<p>*Ursinus is 5 min drive from my house
*l can not sign up for Lehigh interview or campus tour (too late), Lehigh really doesn’t like that (especially for someone who lives 50 mins away).</p>
<p>@MYOS1634 Do you know what I can do instead of a college interview? Can I do a student interview/tour? Should I call the admissions office at Lehigh and ask them? I want to give Lehigh a chance because F&M felt really weird. Downtown Lancaster is considered a huge paradox in my area, and I felt as if I was in a decently sized city when I was in Lancaster, which is really weird.</p>
<p>OP, I still think your mom could be nixing this commuting idea. This is not a good idea, and in fact it is not as safe as staying in the dorms. </p>
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<p>@jkeil911 I try to convice my mom to live on at the dorms (she thinks I’m too young to make adult decisions).</p>
<p>In the dorms, you won’t be making that many adult decisions. She can remove partying from the equation by having you stay in a substance-free dorm, and you won’t be responsible for cooking, paying bills, cleaning the bathroom, etc. However you do have to start making your own decisions, since you can’t jump from being a child to being an adult. She won’t be there when you get your first internship, for instance, and it’ll be both trickier to handle and much more “dangerous” for your future if you have to handle both a first job’s responsibilities and adult responsibilities AT THE SAME TIME for the first time. Residential exist for a reason - they promote growth in a way commuting doesn’t.
(Is your mother, by any chance, from another country?)
In addition, on campus residences have directors, resident advisors, etc. You can check into residence life if you wish - some schools may even have one RA per corridor and special sessions organized for freshmen.</p>
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^This is very, very true.</p>
<p>You can email Admissions and ask if you can do a tour (at least, sign up for one and DO show up!) Also ask if they can put you in touch with a student with a similar background.</p>
<p>What about Dickinson and Muhlenberg? Apply as a residential student there. DO NOT plan to commute… It’s a really bad idea. College students routinely have study groups till 11 or 12 at night, and you’d have to return home afterwards, for instance.</p>
<p>You are planning to take the train 5 days a week? You will probably want to be there on weekends to see your friends, study with them at the library, have fun, etc.
Try to be realistic with your planning!</p>
<p>@MYOS1634 yes, she is from another country (20 years living here, but she lived at a dorm when she went to college). She is very nervous about me living at a dorm because of all of the horror stories she heard (about 2). I telling her that 100s of millions of students have hitherto gone through this process, except that I’ll LESS THAN 1 HOUR away from home. According to the net price calc., all of the room & board bills will be covered by a Lehigh needs based scholarship, so it would be better financially to stay at the dorm (vs. fuel, car depreciation, insurance, possible hospital & body shop bills, other car consumables/parts, tires, stress, traffic, being late, driving on the Lehigh Valley hills in the winter, etc). @naviance I do need to be more realistic with my planning. I have a friend who takes the 1+ ride to Temple everyday, and he is starting to really hate it. The only difference will be that I’ll be taking amtrak for 40+ mins, 20+ drive to the train station 1st, and 1 mile walk to main campus…if I were to go to Franklin and Marshall, vs. him taking public transport train straight to main campus 5-10 min drive to station, 1 hour trip to main campus (train). </p>
<p>Tell your mom that 1° financially 2° safety-wise and 3°for your academics living on campus will be better. Don’t do that to yourself - and your freshman FA with room&board will be the basis for your subsequent FA,
You can tell her you’ll ask for the substance-free dorm. This way, guaranteed no partying (anyone who parties in the dorm is automatically kicked out) but no danger on icey roads in the evenings. And if she says you ought to be back at 8 or 9pm… that’s just not the way it goes at college. Many study groups take place 9-11pm, and review session are either 7-9pm or 8-9pm (or 8-10pm). Who would want to do that? Not to mention that your academic performance would suffer with so much travelling.
Final point: your mom raised you to be a decent human being. So, she has to trust that what she taught you won’t be forgotten in September. She has to trust you. And now is the time.</p>
<p>It’s time your mother allowed you to grow up. We have a friend (also from another country) who tried to keep a tight rein on her daughter and her college choices. Her D ends up keeping a lot from her mother. </p>
I’ll be doing Lehigh (final decision) for ED2 (just say’n since it goes with the subject of the discussion), and I can live in the dorms (hopefully).
Oh, for Bob Dylan’s sake, there are a TON of serious students at Lehigh, my alma mater. There was a pre-med on my freshman hall, and my roommate was dating a pre-med, both of whom did extremely well and went on to get their MDs. (and mine wasn’t even a “quiet hall,” which they also have) There definitely was a very active social life, but it was all a matter of who wanted to party and when. Yes there were people who partied too much and either straightened up their act or failed out. That happens at every school!
The studious types (and ALL the pre-meds fell into that category) stuck to their study schedule, and went to the library known for great study atmosphere, not the more social one. There’s absolutely no reason you can’t live on the campus and get a lot of studying done, there are plenty of people doing exactly that.
I think your other reasons for choosing F&M are valid, just wanted to point out that there will be parties on any campus, and students’ success or failure rests with THEM. If you want to live on campus, choose a quiet hall and you’ll be surrounded with many like-minded students. Good luck with your decision, sounds like you’re on the right track.
I’d be inclined to apply to any and all schools as if you were going to dorm, and then make that decision later.
Just wanted to add to my reply above that I never toured or interviewed with Lehigh (this was a couple decades ago, so YMMV), my first experience with the campus was arriving there with my boxes! With six kids my parents couldn’t afford for me to visit any campus that was not local, so that was that.
@Trisherella did you ever go to the “quiet halls”? If so, how were they, compared to your [normal?] type of hall?
Nevermind. Bucknell and Lafayette are really starting to interest me. How does Bucknell compare academically to Lehigh exactly (I have heard about the us/Forbes rankings and accept rate, etc stats)?
I thought you decided to apply ED to Lehigh.
Anyway, IMO and in the opinion of most people I know Lehigh, Lafayette, and Bucknell are all pretty similar in terms of academics, reputation etc…
@happy1 yeah, that’s what I thought for sciences, aside from Lehigh’s massive microscope lab, which is why I’m still applying ED2 to Lehigh.
@indubitableDan It seems you are not completely sold on Lehigh, so it surprises me you are applying ED there.
@dadof1 you are correct. My mother recommended me to go to comm. coll. or any school nearby, so I could get my feet wet then go on to college, where I would do much better and know what I’ll be majoring in & be more passionate about it. The thing is my stats, http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/lehigh-university/1723258-lehigh-ed2-chances.html#latest, are fairly impressive (above-average), so me doing what she recommended is out of the question. Despite this, I will listen to her about staying close to home; therefore, I only applied to schools within a 2.5 hour drive of where I currently live (I’ll stay at dorm though). A major reason in picking Lehigh over other schools was the beautiful campus, humble surroundings (shady to some), most financial aid with net price calc (I know ED hurts this), and microscope lab. Now my match school that I would love to go to would be Gettysburg (for many reasons), but I honestly don’t care where I go for college. As long as I get a good education and make many connections (better at prestigious schools), then I’ll be delighted.
^^is there a reason you are applying ed with all of the associated ramifications?
@dadof1, yes. One of the common app questions was “why lehigh?”, and I think that I did a stellar job answering it.