In love with Vanderbilt

Parents Forum
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<p>I am not pretending to be an expert on the questions you raise, mammall, and I don't have any numbers at my fingertips, but Vanderbilt has a top medical school of its own, as well as a law school. It does admit a good number of its own undergraduates to both of those. Ditto Washington Univ. I don't know much about MBA programs. As for doctoral programs, top students graduating from schools like those under discussion have no problems getting into top graduate schools. Even those programs not extremely highly ranked, for instance, engineering at Vanderbilt, place their top graduates in top programs. (MIT, Stanford have taken at least a couple in the last couple of years.)</p>

<p>Now, the partying question. I'd say you and I are on the same page with regard to this--and other--questions. This was an issue for my son. He is very sociable, loves to be with his friends, but is a very serious student and is not a drinker. He visited Vanderbilt a couple of times before deciding to attend, and this is something he was trying to get a feel for. He came away convinced that the campus has a wide variety of students and a wide variety of activities. The drinking is there, but he has no trouble avoiding it or finding company to avoid it with him. (I might also say that if you think attending one of the super-selects, either univ or LAC, is a way to avoid this issue, I think you will be disappointed, for sure.)</p>

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<p>Thanks, Midmo. That's just what I wanted to hear. Vanderbilt keeps drifting to the top of daughter's list. Wash U is also a good one but somehow Vanderbilt is just more appealing. Emory has the CDC (she's leaning toward medicine) but the campus feels too ringed in by the urban surroundings. An intangible I guess. The "well-being factor." We've just felt good both times we visited Vanderbilt.</p>

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<p>I think I can comment on both, my wife and brother went to Vandy and My son is a freshman at Vandy. I live near Emory and have a lot of friends that attended Emory. They are to totally different schools in feel. Both are great education wise, both have great Hospitals associated with the schools and both have great law schools. The difference is Vandy is more internally focused and big time sports and Emory is decentralized and small school sports. Emory students come in and out of campus for classes and Vandy students are on campus 24/7. Not saying it is good or bad just a different feel. You really need to visit both campuses for a couple of days while classes are in progress to get a feel. We visited roughly 12 campus and when my son visited Vandy, he just knew. I imagine the same will happen to you. But I will tell you also most kids will be happy in the end of four years wherever they are. Good Luck!</p>