<p>I posted last winter when D and I toured 4 midwest schools, Hope, Wheaton, St. Olaf, and Carleton. She came away really liking both Hope and St. Olaf.</p>
<p>Her cirtieria is a big LAC (2,000+ students), quality academic reputation, atmosphere that fosters spiritual pursuits but that is tolerant of views from the left and the right...she can be challenged and can explore new ideas. She is a liflong Californian and she seems to have an affinity for the midwest. She is a strong student with a ton of ECs. I would think St. Olaf is a match and Hope is a safety for her.</p>
<p>This round we are visiting Calvin, Notre Dame, Valparaiso, and Gustavus Adolphus. GA is way off the beaten path in northern MN so that is still a maybe. Notre Dame is in the mix because I want her to see a high ranking national University. The same reason we visited Carleton the last time. I want her to have quality benchmarks to judge schools by. </p>
<p>Seeing the places we have visited / will be visiting is there any others that we have overlooked? Any comments / insights on Calvin, Valpo, or Gustavas Adolphus? How does GA match up to the others...is it worth taking the trip up north?</p>
<p>Thanks for your responses...this board is a great resource.</p>
<p>One you might want to include is Kalamazoo College. Superb academics, perhaps the best study abroad program in the country, and, while officially independent, still has ties to the American Baptist Church. Out there on the wing (Quakers) is Earlham, but it might be too small for her tastes.</p>
<p>If you consider Hope to be a safety, then Calvin will be as well. It's located in Grand Rapids...Michigan's 2nd largest city. It's a very nice area with more available to students off-campus than in small-town Holland. Calvin's reputation in Michigan is that it attracts a fairly conservative Christian student body. If you'll be taking the tour soon, spring is a really nice time to visit the Midwest.</p>
<p>Just saw mini's post. My own S. will be attending Kalamazoo this fall so I highly recommend visiting there as well. It's one of the top LAC's in the state. Kalamazoo, Michigan's 5th largest city, is south of Grand Rapids and an easy stop on the drive back down to Valpo and ND in Indiana. There's a large state U located directly next door so there's plenty of student activity in the area.</p>
<p>Calvin really impresses me--a conservative Christian school, yes, but it is also welcoming of dissent and intellectual debate. I get the impression that the tolerance you were talking about exists there. They sponsor interesting lecture series (I only wish I lived closer). I've met some quite sharp Calvin graduates.</p>
<p>I hope you visit Gustavus Adolphus so you can report on it--it is one that we were considering for our oldest a few years back, but never got to the point of checking it out in depth. We know the choir director there (I'm assuming he is still there--I should check)--so I can tell you that he is outstanding, though don't know much else about the school. I would guess the culture/feeling at GA is similar to St. Olaf and others in that particular group of Lutheran schools (a couple of others are Concordia in Moorhead, MN and Augustana in Sioux Falls, SD).</p>
<p>"She is a lifelong Californian and she seems to have an affinity for the midwest." </p>
<p>As a midwesterner, I just want to say that I am glad to see someone from California come to her senses.</p>
<p>As to Valpo, it is a good school and though Lutheran owned it does not require students to be religious or to engage in religious events, although it provides the opportunities to do so if desired. Valparaiso is a very nice town, as is its sister town to the north, Chesterton, and you have an easy drive to the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, and a little over an hour to Chicago. Chesterton and Valparaiso combined have an inordinate amount of art shows every year, although most are in the summer, because the two have many residents who are would be or already established artists.</p>
<p>Thanks for your responses. Looks like we will visit GA with the other three. Valpo has a visit day set up for the Saturday when we will be in the area (4/22). Calvin has a special presentation every friday. Scheduled GA for Wednesday and ND for Thursday afternoon. Busy but doable...we will split the long drive from St. Peter MN to South Bend IN over Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning. I will post a review after our visits. </p>
<p>In the meantime, any other insights into Calvin, Valpo, and GA would be appreciated.</p>
<p>Just a little correction (although to others outside of Minnesota, probably a distinction without a difference) Gustavus is actually considered to be in SOUTHERN Minnesota, and actually has much better (ha!) weather than those schools such as Concordia in the North.</p>
<p>I just looked at the location of the original poster in Sonoma Cal. I am a MN native and I am always moaning about how the Swedes could have kept on going to the Cal. Wine Country intead of settling in MN and here is a kid who wants to leave the promise land for the wilds of the Midwest. Go figure.</p>
<p>Ha! That will teach me to look too quickly at mapquest. For whatever reason the town of St. Peter wasn't registering and I was seeing a location north of Minneapolis/St. Paul area. I didn't see where it was merely indicating the center of MN!</p>
<p>St. Thomas in Saint Paul, MN is a really nice school that might be a fit and would be a very different environment to explore. </p>
<ul>
<li>It's not as highly ranked academically as the others you listed but is a very good school and is on the rise.</li>
<li>It has 5,000 undergrad students so it's a little larger if you want to look at a variety</li>
<li>It is in St. Paul on an absolutely beautiful campus near the Mississippi River. They have been adding a lot of new buildings lately so it's very up to date.</li>
<li>They are a Catholic school and do have an environment that fosters spiritual pursuits. This is quite different than say Macalester (just down the road) or Carleton which are very left of center. While they do draw a lot of Catholic students (and are more midwest centric than global) they are tolerant of variety.</li>
<li>They are located in the Twin Cities which are a much different environment than Northfield, St Peter or South Bend. If your child likes the idea of a city Mpls/St Paul are filled with a ton to do, great culture and a wealth of job opportunities. Of course the winters aren't perfect.</li>
<li>It costs $5-10k less than the others. Every kid gets some merit scholarship money.</li>
</ul>
<p>If ranking and prestige are important than it won't rank with the others. My daughter loved the campus and school but didn't quite know if she'd fit in with her leftist/socialistic views so she's going to the U of MN - Honors instead.</p>
<p>My S was accepted at Valpo - he's an engineering type student who also loves history, philosophy, economics and religion. Valpo has the nation's oldest honors college (Christ College) and the line that grabbed him from its brochure said, "Are you an engineer who loves liberal arts?" Few Christian schools offer engineering (Grove City is another) and this school is a good match for him.</p>
<p>I'd agree with "GoBlue" and Mini if you can spare the time, stop at Kalamazoo College...it's on the way for you. The campus is lovely with brick streets and buildings. Academically it is top notch. The religion and religious aspects are there for those that desire it. The foreign study program is great. The K Plan is very unique.</p>