<p>I met Nido Qubein this weekend in San Diego. He spoke so highly about his school that I almost wanted to go there myself. My daughter will be applying to UNC next year, and frankly we never considered HPU, but maybe we should look at it as a safety school. How would you compare it to ECU.</p>
<p>There is a long recent thread about it:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/554943-anyone-visit-high-point-university.html?highlight=High+Point[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/554943-anyone-visit-high-point-university.html?highlight=High+Point</a></p>
<p>A safety school for one person is a match or reach for another. It all depends on your D’s stats really.</p>
<p>Thanks for guiding me to that thread, gadad. The posts suggest that the campus is beautiful, the tuition is expensive, the kids are pampared, and the As are easy. Having never been to the school, I am not sure if that is a fair discription.</p>
<p>I was interested in HPU’s recent newsworthiness, so I went to the website and then googled Mr. Qubein. He is undoubtedly a remarkable and accomplished person, but I have a degree of unease about a university being reinvented by someone best known as a motivational speaker.</p>
<p>Pres. Qubein’s bio on his website notes “He is often acclaimed as a motivational speaker who comes from a tremendously successful business background. As a result, he walks and talks business while uplifting his audiences with success and proven experience from the entrepreneurial world.” Students certainly require motivation and colleges - especially private ones - are surely businesses. But in the food service and hospitality business - Mr. Qubein’s background - the customer is always right, and the product adjusts to the desires and whims of the client who is offering the money. Higher education lives on a slippery slope in which student-centeredness is critical, but student satisfaction is not always possible or even desirable. Pampering and easy As would certainly be popular, but a truly great learning environment requires stretching students’ comfort zones, which almost always involves a degree of discomfort, frustration, and struggle. Teaching students to embrace the struggle is a key part of the long-term benefit. But perhaps if you can do that in a beautiful setting with free ice cream, then so much the better.</p>
<p>I’d rather go to a spa than a fitness center, and I’d rather have a massage than do bench press repetitions. But at the end of the day, the fitness center would do me more good, while the benefit of the massage would be offset by the ice cream I consumed during break time at the spa. The same principle is at play above the neck too.</p>
<p>" Having never been to the school, I am not sure if that is a fair discription. </p>
<p>If you’ve never been to the school, why do you think that the admittedly unflattering, but first-hand descriptions from the other thread are unfair or inaccurate?</p>
<p>I don’t know anything about the school, but I have been to High Point and it is a very depressed area with shuttered downtown stores and general seedy air. I don’t know how close the school is.</p>
<p>A saftey school should be somewhere where you would like to go.</p>
<p>We have been over this before. To be fair, UNC and HPU are not the same school in what they do and how they do it. Nor do they attempt to be. One is a flagship state school which admits essentially the top 10% of instate high school kids (and some minorities further down the ladder), and the other is a private institution that is a “wellness” kind of place, emphasizing building one’s self image, and focusing on the whole person, not just the brainiacs. HPU is not for everyone. But it is an amazing and somewhat unique place. For kids who go there (and some UNC graduates who work there in admissions!), its a refreshing experience aimed at making everyone a success and leader. For people who are more motivated by high calibre high pressure intellectual course work where its sink or swim, HPU is not for you. </p>
<p>No school has to follow one model of how to “do higher education.” Nido is a motivational speaker by profession. Its his bag and his mission. Great! For many kids that is PRECISELY what they need to get a kick in the rear and off to a great start in the working/business world. Its a feel good kind of place. No morose reading of existential poetry taught by some left wing nut with a Phd and a grudge on their shoulders. That isnt what HPU is all about. (Nor UNC…though those kind of classes and professors DO exist there.)</p>
<p>Applying to HPU is a conscious choice for precisely what is has to offer. If its not your bag, that is okay too. But no need to compare it unfairly to Georgia, UNC, William and Mary etc. I have been to HPU campus several times. Its NOT what my oldest kid was looking for, but it may well be what my middle kid is looking for and needs.</p>
<p>HPU is NOT expensive by private school standards. Another thing they do nicely is get rid of this ridiculous separation of charges (a legal fiction) between “Tuition” and “Room and Board.” Everyone knows the money goes in the same kitty and the university spends it as they see fit. So HPU just has ONE charge, all inclusive…and that means EVERYTHING including laundry service. Its cheaper than many of its peer schools who are also private. But yes, its more than a state college.</p>
<p>I would not attempt to sell it to anyone who would be illsuited to go there, just as I would not sell William and Mary (a high stress school by all accounts) to someone ill suited to go there. Its not one size fits all. </p>
<p>To answer the OP’s question directly, I would suggest that she visit the campus and interview students and maybe some professors. Yes, its a great safety for many kids. And one never knows how admissions works out. Though if your kid is in the top 10% of their high school class come next December, the chances of getting into UNC are fairly high, if the SAT score is also where it needs to be (above 50th pecentile…and approaching the 75th). </p>
<p>I am a big fan of HPU for what it does for those students and families that it serves, and serves very well. Its a stunningly gorgeous campus. </p>
<p>As an alternative to HPU for a safety, there are other really good LAC’s in the NC, SC, Va. area, including UNC-Asheville. </p>
<p>Just my two cents.</p>
