<p>This thread has gotten beyond ridiculous into tedious. It should be locked or whatever it’s called. You loyal “smithabees” and “smithies” continue to rise up to the bait of the “■■■■■■” and “trolettes.” No mas, por favor. Last I’m posting or even looking at this one. I’m going to spend the rest of the day releasing my birth certificate to prove I wasn’t born on Mars. BLAAHSHSHSHDLDISH:SFGIFHS:S:F:SFS::FSIFSD:FNM<<DD. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Yes, I agree, this is just getting silly. Though I don’t recally calling anyone outrageous as the OP claims that I did (I don’t recall doing anything that the OP claims that I’ve done, but maybe I have Smith-induced amnesia). I also think it’s funny that Schmaltz said they were leaving forever, but are clearly still reading avidly. </p>
<p>We should just stop feeding the ■■■■■■, they’ll wander away and find other areas to pillage.</p>
<p>I think I would take the Smith Open House Experience to the literal physical pawing and lascivious comments I received while being on the Dartmouth campus for a summer session and, stupidly, again for Winter Carnival. </p>
<p>I also think that these Open Houses, like the college visits, are of limited, accurate value. I think of the kids I know who visited Cornell on an exquisite Spring day only to transfer because of raw winter weather, in isolated upstate New York, and a real objection to the social climate, there, as well.</p>
<p>It’s funny how much weather really can influence a college visit. I remember when I went to Bryn Mawr to was raining and gray and awful. And then when I went to Smith we had beautiful sunny weather. I always tried to work harder when I was tour guiding in bad weather, to out-work the rain.</p>
<p>Bossf51, I second that e-motion. Enough already.</p>
<p>Ditto - Momwaitingfornew can this be locked?</p>
<p>“A real woman always keeps her house clean and organized, the laundry basket is always empty. She’s always well dressed, hair done. She never swears, behaves gracefully in all situations and all circumstances. She has more than enough patience to take care of her family, always has a smile on her lips, and a kind word for everyone. Post this as your status if you, too, suspect that you might be a man.”</p>
<p>–a quote from I don’t know where. Gender identity questions can be fun.</p>
<p>This thread does not meet the threshold for locking it. It is relevant to the discussion of Smith (even if not all of us like what it says), and it has not devolved into a slew of personal attacks, even though some posters are coming close. </p>
<p>The best thing to do is let it rest so it will sink to the bottom, then disappear altogether. And if people want to keep bumping it, as long as people don’t violate the Terms of Service, that’s fine, too.</p>
<p>Wow, this is quite a thread.</p>
<p>Four years ago I hung out on this message board, trying to figure out where my daughter should go to college.</p>
<p>Naturally, people try to figure out what the “best” college is that their child has a chance of getting into. I fretted about SAT scores, GPAs, ECs, U.S. News rankings, etc.</p>
<p>Then I read a post on this message board that really changed everything for me. This person said that every school has a culture, and you should figure out what that culture is, and whether your child fits. For instance, if you read or observe that a school is extremely serious about academics, and that the students are very competitive, then you should decide if that’s a fit…not if that school ranks higher on the US News and World Report rankings.</p>
<p>So, after that, I started looking at the school newspapers, the Myspace postings (no Facebook back then) and the school calendars to see what kind of culture there was at the different schools, what they were interested in, what was important, what was big outside and inside of class, etc. I really wanted to find a school where my daughter would walk in and go, “This is me.”</p>
<p>That said, I THINK THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT THREAD. If I knew nothing about this school, I would definitely want to know that some peoples’ impression is that it has a strong lesbian component.</p>
<p>It’s not about being homophobic or anything. I don’t think people should be “silenced” if that’s what they experienced or observed. This is important to know, just like it’s important to know that a school is a “party” school, or a “serious” school, or a “Greek” school, or whatever. Even if it means you want your kid to go somewhere outside their comfort zone, it’s still information that should be out there. Obviously, no school is black or white, there are always shades of grey, it should still be mentioned if a school has a certain component that is prevalent and makes a mark on going to school there.</p>
