<p>Am quite thankful to have recieved the thick envelope from Vassar, among such great company. However, i have gotten good news from several other liberal arts schools, including Scripps College, Carleton, Macalester, Tufts, and Barnard. </p>
<p>I am very interested in american studies and in political science and in community health. i love (creative) writing and musical theater. i want to dance (beginner level) and play badly at intermural basketball (never have before). i want to make the world better. i want to make a difference for one person. i'm shy more than i'd like to be. i'm not a partier, but im not snobby about it. i just havent done much letting loose. i'd like to. i take pride in my work, but i dont like competition. i am DESPERATE for CHALLENGING CLASS DISCUSSION.</p>
<p>Will i have a problem if i dont drink?
is the stereotype that vassar students are intese misguided?
is life in poukeepsie siffling at times, in its limits? how frequently might one get in to the city?</p>
<p>please, share the gritty details, the horror stories, the facts literature doesnt expose.</p>
<p>does vassar seem like a good fit for me? obnoxious question- i am well aware. it pains me to ask. but i want to make the right decision. thanks!</p>
<p>Hello High Hopes,</p>
<p>I'm afraid I can't tell you too much about the Vassar experience, but I can tell you a little bit about the Poughkeepsie experience, and to a larger extent, the Hudson Valley experience. We lived there for 6 years when my husband worked for IBM. The campus is beautiful, as I'm sure you've been told, though it isn't very large. Poughkeepsie is a smaller industrial type town, not really unpleasant, but not very remarkable, other than it is right next to the Hudson River, which is remarkable. </p>
<p>Dutchess County has a long history of being a bucolic retreat for the gentried New Yorkers. When we lived in Hyde Park, NY, the Roosevelt Mansion was a mile south of us, and the Vanderbilt Mansion was a mile north of us, and the Ogden Mills Mansion was another few miles north of that. Of course, these mansions are all museums now, and other than some larger homes in the Millbrook area, there really aren't any of these old-fashioned estates in the area now.</p>
<p>The countryside is absolutely stunning. I wish I could have bottled it and taken it with me when we moved to Texas 13 years ago. The high cost of living, though, was easy to leave. The high cost of living does have a social effect on the community, though, in that I think the regular people are more stressed than the average community because making a decent living seems to be so difficult. Socially, our family didn't blend well in the Hudson Valley. The local community is generally very tight and reserved. Open friendlliness is rare, though of course this is a generality and there are some lovely people and we did make some very good friends over the years.</p>
<p>There is a train to NYC, though, I really never liked big cities, so I only visited NYC a couple of times. If that is important to you, I think you would find the train convenient. I believe it is something like a 90 minute train ride to downtown.</p>
<p>Good luck with your decision.</p>
<p>"Will i have a problem if i dont drink?"
Not at all. My sister goes to Vassar, and she doesn't drink at all, and it definitely isn't a problem.</p>