). And I found plenty of geek friends who wanted to get beat down in Smash Bros. But I also had tons of friends who weren’t into the geek sub-culture at all, and I did other non-geeky things with him.</p>
<p>I think a lot of people will assume that techie, “nerdy” schools are likely to have lots of geek kids there, but geek culture is actually pretty diverse and I wouldn’t assume that you’ll find a large group of dorks of a particular kind just because a school is ‘nerdy.’ There are different types of nerds. I’m a self-described geek (see above interests) but I have never played Magic the Gathering and am not interested in magical card games or tabletop (D&D), and there weren’t a lot of people in my geek circle in college who were into that either. You might get LARP dorks at some schools who think anime is weird (perish the thought!!).</p>
<p>And your kid may want friends of both kinds and may be happy with a small niche community or even just going to college in a medium to large city where he can meet other geeks and maybe attend a con or two locally. Going to grad school in NYC was very nice because of NYCC - didn’t even have to fly! Atlanta has Dragon*Con and lots of small colleges.</p>
<p>I agree with @ssteven2015 I am familiar with RIT and it has a very good regional reputation, and I have heard that they have a good percentage of geeks there.</p>
<p>@Juillet Funny that LARP dorks are making fun of other dorks. haha</p>
<p>Look at some of the Colleges That Change Lives, not only will there most likely be support for his LD but also a very accepting mix of kids. My daughter goes to Knox and, while not east of the Mississippi, has everything he is looking for.</p>
<p>Knox is east of the Missippi, albeit not so much!</p>
<p>Thanks chatsmom, I was too lazy to look it up! </p>
<p>You’re welcome @amtc. I grew up in Illinois and now my D is applying to Knox this year. When we visited over the summer, I spent a lot of time looking at the map for travel logistics!</p>