Your list is impressive! But it kind of hurts my heart that you could see so many schools and not even see one Boston Area school.
Do you hate the Red Sox or something? Lol.
@privatebanker I laughed. Purely, by chance I can assure you. When, I wrote the list, I realized Boston is the giant hole. So many great universities there. One of my daughters did visit some in Massachusetts - Williams, Amherst, and a couple others I forget, (Middlebury in CT) with her mother.
?
Oops, should be a ‘V’ not a ‘C’. (Middlebury in VT).
It could have been Middletown ct and Wesleyan too
Ah, so there were Massachusetts colleges visited, but they weren’t included on the list. The case for anti red Sox bias is getting stronger…
Northwestern vs U of Chicago
is like waterfront property vs courtyard
in terms of the school, like Northwestern better, don’t want to start fire…
@Lynnski You make me laugh too. Obviously, I didn’t include them, because I didn’t go on the visits. My kids went on visits with their mother, that I did not attend.
@Publisher Wow! Your list of 9 includes several of our favorites. All nine are great institutions, that I would personally like to attend, so please, don’t get upset if I am honest to try to differentiate between them.
Since, there are nine, I will break it down into groups.
I’ll start with our least favorite three (again put into context that these are all wonderful institutions and this is just our opinion):
Yale - Wonderful architecture. Reminds me of English institutions. The campus and people exude higher learning. Unfortunately, neither my eldest daughter nor I could get over the crummy, dirty, well-known crime town it runs right into. Too bad it couldn’t be separated from its tough city/town like Wake Forest is. That said, my brother-in-law completed an interesting trifecta of Harvard undergrad, Yale med school, Stanford residency and he swears his best friends in life were those he met at Yale. Would never cross Yale off, if the surroundings don’t matter to someone.
U. of Washington - Seattle (aka UDub) - One of my children applied to and was accepted to UW, sight unseen. We heard so much about the UDub campus, before we flew out for her to make a decision. Unfortunately, it disappointed. First, I am not a fan of Seattle. Many are. Maybe it is me, but it is just too dark, dirty, gloomy, and rainy every time I go. Yes, the mountains and hiking are probably nice. We lived in dry, sunny, mountainous Colorado, so Seattle’s rainforest mountains just aren’t appreciated by us. Second, the campus didn’t meet the hype. I’ve been on a lot of state campuses. UW was not Top 10, let alone comparable to many private campuses. The real kicker for my daughter was dealing with the disorganized bureaucracy. Everything UW does is their way or the highway. It got a bit annoying. She could tell it would be hard to get simple things executed compared to other universities. She decided not to enroll.
Georgetown - What a Washington DC vibe. If one is into politics, then its almost a no-brainer. Discussions in the surrounding area are about DC, DC and DC. I have a lot of friends from NOVA (northern Virginia), so I expected it. The kids did not. The campus is kind of an afterthought, yet so close to wonderful Georgetown (the town) itself. None of my kids are particularly political, so none applied.
Alright, on to your other six we liked a lot.
@bloomfield88: Thank you for responding & thank you for your candor.
I & family members have substantial experience with Colorado (Boulder & Denver) and with Seattle, Washington & with both state flagships. One family member who worked as an engineer for Boeing had difficulty dealing with the weather in Seattle and, after a few years, went back to Atlanta. The other refuses to return to Colorado & cannot be moved out of Seattle & UW despite lucrative offers to do so–even with his current employer.(Our experience with UW is limited to the graduate & professional schools.)
Agree with your observations about Georgetown & Yale.
Looking forward to your comments on the other six universities.
Again, thank you for your candor.
P.S. I just noticed that you also visited Colorado State & the University of Colorado. I have found that undergraduate schools at large state universities can involve a bit of red tape type administration frustration such as you found at UW. Especially noticeable in the UC system & at Penn State.
@Publisher Okay, your next three.
Two Disclaimers (A and B ) to cite possible bias:
A. For whatever reason, four out of the five of us independently gravitated towards private universities in the Power 5 conferences.
Pac 12 - Stanford and USC
SEC - Vanderbilt
Big 10 - Northwestern
ACC - Duke, Wake Forest, Notre Dame and Boston College, Big 12 - not so much
Perhaps, we enjoy the big-time sporting culture, rivalries, hype, love of alma mater, that Power 5 public universities generate, but from a more cerebral academic perspective of the few private colleges in those conferences. I guess we must think, we get the best of both worlds at those eight universities. They tend to be mid-size. Not so small that one feels like one is back at high school and will grow out of the college in 2 years. Yet, mid-size is not so big one feels the impersonal bureaucracy of a 45,000 student giant. Goldilocks scenario?
B. 2 out of my 3 kids are enrolled at Vanderbilt University. Ok, disclaimers over for now.
Dartmouth, Vanderbilt and Duke
Dartmouth: In my mind, Dartmouth is the quintessential private college in the quintessential college town. I love the vibe of both. I cannot say enough good things about this Ivy.