<p>I would definitely want to know this about any school.</p>
<p>From what I have observed (my niece went to Smith) the lesbian influence will have some sort of affect. Although this is anecdotal, of course, it had a huge affect on my niece. Apparently there is a joke about the “four year plan” at Smith (being gay for the 4years at Smith) and about girls cutting their hair the first year. This is not true for everyone, obviously, but it is true for some, and should be mentioned.</p>
<p>Someone on this thread said, "My daughter entered Smith as a relatively shy teenager and left a confident, outgoing woman. " Well, my daughter went to a different school and experienced the exact same change, so it’s not that simple. </p>
<p>My advice, as a parent with a kid who is graduating from college this year, is figure out what the culture of the school is, including the academics of course, and find a fit. Tune out everything else.</p>
<p>I think that it’s sound advice to find a school that’s the best fit, I doubt anyone on this board or on CC in general would say otherwise, but I also think you’re unlikely to find out what the culture of a school is based on some vitriolic comments in one thread on a message board. You have to read widely and draw from a lot of sources, including people who attended the college/had daughters attend the college, versus people that were just there for one day. </p>
<p>So for example, you shared the anecdote about your niece, but I would say that, based on my four years of experience at Smith, girls who cut their hair short or who explore alternative sexualities as students aren’t suffering and a “lesbian influence” so much as just expressing who they are. College is a time of learning and exploration, otherwise what is it for. Those same girls might have very well done the same thing at any other college and that college would not have been labeled as a lesbian influencer. But since they were at Smith, people make assumptions (I think wrong ones) that it’s because Smith is some kind of bubbling pot of lesbian tension. While we have a very active and visible gay community at Smith, one of which I am very proud though I was not a member, I don’t think you can say that the culture of Smith is “lesbian influenced” based on just one visit or knowing just one student. What you could say is that Smith is a place where young women are encouraged to be themselves, even if who they are is changing all the time or is somewhat out of what others consider the social “mainstream” or even if it’s dead in the center of that stream. It’s a place with a lot of freedom and, in my experience, a minimum of judgment. I don’t think that to have that qualities it has to ascribe to a particular sexuality.</p>
<p>Just started reading this thread and am NOT going to read through all 13 pages of posts…it occurs to me that the op is a ■■■■■. Otherwise, why not just walk away from Smith? It’s obviously not a good fit. </p>
<p>D and I visited a LAC that is regularly ranked in the top 10 and neither of us could get off of that campus soon enough- one student guide giggled continuously and acted “ditsy,” while another was dressed in a torn t-shirt and slept with his head on a table prior to the tour (we thought he was a prospective student!) The campus facilities were like a country club. We also generally observed (by our subjective standards) that the parents of other prospective students were on the upper end of the socio-economic scale, were pushy and bossy toward their young adult children, and pretentious in the comments they made. So what’s my point? D didn’t even apply to that school: she didn’t like the environment or the students. Not the right vibe. We simply chalked it up to “glad to know that before applying.” Now, just within the past year, I met a parent in our local community whose son attends this very college and is as happy as a clam. </p>
<p>There are many, many excellent colleges with environments that hold potential for meeting your D’s needs- focus on those! Good luck to you.</p>
<p>I agree with Twiglb that this information, as skewed as it may be, is important to know for prospective students and parents. My daughter’s high school guidance counselor asked her upfront, before she applied to Smith, if she had any issues with seeing openly gay couples. I actually appreciated the heads-up because then my daughter wasn’t surprised by it when she first visited the campus and later because she had time to determine that it didn’t matter to her. But she has a cousin who would have left on the first day – and an aunt and uncle who would have believed that Smith was a piece of Hell on earth. It’s all a matter of perspective.</p>
<p>From a parent whose D just chose Smith:
</p>
<p>Young women of different types mixing comfortably. Imagine that!
