WAY UP – University of Puget Sound, which I recently toured with S23 for the first time ever. We are more or less just starting the college search for S23 and despite many years in the PNW I had ignorantly lumped UPS together with the religious schools in this area that all share the same letters (PLU, SPU, UP, SU…) and never even glanced at it for S21. (It wouldn’t have mattered since S21 had a strong preference for the northeast.) Anyway, S23 and I both came away very impressed by UPS. Stunning campus; gorgeous setting; set apart from but well-connected to both Tacoma and Seattle by various transit options; good dining, shopping and recreational activities nearby campus. From arrival to departure, there wasn’t a single discordant note during our visit. Most importantly though for S23, UPS offers a business program within a small traditional LAC, plus it has a mens rowing program. S23, like his older sibling S21, wants to continue rowing in college. The UPS rowing coach met with us for nearly an hour after the official UPS tour concluded and S23 was smitten by the entire experience, and I admit I was too.
UP - Bates College, where S21 is a current freshman. It may not be in the spirit of this thread to give impressions of a college one is already enrolled in, but S21 had never set eyes on Bates before the August move-in. I myself finally visited Bates the first time for Family Weekend earlier this month and was thrilled to find S21 as happy as he had hoped to be. He has friends elsewhere who are less than happy, so we feel lucky and relieved. DH and I took an official campus tour (no building interiors, unfortunately) while S21 was unavailable, and we found the campus pretty and intimate but not too small. The campus exudes an easy friendliness, a pleasant relaxed vibe. We also found Lewiston a nice little city if not glitzy, and not blighted as portrayed here by some posters. Baxter Brewing is a new favorite of DH’s and I mention it because it is one example of the repurposing/revitalization of Lewiston’s brick industrial infrastructure underway. We also found it an easy 2+ hour drive from Boston where we can fly direct from homes in both Houston and Seattle. DH and I coordinated our arrivals into Boston, picked up a nearby Zipcar and headed north.
My visits to Bates and UPS took place within a week of each other and the two schools struck me as being far more similar than different.
Impressions from past college visits that moved the needle, up or down:
UP - UT-Austin. We took both S21 and S23 on an official tour of UT-Austin in the fall of 2019, as one of our state flagship schools and my undergraduate alma mater. Neither was enthusiastic about this tour and both were insisting they would never go to college in Texas, but then both came away from the tour excited about being a Longhorn someday. We scored the perfect male tour guide in a laid-back, sharp and witty Communications major. The UT-Austin campus fairly hums with a high energy positive vibe, and I fell in love with UT-Austin all over again alongside my boys. (Alas, neither will become a Longhorn after all. S21 obviously chose Bates and S23 has a snowball’s chance in hell of getting in.)
UP - Whitman College, which I toured with S21 early on. Like others I initially discounted it because of its remote location but we very much enjoyed the campus and tour and found Whitman and Walla Walla to be a charming oasis in eastern Washington. I can’t really comment on the vibe because we toured in June after most students had left for the summer. If my boys weren’t rowers, Whitman would have been very high on their lists.
DOWN - Lewis & Clark College, which I toured with S21 and one of his friends from Texas. The friend from Texas did like it, applied and was accepted, but ultimately matriculated at The New School in NYC. This was just not a good fit for S21, too much of a hushed, dark PNW vibe amplified by the heavily forested (beautiful) campus. S21 himself is quiet and reserved and needed a campus with a more outgoing vibe.
DOWN - Reed College, toured on the same trip as above. More edgy dark PNW vibe but without any of the relaxed/sporty types that soften the edge at L&C. This school was just way too serious for either kid. I can see how this is a fantastic niche school for uber-academic types.
DOWN - University of British Columbia, it was too big, too impersonal, too much (which is my impression of Vancouver BC as well despite wanting to like it and visiting numerous times). I toured UBC with S21 during the Feb 2019 Int’l Student event (Presidents Day in the US) and S21 was very interested before arriving but left feeling meh. No complaints about the tour or leaders themselves and we sat next to a wonderfully informative faculty member during lunch, but the overall impression was of an immense impersonal commuter school. In any event, the international unis we were considering before the pandemic like UBC (and Leiden and Erasmus, as DH works for a Dutch company) fell off our lists pretty quickly when international borders were closed for a second time in twenty years.
DOWN - Harvard, which S21 had set as his goal college in middle school, despite the absurdly long odds even for high-caliber students. We did an official tour in 2018 and even though we hit the tour jackpot with picture perfect weather and a guide who was both pre-med and on the mens rowing team (exactly like S21), my son walked away knowing Harvard wasn’t a good fit for him. And we could immediately see it too since S21 is a quiet dark horse never seeking a spotlight, whilst his fellow tour members were students who obviously thrived in the spotlight and practically clamored for it. Good for them, it’s not a criticism. It’s just a wholly different type of kid from S21.