<p>And Queen’s mom: Not all of High Point is seedy and shuttered. HPU is just off of Highway 68 which runs from Greensboro to Highpoint and is a major thoroughfare. The campus is safe and well lit and heavily policed. Some of the areas nearby are somewhat blue collar, but that doesnt make them unsafe or bad. In fact, I would strongly suggest to you that Durham is much more unsafe and seedy than High Point would ever dream of being. Duke sits in the middle of a nasty part of Durham. Yale is in New Haven, which by most accounts is not very clean or safe. Its all relative.</p>
<p>
If your D is like most NC applicants, then UNC-Asheville would be a more logical and considerably cheaper safety. UNCW is also very good, although obviously quite a bit larger.</p>
<p>If she wants a private school on her list, I recommend Guilford. Possibly Elon as a safe match.</p>
<p>“As an alternative to HPU for a safety, there are other really good LAC’s in the NC, SC, Va. area, including UNC-Asheville.”</p>
<p>Endlessrecession:</p>
<p>I would be curious as to your thoughts regarding other schools in the region that would serve as an alternative to HPU as a safety?</p>
<p>Riggo:</p>
<p>depending on your stats and interests they would include UNC-A, UNC-W, UNC-Charlotte, USC-Columbia, Wofford, Elon, James Madison, Virginia Tech, Clemson, Elon, Guilford, NCState, College of Charleston, Randolph College, Charleston Southern, Citadel, Furman, ECU, Sewanee (Univ. of the South)</p>
<p>the list goes on and on…different shapes, sizes, and academic rigor. It all depends on you. But there are many. And some small schools too like Presbyterian, St. Andrews, Lenoir Rhyne.</p>
<p>HPU is very unique in its mission and experience. </p>
<p>What are you looking for, what are your stats?</p>
<p>I’m currently a student at HPU and some of what has been said is true, and some not. I went to a top-50 high school (nationally) where they prepared me extremely well for college life. The work load, in my opinion, is easy, but in other classes it’s quite the opposite. Just because the work load can be light doesn’t mean you don’t learn. In my history class we have had very little actual homework, about 5 quizzes, and a book report, but I have learned more in that class than most of my friends at other schools. In other classes, my work load is heavy (about a 5 page paper every other week with homework just about every night). My teacher isn’t a crazy nut with a PhD, but he provokes thought every class and dares us to be bold with our thoughts and papers. Dr. Qubein does give us a lot, but what people don’t see is in the classroom. He teaches a seminar class that meets once a week that gives the students the lessons and tips for life that they need to succeed. He opens up a lot of opportunities for us and every parent who visits is nothing short of impressed. </p>
<p>As for as the grades required to get in, I know people who applied to schools like Philly U, Drexel, and Elon, but also kids who applied (and got into) schools like UVA, Clemson, Syracuse, and Wake Forest.</p>
<p>Thanks citykid! It’s great to hear from a student. My D is a very serious and well-qualified student and right now HPU is #1 on her list.</p>
<p>My son is a freshman at HPU this year and loves it. He chose HPU over Richmond, Furman and Elon because of the culture on campus. Everyone including students and faculty (staff too) are friendly, caring and looking for ways to ensure your success. The school is drop dead beautiful with over $400M haviing been invested in the last 5 years and there are many more plans under way. I couldn’t be more proud of his choice and am a little envious of the tremendous opportunity he has there.</p>
<p>My son has been accepted at HPU as well as several other great schools, and he plans to attend HPU. I am a Wake Forest graduate, and we visited schools from Wake to The Citadel to UNCW and Elon. My son found my dear WFU stuffy and pretentious, but walked on HPU campus and said “I’m home.” It is very important to find where the student will be successful, and not fall for a name. Just because a student can get into a high pressure, well known school does not mean they will graduate. Many kids drop out or transfer because they start with the wrong school, thanks to mom or dad. As a business professional I was impressed by the cutting edge technology and forward thinking faculty and staff. The business world is changing exponentially. Learning how to thrive in a business environment is more important than making an A in an esoteric history class. I liked what I heard and what I saw at HPU. It may look like a spa, but they are teaching the best practices of corporate America.</p>
<p>Being a Business Finance major and transferring into HPU, I couldn’t agree more with your post eatonl. </p>
<p>From talking to professors, HPU really knows what it is doing. They are headed in the right direction.</p>
<p>Excellent post eatonl; thank you. My daughter’s experience rivals your son’s when he set foot on campus. More compelling than the pristine campus was the people and the mission. The rest of our college visits paled by comparison. Mind you, we have over 30schools - many are “name brand” - within a 15 mile radius of our home, yet we drive 8 hours to HPU and it’s well worth the trip. </p>
<p>Plus, I could not agree more with your philosophy of education. IMHO there is much ado about nothing when it comes to “name brand schools”. In my travels professionally and personally, my impressions are formed by the person and not by where they went to school. HPU’s holistic approach to education is authentic and visionary. It is exciting to be involved with this rising star. Welcome!</p>
<p>eatonl and MMAMom…my son had a similar reaction to HPU. We also did the college rounds and once he set foot on the campus, he was sold. I was a little concerned that it was because of the beautiful campus or the ice cream truck but he actually had a less superficial reason–he said it just “felt right”. My older son went to a small LAC about 3+hrs away from home and was extremely homesick. He ultimately finished the year but then transferred to a school closer to home. Having seen the pain my older son went through he was a little concerned that he would be 6+ hrs away from home but one night after thinking about it he said that he felt more at home at HPU than at any of the other schools he was accepted to even though they were much closer to home.
The school is definitely on the “up and coming” list in my opinion and I’m glad my son found it. He too plans to major in Business and feels, as do I, that HPU will prepare him well for the business world, personally and professionally.</p>