Hello!
New to this site but already learning a ton. This is our families first experience with the college process and we are getting nervous deciding which school. My daughter had her heart set on either Villanova or Lehigh but unfortunately was waitlisted to both. We are now down to deciding between the 4 schools mentioned above. Out of the 4, Muhlenberg is the one we are least familiar with but seems to be at the top of my daughter’s list. Anyone have children that are already students there or who can offer some feedback about schools reputation. Truthfully never heard of it until this process began. Daughter planning on pursuing Psychology and eventual Pediatric OT career.
Thanks for any and all advice!
In terms of prestige, Dickinson, and Carlyle is very hard to beat as fun, safe college town.
Muhlenberg is a very good school as well. Strong in sciences. The new science center is impressive.
To me between these two would come down to fit and finances.
Dickinson isn’t that much more prestigious that a very good deal from Muhlenberg should be passed up.
I have visited both schools twice and would say I found them both excellent. Muhlenberg definitely has a more urban edge and the food is much much better than Dickinson’s. If you don’t think food is important now you will learn the hard way when you see what kids eat and how much money is spent when they dont like the dining hall food.
Dickinson has a much more homogeneous student body but both have substantially more women than men.
How heavily are the finances weighing in on the decision? How much more does your DD prefer the more expensive schools over the least expensive? Unless money did not matter at all, if it’s truly something that isn’t that important to the student, I’d go with in state Binghamton over the others due to price.
Don’t get me wrong, it would be great if she decided on Bing, which is substantially less expensive than her other two choices. However, my husband and I decided that if they made the grades, we would take care of the rest. Bing is a great school, only real drawback is the distance and no family even close by. We have family in the Chambersburg and Warminster PA areas so I think she feels a little more comfortable with the PA schools.
My son liked Dickinson much better in terms of the focus on education abroad and international students. He did nto apply to Muhlenberg, but my older kid got substantial money from Muhlenberg but decided it was just too much like high school. I would not say Muhlenberg is more diverse than Dickinson. Dickinson is ranked higher, but not sure if the difference is significant. Some kids like the small schools, but find it harder to do internships or get jobs than at a bigger school.
What about Fordham? It is a university and not a LAC and a bit bigger.
I would urge you, unless the money is truly sitting there, to consider finances in your choice. None of these schools is substantially “better” to not consider. OT grad school is costly as well.
I know Muhlenberg and Dickinson pretty well… Fordham a bit and Binghamton not at all. Muhlenberg and Dickinson are both very good LAC’s of pretty similar size. Muhlenberg has great statistics for getting their students into post graduate programs. I have found the people at both Muhlenberg and Dickinson to be friendly and helpful. Fordham has a different feel. It is a city university. The new freshman dorm at the Lincoln Center campus is very nice. I suggest you take some time while the schools are in session and do the official visit if you haven’t yet. When you are done with that part I always suggest you hang out and get a coffee, talk to everyone all around you. The students, the staff, the professors and baristas, everyone. Sit and watch the community. See if your daughter can picture herself fitting in there. In my experience our kids know pretty quickly if it seems like a good fit or not. Best of luck to you!
Well, then it comes to personal preference. We let our kids pick, sometimes they picked wrong, but that was their call. If she likes the vibe of a small town LAC, M and D are the ones. F is a whole other environment being in NYC and having such great access to Manhattan. Binghamton is a mesh of the three, IMO. The city is not anything close to a big city but much more than Carlisle or whereever M is.
If I kid decides he/she will work harder and enjoy it more and complain less… Of course it ahs to fit the parents pocketbook or they will complain more, will need to work harder and enjoy it less ( BU Freshan DD here)
Mulenburg has an excellent rep as pre-professional school great area and near lehigh
If you can afford all 4, I’d cross out Bing. it’s less personable and she’s got either big city or charming college town as possible location choices.
Between Muhlenberg and Dickinson, Muhlenberg has a GREAT theater program (great if she wants to watch, less so if she’s a part-timer who likes to act as she wouldn’t be in productions) and good for sciences, Dickinson is very strong in foreign languages with a cultural focus, international /study abroad, and science.
Fordham has a strong core curriculum (17 required classes including philosophy and theology) and is in the city.
Is a visit possible?
Thank you all for the input! We live in NY and have visited Fordham a few times. She likes it but feels it’s just too close and really wants the whole dorm experience. (I sympathize since I was limited to choosing a school that I could commute to, NYU) Truthfully at $16,000 for just R & B and us living about a half an hour away seems kind of silly and wasteful. She didn’t have that “feeling” when we went to Bing for Accepted Students day even though my husband and I thought it was perfect and big enough without being overwhelming. Negatives were distance and weather. We have yet to visit Muhlenberg for Accepted Students day but my fear is as someone mentioned, it’s not much bigger than her current high school. Current High School Senior class about 325 kids, expected Freshman class at M, in the 500’s, same thing with Dickinson. Aaaaahhh, if she was accepted to either Villanova or Lehigh rather than wait-listed, either would have been perfect. Sigh…
A college “feels” very, very different from a high school of the same size. First, because you have all the different departments that no high school has - expect 30 to 40 majors instead of a high school’s customary 6 to 7; each with at least 4 or 5 professors, often MUCH more, each with an office, plus the department staff and their offices and machines, plus areas for students to gather or work together in each building. Then the labs for the professors to conduct their research. The various classrooms, from small discussion to large lecture hall. Dickinson has its own cinema on campus in the foreign language building I think. Then the libary, which is nothing like a high school libary. Then all the dorms. Then the cafeteria(s), the post office, the on campus store, the student union, the place where people gather for large concerts of convocations; the administrative offices, the president’s building, the president’s house. The study abroad office. The Admissions’ Building. The playing fields, varsity facilities, intramural gyms, the pool. Sometimes, the chapel, the Hillel House. The quad(s) and the college gates.
It doesn’t “feel” the same as a high school at all. 
My S went to Fordham and had a great experience. We live a half hour away, he dormed there and it was absolutely not “wasteful” in our eyes. He had a full campus experience and gained as much independence as he would have had he gone anywhere else. In addition to living in a dorm, hee had a city experience as opposed to his suburban upbringing. We had a long talk before he chose Fordham and we agreed not to “call and stop by when we are nearby” and in turn he agreed not to “show up with his laundry”. He basically never came home other than school vacations. I didn’t ask him to come home for anything other than school breaks. It was helpful once or twice to have him nearby – ex. when his laptop died I drove down an old one we had for him to use until his got fixed (he took care of getting the repairs done). We found no downside (other than it is expensive) to his living on campus close to home. If you have any questions about his experience you can PM me. PS He ended up at grad school halfway across the country!
I did look at Muhlenberg and Dickinson with my D who wanted a LAC (she ended up at a different one) and they are both fine schools. I think it really comes down to fit as each LAC seems to have a different “vibe”
If there are any doubts, I suggest you go to accepted student days at her top choices. Doing that really helped to solidify my S’s final choice in his mind.