Loved Furman’s beauty. S got offer from Furman for football. Loved the sports team for entering D1 football it seems totally do-able. Facilities for football amazing. Coaches and friendliness of the coaches amazing. The campus amazing. It has a very high acceptance rate yet oddly every place I look online said classes are rigorous.
I’m concerned socially for him. Seems like its a very small school student body. We took the tour and mid day on a Friday there seemed to be barely anyone walking around campus. It might be because the campus is so large and spread out. He is a good-looking 18 year old guy he is going to want to date around. Superficially thinking but we were there for hours walking around campus in and out of dorms and in buildings and saw literally one pretty girl and this is South Carolina!!
Academically it seems like he would get such a great education. Football for a kid coming out of high school being able to play d1 does not seem daunting. But I worry honestly about the social aspect. Is it dead on campus on the weekends? What do the students do for fun? I like that Greenville is close. Need real answers. What kind of social life would Furman provide? Do people tailgate at all at Furman… at least for bigger name games? I noticed there is a high percentage of athletes at the school do they hang together? He is not a big partier but he will want to do things occasionally besides just study and football.
Clemson I think is a good overall school but it would mean completely dropping sport. Love the campus. People seem friendly. Has the frats, sororities, things to do, big student body to meet people.
Hate to rule out Furman just concerned. Furman was great with both football and academics. Social life looks like it might be totally lacking.
My 2 Ds graduated from Furman (and they are quite pretty btw) and they had a full social life, along with strong academics in their chosen majors, and lots of extracurricular activities, internships, study abroad, and research. But, I’m not sure the experience of anyone here (or their children’s) will help that much. Furman and Clemson are both good schools with a lot to offer, but they are very different. I would suggest your son do an overnight at each school if he can, because he can get first hand information from current students about the campus social life and answers to any other questions he might have. And make a pro-con list. If playing football is very important, well he’ll have to go to Furman to do that. If a large pool of pretty girls is important - you’ve mentioned concern about that aspect at Furman in 2 posts - well Clemson has about 15,000 more students than Furman, so the odds are with him that there will be more pretty girls. :).
But in all seriousness, factors such as cost, major, desired extracurriculars, may not be equal for your son at these two schools, so writing down the pros and cons at each school for what he wants out of college may make his decision clear to him.
I think it also comes down to how important is football. If it is a super high priority then there is the answer.
For only one year my ds attended a high school of 1400 students. At the end of the year he broke up with a very popular girl he had been dating. The response and “newsworthy-ness” of this among the student body was enough to make him realize small colleges would not be for him. He was shocked people cared about the breakup. So I understand your concern.
Downtown Greenville is a lot of fun. I went to Clemson and like that it has its own little downtown next to campus but I don’t think social life will be a problem at Furman.
Current Furman student here, I’ll address your questions point by point just to be succinct…
-Campus was probably dead on a Friday afternoon because everyone was probably out and about off campus- lots of people hike Friday afternoons, get a nicer lunch or hang out with upperclassmen in North Village, now that rush is over. Around 6 or 7 is when things pick up and people get ready to go out, or will plan a movie night, go DT etc.
Football isn’t huge, but definitely well attended during the season. The football players were clique-y at the beginning of the year, but as the year has gone on everyone seems to mingle a bit more. I’ve had football players is 3 of my classes this year and they’re all great guys. There are tailgates, but nothing like you would see at Clemson- they’re super fun! Football had a great season this year, so everyone got super hype for every game and travelled to away games.
I tell every prospective student that I meet through lunches that Furman is not a 4 year party- Furman is just way to expensive/ rigorous to party away, but there are off campus frat parties/ bars downtown that students frequent. School spirit isn’t just sports here; there are awesome opportunities for undergrad research, volunteering in the community and engaging in area around Greenville.
That being said, I completed 10+ AP courses in high school, and I find Furman to be a rigorous academic environment- there’s a reason the library is a hot spot for students lol. I find the social life to be a healthy mix for myself… I recently went to Bama and realized I was super uncomfortable with the big school social scene, so I’m really happy with my choice to attend Furman. If possible, have your son do an overnight. (preferably not on a Sunday, many of my Sunday overnights have been a mixed bag) Furman and Clemson are polar opposites so it really comes down to what your son is looking to get out of his college experience and what environment he would thrive in.
Also, don’t worry about a lack of girls… there are plenty, and I would say we’re a pretty attractive campus as a whole
Thanks for all the information from a current student!! Great stuff…
Sounds like maybe we didn’t see the full picture on our tour. It was a Friday and when we did the golf cart tour of the whole campus and walked around a bit I just kept thinking its noon and Friday and where are all the students?! The school is beautiful and calm, I think my son might get a great education however he did well with not much effort in high school has a very quick brain so he will have to change his ways I’m guessing at Furman. I really like the idea of professors knowing students and having influence on their lives that is amazing. But, I don’t understand how they have such a high acceptance rate yet everything I have read online is that the work is very rigorous? This school was way easier to get into than most of the schools he applied to and yet most people up North have no idea about this school doesn’t have the name recognition but I guess that is true of most private expensive small colleges though.
I do agree with your comment about Alabama going there. My son went to U of SC to visit my daughter went there and while he had fun I think he would be overwhelmed since his is not much of a partier. My son is social but is not a rager under the table drunk and the other big rah rah schools I think he would feel out completely out of place. The price tag is a killer but I’m hoping next year he will earn a scholarship with football if he works hard.
And yea he is def. going to want to date always has some cute girl around him…so hopefully there are plenty…
Following this thread for our S19 who is thinking about adding Furman to the list. Does it feel conservative or are there a mix of views on campus? Not sure if that’s important to the OP but maybe Furman and Clemson are different in that way because Clemson is bigger and there’s more likely to be all different types of views versus a LAC where there may be a leaning to the right?
@homerdog Furman is on D19’s list. We recently attended a Saturday Showcase where there was a student panel. I was very concerned about it being too conservative for her as she is very liberal. There was a young man on the panel who spoke about coming out as a gay man at Furman. He said the reason he stayed at Furman was the love and acceptance he found among the students. He is very involved in their diversity efforts. The most interesting thing was watching him interact with another student who would be your typical small-town southerner (he was a religion major to boot!) They were joking and talking to each other through the whole discussion. Pretty much everyone said that Furman was a place where they found a community that accepted them. They also all talked about volunteer work and Miss Nancy who ran the volunteer office. My D19 liked the school and it is at the top of her list.
