Grinnell vs. Bates

@wyorafter , if Bates is the preferred option (over Grinnell), she should accept the place, pay the deposit, then inform Grinnell that she will not attend. She’ll lose the Grinnell deposit (and that 50% discount on a great education. )

THEN she should evaluate whether she wants to stay on those other WL. If so, do nothing. If Bates seems like a better option than any of those, give up the WL spot.

Should she be offered a spot from any other WL that she prefers to Bates, she’ll repeat the process, this time rejecting Bates and forfeiting that deposit. I would guess, but of course don’t know, that none of those will come with $.

Realistically, unless she doesn’t really like Bates or has her heart set on one of those WL schools, it gets harder to walk away from the school where you’ve committed as time goes on. Housing assignments, "meeting " your advisor and starting to work through courses, meeting classmates at local events… all of this can make it feel more real and harder to leave. Not that it doesn’t happen but it’s why WL schools tend to check in on continued interest periodically.

OP, is there a decision yet?

Thought it might be useful for other readers to share this story about why it’s a bad idea to double deposit. When my D was offered admission to Bates, it was from an AO who had JUST come from the college she had originally planned to attend. This AO was now working at her new college (we discovered this after the fact), and I have no idea if it was checked or not, but it would have taken just a phone call to determine if she had indeed withdrawn acceptance from the other school. (It seems pretty likely that the AO at Bates knew her name from the other college she originally planned to attend.) If she had double deposited at both schools, she would have had both offers rescinded. Scary thought!

@Lindagaf : Re: your post #39 above: I only view the timing of short term as a potential negative as it could bring more joy if scheduled during January rather than in May. Due to poor weather in January & the chance to escape for a month to the Bahamas or elsewhere, short term could be a strong positive for attracting students, in my opinion & in my experience.

P.S. It might be interesting to take a poll of current Bates’ students asking whether they would prefer the separate one month, one course term to occur in January or May.

Getting off track now, but…

@Publisher , stated by my daughter most emphatically, just now: “the fun of short term is enjoying the outdoors. If it was in January, I wouldn’t do it the third time. If I’m going to be stuck on campus in January, I might as well be doing proper classes. Plus the weather in May is better for short term study abroad options.” (Bates allows students to do short term three times if they like. Most seniors do it.)

That’s straight from one current horse’s mouth, anyway. ?

That was my point = to enjoy the outdoors in a different location such as Colorado, Florida, The Bahamas, etc. I went to an LAC that had a J-Term similar to short term & to what Colby College had or has. The options were incredible both on &, especially, off campus.

P.S. One such offering was “People Watching in Montreal” offered as a psychology course.

Pros and cons to both. I don’t know about Jan terms anywhere, I just know that Bates’ short term is very popular. Regardless, I like the idea of either a Jan or May short term. Grinnell doesn’t appear to offer a short term option.

Just saw that Dartmouth admitted zero from WL last year.

Spring athletes love the May short term as it really allows them to focus on championships. Skiers (including recreational) love the Jan short term in NE. Travel study is popular for all of them. Personally, I would pick Jan over May. But never having gone to a school with a short term, I would pick any short term over no short term! It really lends itself to a different kind of study, even if it doesn’t involve travel.

@Lindagaf , I never even suggested that she double-deposit. I merely thought that another poster had and wanted clarification. My daughter has not yet decided, and we have a call scheduled today with them.

No worries, @wyorafter . It’s information that benefits other readers. There are lots of people reading this thread who aren’t commenting (over 1.4k, it would appear.) You’d be surprised at how many people don’t realize you aren’t allowed to double deposit.

Smith College in Northampton, MA has a 3-wk January Interterm. Campus is open and students can use the time to investigate a special area of interest; to participate in courses, activities and conferences at Smith and other area colleges; to do work in libraries, museums, laboratories, etc.; to participate in internships; to work on research projects; or to enjoy the facilities of the campus at a more leisurely pace. You could also use the time to extend your winter break for travel, etc. As an alum, I can say I really liked this calendar a lot. Interterm sessions were great and with classes wrapping up in mid-May, I wouldn’t have valued the 3 wks in the summer the same way I enjoyed them in the winter.

I recall at Massachusetts we had a “W-inter’session”. It was great. Knock off a few credits or take a focused tougher class.

“OP” here again to say that she’s been given until mid-week to decide. Meanwhile, now has a voicemail from Wesleyan, which I neglected to list earlier as a waitlist for her. AARRRGH. You know, out here in the rural Rocky Mountain West, this stuff all seems somehow theoretical… but to those of you active on this board and living on the east coast, it kinda seems like a sport… I mean, it’s not like we’re not taking this seriously, for Chrissakes. We spent two nights in F-ing Ottawa plus one in Canton New York on Easter weekend just in order to rule out St. Lawrence after riding on six airplanes. I could write a book about trying to make up for geographical disadvantages in the college search process. (I’ve been drinking…)

I’m in a similar geographically challenged location. We took a trip to the east coast and had time to visit 4 schools. Costly and a major logistical undertaking. And of course he is headed to a different East Coast school this fall. Although it was still a worthwhile trip, he learned a couple places he didn’t want to go and I found a couple targets for D21.

