My Trip Report...

Parents Forum
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<p>Here are tour reports from my trip. They aren't the typical CC schools, so I'm not sure anyone will be interested, and I know they aren't as good as Carolyn's, but for anyone interested:</p>

<p>University of Utah (Salt Lake City)
Both my parents went here, and I lived in SLC for 12 years, so I felt more or less required to visit here. Salt Lake is a great city and the skiing is hands down the best, so I wanted to like it a lot more than I did. The info session was very dry, and the office where it was held quite literally smelled like garbage (They were having some problems with the ventilation over the weekend. The school does everything based on admissions index, so it's not particularly hard to gain admittance, even for out of staters. They do offer some out of state merit and leadership scholarships, with the merit being based, of course, on index. The school does not give consideration to the difficulty of curriculum, only GPA and test scores. Their logic, which I don't necessarily agree with, is that harder class will lead to higher standardized test scores. One plus about Utah is that after completing 60 credits, students qualify for in-state (cheap) tuition.</p>

<p>We went on an individual tour as to avoid stairs, and our tour guide was a very nice local from SLC who was, interestingly enough, an incoming freshman. It was cool because he actually knew some of kids that we knew back in the day and went to some of the same breakfast haunts we did. However, being an incoming freshman, he didn't have as much hands-on experience with the school as I would have liked. </p>

<p>The campus itself was well-maintained and fairly attractive (Granted, it didn't have a lot of trees but then again, Utah doesn't have a lot of trees.). The bookstore was especially nice, even boasting its own candy shop, and the U has ample recreation areas (bowling lines, arcades, pool tables) on campus, though one building we went in did seem kind of dingy. The campus is also quite spread out, though it does have a shuttle system, which was decent but not spectacular. The big drawback for me was that it had a very "commuter" feel to it and thus I didn't really feel at home. However, the dorms (actually the Olympic village from 2002) are huge and hotel-room quality and fairly cheap. The problem is that no one lives there.</p>

<p>We were planning to eat in the cafeteria, but there was a fire drill while we were there, so we went out instead.</p>

<p>The disability guy at the U was a little person and extremely likable. He was very frank about the problems as far as snow plowing and accessibility and really strove to give us a good feel of the college. I greatly appreciated his candor and honesty. </p>

<p>Overall, the U felt more commutery than I would have liked, and their info session needs some definite pumping up, but I have to give the dorms and disability services office props. </p>

<hr>

<p>University of Montana (Missoula)
This school looked great for me on paper and even better in person. Mom had her reservations about Missoula from HER college days (She called it a "pit"), but she actually came away really liking the city. Missoula has the definite feel of college town, but it seems to be a nice college town. Downtown feels closely picked together and the school offers buses, so you don't appear to need a car.
Our tour guide was a rising junior from Billings and probably one of the best guides we have had. He was very willing to answer questions and seemed sort of disappointed when we didn't have any. He emphasized that the town supports UM a lot, not just the football team (which is apparently big there) but the concerts and other activities as well. He said that the amount of community support surprised him coming from the two college town of Billings (apparently much less enthusiastic). The intro classes can be very large (500+), but he said very sincerely (It didn't feel like we were being fed a line) that professor contact is fairly easy and that professors are even willing to work around a student's schedule. The Honors Program has classes capped at 25.</p>

<p>The campus itself is very nice indeed. The whole campus is situated around a grassy overall where it is common for students to hang out during the school year (most of people there when we went were actually summer camp kids), and the whole campus was very compact and easy to get around. Also, the school has a bell tower in which someone is actually playing the bells (sound cool to me at least). Overall, the campus was very pretty and incredibly well-maintained. There are several coffee shops and stores around campus, a gym, and a place where students can get reduce-price physical therapy from supervised physio students. Mom liked this last point. Me? Not so much.</p>

<p>After that, we had a one-on-one session with an adcom. She was very nice and eager to talk about the school in general. Montana has a very generous AP program though two APs I have, World History and Human Geo., are currently under review for credit. Apparently, UM has a surprisingly strong emphasis on Asian languages because a large benefactor of theirs was also a Japanese ambassador. The school actively recruits Asian exchange students and is working to further its international program. They have about 150 campus organizations, which doesn't seem like much, but then again it's a smaller school with only about 13,000 students total. Also, I got the impression that the school cares about its students with things like its food delivery program for sick or injured dorm students. Overall, the session is very informative and personal, both pluses in my book.</p>

<p>The Food Zoo (where we were given free lunch) was your standard cafeteria. That is not say the food was bad (it wasn't), but it wasn't UW either. A particularly awesome point about the Food Zoo, however, is that they list all the ingredients in ever dish, sauce, etc., a great thing for people with allegories or people like me who just give up food groups. They also have a lot of vegetarian/vegan choices, which underscores the fact that Missoula is pretty liberal (a plus in my book but maybe not in yours). There are also several other eateries on campus, which I would have liked to try out if just for comparison's sake. </p>

<p>After lunch, I talked to a very pierced-up girl about the Japanese program. It impressed me that she was an incoming sophomore and had already been on a month-long exchange program in Japan. She sounded like she had a great time and was eager to go back. She said she took 3-years of Japanese in high school but had a two year break and so she didn't test out of any classes. (According to her, the first semester was review, the second new material for her.) She said each student is assigned a Japanese speaking partner if they want one, allowing the Japanese students to practice English and vice versa, which sounded awesome to me. She said the Japanese classes start at about 25 and then shrink as you move up, and the professors are about split 50-50 Japanese/American. The course work (essays, skits, speaking in classes) sounds not unlike what I'm used to.</p>

