<p>Front page feature in this morning's Phila. Inquirer. Some interesting numbers, worth a read. Also a link (very bottom) to college visit advice.</p>
<p>It's a good article. Students need to know they can transfer if they don't like a place.</p>
<p>The story of the girl who transferred the first week of school was a little much though!</p>
<p>A girl my daughter knows left McGill after 2 days.</p>
<p>What was wrong with McGill?</p>
<p>I don't know. She just didn't like it. Maybe she was talked into it by her parents because it seemed like such a good deal when you paid the tuition with American dollars. She speaks fluent French too because she lived in France as a young child.</p>
<p>Girls we know left Lafayette after 1 day.</p>
<p>Don't think it had anything to do with the school more the realization that she was a long way from home.</p>
<p>I wanted to leave after 2 days. And after 2 weeks. And after 2 months. But now that I've been here a whole semester, I'm pretty darn sure staying was the right decision. I know that transferring is sometimes the right choice, but I hope that kids don't act too quickly when all they need is some time to adjust and find their niche.</p>
<p>A friend of mine's daughter found something wrong with every school she visited. One weekend, the family drove 2 hours to visit UC Davis and as the family was getting out of the car, the daughter told them they could all get back in because she could see that the school was not for her. The reason: gazing out over the campus from the parking lot, she saw "too many blondes" and she was sure she would not fit in. LOL. My friend realized then that her daughter wasn't quite ready to move away. She went to cc for two years and graduated from UC Santa Barbara -- which I think is pretty funny considering the earlier concern over "blondes" at UC Davis.</p>
<p>I can identify with the "too many blondes" complaint. Thirty years ago, my objection on my one and only campus visit was all the guys with beards. I decided college wasn't for me and joined the air force instead, which in retrospect was a little rash. While transferring is an option, I would recommend students give it a year first in most cases.</p>
<p>I know a student who left school on the same day she arrived! She got in, the parents packed up and drove her to school, but she refused to stay. They came back home a few hours later. That may be a record! The driving took longer than the entire college career.</p>
<p>I second what elizabeth22 said. I'm pretty sure that staying put was the right choice. Yes, there are still a lot of things I don't like (the drinking, Greek life, and the snobby preppy unable-to-think-outside-of-the-box kids) but I've made a decent group of friends to hang out with which makes things easier. Although, sometimes, I do catch myself daydreaming what it would be like if I had gone to UNC or Elon, both of which would have been much, much cheaper and I would have had a lot of my high school friends to hang out with...or if I'd been accepted instead of waitlisted at three other schools that I applied to...oh well. There's not too much I can do about it now, except transfer, and I'm not sure that transferring would really fix the things I'm unhappy about.</p>
<p>I disagree. I think the mother of the girl who transferred out of Millerville in one day was a wonderful parent to let her do so because the Mom said " all she did was switch schools " It is not a crime and the earlier the better ( saves all that withdrawal penalty money ) . I remembered feeling quite lost when I started at Elmira College as a Freshmen. I had two years of a prep boarding high school so homesickness was not a problem . I was out of there by the third week . When I was at Elmira ( and also visited freinds at Ithaca the same week ) , I realized that a lot of the kids were so wild and quite "free " with dope , booze and boys in and out of the rooms . It was an unsupervised high school atmosphere , away from their parents . I will always be grateful to my Mom ( for mental health sake ) who did not press the issue and I was at another LAC more suitable for me by that January .</p>
<p>Interestingly, while I was seriously considering transferring (and not telling anyone in my family except for my parents), my grandma told me that more than half of the country's college students don't graduate from the same place that they entered in as freshmen. Of course, that's probably mostly due to CC transfers. But you get the idea.</p>
<p>Staying for a year is really the best way to go, especially if you've worked so hard to get into college. I'm glad that I didn't drop out mid-semester like a friend did. That would've been a huge disappointment to my parents and postpone my graduation date (unless I wanted to take summer classes). </p>
<p>Did I know that Smith was the right fit for me? I didn't until I got there on my first day. After the orientation, things just didn't seem right. Not like when I did an overnight in April and the previous fall where I stayed with caring hostesses. It looked so great on paper until I really saw the campus for myself. I was too focused on the literature and brand-name not to see that I would ultimately leave. Also, I never took travel into consideration at all. Yes, my mom had to stay overnight when she came to visit/to pick me up. My dad had the guts to drive all day. Still, I was frustrated at not being able to come home when I wanted to, especially that I was already unhappy. Also, I wasn't aware of the extremeness in the campus culture...</p>
<p>But you know what? Sometimes freshmen are stuck with the college offers that they ultimately have- not getting in any dream schools. Smith was just the best choice out of three offers that I had. So I took that and said that I'd give a chance.</p>
<p>Distance became a factor in my transfer in addition to other things- I looked in schools within easy 2-3 hours drive for transfer. Now that I'm 2 hours away with a pretty drive, it's not a problem for anyone to see each other in my family. We're much happier now because I'm happy and they can visit without much planning in advance (which I didn't like to do at all when I was at Smith- too much stress!). I'm sure my brother's taking that into account now as he's looking at colleges.</p>
<p>I know that my decision was a rational, thoughtful one and absolutely right because I was anxious to get back on campus after such a long January break! :)</p>
<p>I know one girl who left her school before classes started ... and ended up at community college for two years before transferring to a more local school. </p>
<p>I know another who, after two weeks, realized that she didn't need to be close to home, and would have preferred to go to college 3/4 of the way across the country. She transferred to the far away school (she'd been accepted there, and turned it down in favor of the more local school) at the end of her first semester and is very happy.</p>
<p>A third girl had a very bad experience within the first few weeks of freshman year. She stuck it out, but transferred after freshman year to a 'better' school, without the bad memories. </p>
<p>These things happen -- the transfer process is available for a reason!</p>