Less talk about partying! What <em>do</em> all those allegedly unserious students talk about then?</p>
<p>All the rest of the post, too. See the “Tough Decision” thread.</p>
<p>Hi, don’t mind me, just drawn in as someone mentioned my alma mater (whose weather “rawness” is basically same as Smith’s, BTW, comparison was not being made there but just saying in case one might be left with a different impression…)</p>
<p>IMO, OP is (I asssume) legitimately and appropriately posting his/her impressions and experiences there, for readers to give due consideration. But then illegitimately and inappropriately, IMO, extrapolating that small snippet of experience to represent some greater truth about the overall experience there, as if that was some statistically significant sample of the experience there and not the small snippet that it actually was. And ignores the experiences of people who have spent, or closely observed, four years there and have a different take, from this broader perspective, than this one snippet afforded the OP.</p>
<p>I agree that it is quite important to discern differences in prevailing campus cultures and figure out where you fit. To do that, I think you have to visit yourself, talk to people, read and listen to all the accumulated individual snippets, and comments from those who have been there. Then, taking them all together, come up with a composite viewpoint that seems the most likely representation of reality. I don’t think it is wise to just dismiss the perspectives of people who are actually most familiar with the place, following long periods of observation. I don’t think one should just completely dismiss the snippets either. Just put them all in your pipe, and smoke it. So to speak. But it must be recognized that all observations are not based on the same depth of experience with the place.</p>
<p>OP saw what she saw and it’s absolutely fine that her D’s decision be informed by that experience - - even if it’s just as snippet. After all, that’s all you get from a campus visit (even an overnithg) and most prospects do extrapolate and do understandably put more value on the limited first-hand experience than reports from student, parents, alumnae. How many schools have been dropped from the list b/c of a bad visit, or shot to the top of the list b/c the prospect identified with the tour guide? In that regard, OP and her D are no different than any other prospect family. What I believe most posters found troubling was the tone of OP’s posts.</p>
<p>To FP & MD: yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. It was the “Fox News (sic) tone” that was not only troubling but infuriating as it was misleading.</p>
<p>A snippet??? Two visits to the campus. Discussions in depth with a professor who has been there for years. Conversing with numerous students on campus who have been there and were not afraid to express their true feelings. Speaking in depth with a senior who is living off campus. Researching the school for hours online. Attending classes. Making observations beyond the hype. These add up to more than a snippet. Perhaps there is some relevance to the US News and World Report ranking of Smith as 33rd for Graduation and Retention Rank when otherwise it was ranked 14th. Could it be that many students who begin attending there transfer elsewhere or simply drop out of college? Perhaps the “fit” was not looked at closely enough by the student and parents before the decision was made to attend Smith. Perhaps the obsessive defenders of Smith convinced many students to attend Smith when they should have gone elsewhere. Again, the purpose of the initial post was to simply tell parents and students to dig deeply to find the right fit. Such a fit may be found at Smith or elsewhere.</p>
<p>Don’t all students live on campus? Including seniors?</p>
<p>“Perhaps there is some relevance to the US News and World Report ranking of Smith as 33rd for Graduation and Retention Rank when otherwise it was ranked 14th.”</p>
<p>No, they simply have a lot of Pell Grant students. Want high retention? Get rid of them. Harvard did. It worked, too. The single most common reason folks leave college is finances/economic emergency at home. (The number to look is “expected retention, relative to actual”). I think if you look at the USNWR data table, you will find that all 32 colleges that have higher retention have lower (usually much lower) percentages of Pell Grantees.</p>
<p>But good luck to you and your d. There are hundreds of really fine colleges out there, and I’m glad you found it this one isn’t for you or her.</p>
<p>Some students get permission to live off-campus, but unless you are an Ada Comstock Scholar, such permission is very difficult to obtain.</p>