Probably my worst college visit memory was on the way to Dartmouth. My eldest was in about the worst mood of her life when we were flying to the northeast for a basketball camp.
Literally, Daughter: “Where are we even going?”
Me: “Dartmouth”
Her: “I don’t want to go to Dartmouth. Why did we accept this camp invite? What state is it even in? I’m never going to apply or play for Dartmouth.”
Me: Stunned silence.
My father would have smacked me, if I said what she said. She was just like a bad, petulant, spoiled kid in a sitcom and my thought bubble was, “So now we are a princess. I hope this teen phase lasts a day.” Fast-forward 2-3 days later. Basketball camp was over and she walked me outside. She said, “I think Dartmouth is for me.” I burst out in laughter. I was happy to have survived her Kard…ian phase. She loved everything about Dartmouth. She did not shut up about how wonderful Dartmouth is on the plane ride home. “Everyone is so welcoming and nice. We had so much fun. The campus is so gorgeous. Did you walk it? Can you believe the town?”
Duke: I actually like the symmetry of the Duke campus. I also really like how they put dorms on one side and classes on the other. I also like the grounds, the architecture and the campus feel. My cousin earned his Masters at Duke and told me not to send my kids to Duke, because he said it was too snobbish. He told me to send them to UNC down the road. Isn’t that sacrilegious to point someone towards the rival university on Tobacco Road? Anyhow, I did not get that snobbish vibe at Duke. Duke was a keeper for me. My geeky daughter said it was just too geeky and did not apply. I didn’t notice that either.
Vanderbilt: 2 of our 3 kids are enrolled at Vandy. We are totally biased. I feel indebted to Vanderbilt for life. My eldest has built an incredible resume. She is like Forrest Gump there. Every time she makes a decision to try a new path great things fall onto her lap. Her friends are so presentable, ambitious, well-spoken, studious and yet so caring and really cool. The only thing that upsets her is that Fall commences her senior year and she wishes she could stay longer. We toured in the pouring rain and she was still all smiles. The institution is incredibly well run. Her dorm is ridiculously nice. I also like the lack of political bias. Nothing is forced down their throats and they can have grown up civil dialogue with professors and students that is absent at the Hillsdales and the UC Berkeleys. Last year’s student political survey was 1/3rd Democrat, 1/3rd Republican, 1/3rd Independent or politically agnostic. That is true diversity of thought that is sadly absent at many, if not most, universities. Vibrant, downtown Nashville is just down the road, yet Vanderbilt maintains a true suburban campus feel with very green, park-like quads. A lot of college town amenities surround the campus on three sides. Her little sis starts this Fall.
bloomfield88 We visited copious schools as well, and I found it interesting how few on our list did not overlapped. We live in between Boston and Providence and did not fly for visits. My wife visited Wellesley with my daughter, I did the visits at these schools, some were not full tours.
Mount Holyoke
Hampshire
Smith
Amherst
U-Mass
Yale
Connecticut College
Hofstra
Sarah Lawrence
Middlebury
Saint Michaels
Colby
Bates
Bowdoin
Vassar
Hamilton
Skidmore
Emerson
Wheaton, MA
Hobart & William Smith
Went to for events but did not tour :
Boston College
MIT
Stonehill
My list in pretty much in chronological order, and she will be finishing up her second year today, she ended up at the first school we visited, could have saved a little time and money. ; )
Boston Bruins moving on, we may leave the NBA Championship for someone else, we don’t want to be greedy and win all four Championships.
How few overlapped, sorry for the double negative.
@bloomfield88 - Nice to hear your thoughts on Vanderbilt. My son will be starting there in the fall!
@Akqj10 It is ironic that I did not visit a single one of those schools. Oops, I did visit Bowdoin. Well, I am a Bruins and Celtics fan since about birth and we are moving from Singapore to either Boston or Charleston, SC soon, so I hope this Boston crowd takes it easy on me.
@elena13 I hope your son enjoys Vanderbilt like my eldest does. Anchor Down!
That is how we felt about Berkeley.
@bloomfield88 , any impressions of Oxford?
I still can’t quote but wanted to agree with @bloomfield88 and @lkg4answers about UW & Berkeley. We visited both, and had the same reaction to both. My son decided not to apply because of the disorganized bureaucracy & ‘my way or the highway’ attitude. Both are wonderful academic institutions, but it seemed that it would require too much effort to navigate the schools.
I was more put off by the homeless in Berkeley than the homeless in New Haven. No idea why…
Just a sidebar meta-comment that the core idea of this thread isn’t so much agreeing or disagreeing about colleges, it’s why our kids liked or didn’t like various colleges.
And an outgrowth of that is that what appeals to some won’t appeal to others—so no need to apologize if you don’t like, say, Seattle or Boulder—this is sort of a kumbaya thread, where we can all sit in a circle and share our kids’ feelings and reactions and be non-judgy about whether those match others’ kids’ (or other parents’) feelings and reactions at all.