<ol>
<li><p>Is this a good school for sciences and math?</p></li>
<li><p>What is the campus/surrounding town like? Social life related things?</p></li>
<li><p>Do they have an honors college. And if so how hard is it to get into the honors college and what is that like?</p></li>
<li><p>What are good stats to have to have a good chance at getting in?</p></li>
<li><p>Any cool things to know about the school?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I went during the Carter Administration, so take all this with a grain of salt:
It is a very good school for sciences. There is a brand new Science building and a superb cadre of teachers. Can’t comment on math.
It is very isolated. That’s what attracted me to the place. There is an insular, cohesive community feel to the place. The nearest anything is Clinton, which is a 25-30 minute walk down a steep hill. It’s a nice tidy upstate NY village with a pretty downtown and a few bars. The nearest city is Utica, about 10 miles away. There’s a good sized town, New Hartford, about 5 miles away. Syracuse, the nearest larger city, is 50 miles west. It is, in other words, in the middle of the middle of nowhere. The campus is absolutely gorgeous. The prettiest college campus in the country! So, virtually all social life is student-generated. I never felt anything lacking in my time there.
No honors college. It’s a small school (1700 students). The whole place is an honors college.
Not sure of the “stats”. It’s pretty hard to get into the school. The vast majority of kids there are in the top 10% of their HS class. Average SAT’s in the mid 600s to lower 700s, I think.
Cool stuff? The novel, “The Sterile Cuckoo” was written by a Hamilton grad named John Nichols. It portrays life at a college very much like Hamilton in the late 1960s (before even my time!). It was made into a big Hollywood movie starring Liza Minnelli. Much of the movie was filmed on campus. Watch it and see if you agree that it’s a stunningly beautiful place. The movie…meh.</p>