If, as you indicated in post #28 Bates was 5th on a list of 5 waitlists (or 6th on a list of 6 waitlists, now that Wesleyan has surfaced as a possibility?) I’m not sure why it’s even an issue.

To my mind, Grinnell is a better school than Bates. It is highly respected among academics, has some very unique programs supporting research and mentorship, and has one of the largest endowments found among LACs.

Were both schools to be full pay, Grinnell would be my choice; the scholarship makes Grinnell a no-brainer over Bates.

That brings us now to Wesleyan, which I would I would say lies somewhere between Bates and Grinnell, depending on the area of interest. If your D is interested in the arts (film, theatre), Wesleyan might get a slight nod over Grinnell. If your D is interested in the social sciences, Grinnell would get the nod. Again, the scholarship would make me more inclined to pick Grinnell over Wes, but your D can’t go wrong with either.

Hmm, I’d put Wes above both of them, if the finances work.

@wyorafter
I for one would love to read your book!
your sense of humor reminds me of an old time CC poster from 2006- crumudgeon, whose tales of what he and his DD went through during the whole college application process- had all of us old timers in stitches in !!
BTW- his DD, as well as my DS, went for the $$, and both have never regretted it.

It is the reality that WL offers are very short lived. If a student does not REALLY want to go to a WL college then he/ she needs to decide quickly so that others can have a chance.
My advise, and those of others who know of Grinnel’s multiple strengths- continues to be- pick Grinnell.
But I want to read your book!

Totally agree with @LoveTheBard. If your D is interested in the sciences, Grinnell gets the nod as well.

@Lindagaf I will raise my hand as someone who only found out very recently that you can’t deposit at two schools. I just never thought about it until I read it in the letter my S received after he made his deposit. Obviously it makes sense.

Wow, Wesleyan too! She has great choices. OP, how does she feel about Grinnell though? Is she hoping for something “better” than Wes, Bates, and Grinnell? I’d still choose Grinnell, due to the money.

I have to offer a defense of Bates, because I feel that it’s being bashed somewhat. Bates and Grinnell have similar outcomes post grad. Both see 5% of grads go on to fellowships (scholarships), Grinnell has higher rates of students going to grad school, Bates has higher percentages going into work. 91% of Bates students who applied were accepted to med school, whereas it looks like 80% of Grinnell grads were, (though maybe I read that wrong?) Bates comes in #4 in Fulbright scholarships, and Grinnell is #26. It depends on the list you look at, but Bates is ranked more highly in several (showing that rankings are not very meaningful, haha.)

Bates can never come close to Grinnell’s endowment, or that of many other colleges. Historically, Bates graduated working class men, women, and African Americans, all people who were never (back in the day) going to earn a lot of money to donate to the school. So no, it doesn’t have some of the top-notch facilities that other colleges of its ilk have. But it’s not a second rate school by any means.

Anyway, it doesn’t seem that OP’s daughter is inclined towards Bates, which is fair enough. With the wonderful scholarship she’s been offered, there is still nothing that would steer my child away from Grinnell.

@LoveTheBard wrote:

Wesleyan is most emphatically not somewhere between Bates and Grinnell. Wesleyan is almost in a category by itself. It is nearly twice as large as either Bates or Grinnell and is the only one of the three that isn’t located in a remote part of the country. Middletown is not New York City nor is it Philadelphia or Washington, DC, but, Connecticut as a whole is one of the most densely populated states in the nation and Middletown is one of its traditional county seats. That translates into dozens of restaurants, a waterfront, and all sorts of civic activities - including a hospital - all within walking distance of campus.

A slight nod for arts? Okay, now we know we’re dealing with a Grinnnell booster. But, let’s move on.

Social Sciences? As of last count, Wesleyan has two alumni running for President, John Hickenlooper (read his autobiography, “The Opposite of Woe”, where he devotes two chapters to Wesleyan and Middletown), and Michael Bennet, the senior Senator from Colorado.

Not sure where this is coming from. Wesleyan is one of perhaps two traditional LACs that awards STEM degrees all the way to the doctoral level (the other is Bryn Mawr) This translates into millions of dollars in tax-supported research, the highest both nominally and per capita of any LAC in the country (okay, maybe that title toggles between Wesleyan and Wellesley from one year to the next). And, because all Wesleyan professors teach undergraduates, the demand for interns is constant and ongoing (i.e., not just during the summer.)

I would definitely add the Wesleyan W/L to the mix.