<p>The disability coordinator here was blind and, interestingly enough, knows the disability coordinator at Rice. He was knowledgeable about advocacy and said UM has a very active student group (ADSUM) to help keep the campus on its toes. He also said the UM president is involved in advocacy and that they campus was even having a bit of celebration in honor of the ADA's 15th anniversary. He did admit that there were some problems (two inaccessible buildings), but I had few problems getting around for my part. He stressed, like the U did, self-advocacy, saying that the university was there for help but that students need to take initiative for themselves. The office is almost entirely disabled people, and they just hired their first able-bodied disability coordinator (who is actually from Japan, I believe.). He seemed to be really passionate about his job, in contrast to UW.</p>

<p>My biggest concern about UM is prestige, though they're pharmacy school (my interest), business school, journalism school, and forestry school all seem to receive decent reputation. Also, the Honors program seems to have interesting courses (Art History with an actual trip to the Netherlands).</p>

<p>Overall, it seems this would be the school for me so far.</p>

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<p>University of Washington (Seattle)
I really, really want to like this school. It's hands down the most beautiful place I've ever been with lovely foliage and very attractive architecture. Of special note is the library, which is built very much like a cathedral and has a very cool (some say Harry Potter-esque) reading room. The campus also has a huge quad with sakura trees, and the tour guide said professors sometimes hold classes outside, which sounds just great to me. It was raining the day of the tour, but it was light rain and cleared up quickly, so it wasn't much of a bother. The campus was huge and a pain to get around (I'll get to that later), but the students we saw were very helpful in directing us. The tour guide was nice, though not spectacularly entertaining. Mom commented that many of students seemed "freshmany" and both the tour guide and student reps at the info session were or had been in the Greek system. I'm not sure if this was just luck of the draw, though, or truly reprehensive of the campus culture.</p>

<p>The dining hall was very nice and fancy, but it was also very crowded. There was a Subway, a Chinese restaurant, a pizza restaurant, and a couple of others that I'm forgetting. All had extremely long lines. The food was good, not like I had pictured dorm food, though I can see a lack of variety being a problem. Supposedly, each dorm has its own food as well, though we couldn't really see much of dorms because of privacy issues (summer students).</p>

<p>The info session was next. First, two students stood up and talked about UW. The girl was a French major, and she mentioned she had been on two trips to France, a month long experience with a professor in Paris then a longer exchange program in rural France. The boy was a business major, I think. He heavily promoted Freshman Interest Groups (FIGs) as a way to meet people. However, it seemed like FIGs or no FIGs, it would be impossible to make UW "small." Both of the students were well spoken.</p>

<p>After the students were done speaking, two young adcoms came up to give their presentation. They appeared to be very new to the process, as they often looked to an older, more experienced woman to answer questions. Mom thought they were startlingly inarticulate. I didn't notice that, but it did stick out to me that one of them avoided mentioning merit scholarship because he hadn't received any. It struck me as odd that they wouldn't be well-versed in every aspect of the process! The presentation itself was pretty standard as far as admissions criteria, etc.</p>

<p>I was, however, incredibly disappointed with UW's accessibility. The campus is 75% stairs (and 95% Bill Gates and family ) and the ramps and accessible entrances seemed to be an extreme afterthought. Three adcoms couldn't tell us an accessible route and twice we were forced to use the stairs for want of a ramp. Part of me wonders if this is because UW is highly ranked, and they just didn't expect disabled students. Also, the disability services office did not have, that we saw at least, a single disabled person working there. The women said, in sum, that they could move classes and have a shuttle but little else. I think Mom hit it on the head when she said the woman was there because she wanted to "help people," not because she had any experience in advocacy. UM and the U both had people who knew about access in practice as well as theory, but UW was painfully unaccommodating.</p>

<p>Bottom line: Wonderful school that obviously doesn't care about the disabled at all.</p>

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<p>Thanks so much for these reports. It is great to hear about some schools outside the CC norm.</p>

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<p>I think the size of the UW would also put off many people who have motor disabilities.
maybe by the time you go to grad school?
I think Missoula sounds good- a friends daughter will be entering this fall and another friend graduated umpteen years ago
Sounds like worth checking out even if my daughters interest is marine biology
thanks for taking the time to give us your viewpoint</p>

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<p>Wolf, These are wonderful reviews. The U of Montana sounds like a very good fit for you. I would not worry too much about relative prestige if the school is a good fit and good academically, which it sounds like it is for you. I also found it very interesting to hear your comments about the varioius accessibility and disability program issues. That was very useful and interesting. Did you make it to any other schools?</p>

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<p>Wolf, very enjoyable to read your tour reports. I think you are in the running with carolyn, curmudgeon and doddsdad for colorful and readable trip reports. It must be so, because I read all of yours, and S is already finished with the process!</p>

<p>I would like to see these highlighted for others interested in disability/access issues. Not sure how to do that - maybe start a new thread with a title referring to disability/accessibility and reference this thread for reports on Utah, UM, UW. Others could add trip reports, questions, etc.</p>

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<p>Wolfpiper - thank you for the trip reports and the fresh perspective you bring to them! I'm glad your mother changed her mind about Missoula.</p>

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<p>Those were wonderful posts, Wolfpiper. I really enjoyed reading them.</p>

<p>If you don't mind, I will forward your comments about UWashington to some people who think a lot about these issues. Seems as though the happy beneficiary of so much Gates largess might try to do better!</p>

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<p>wolfpiper, I also think an accessability thread would be a great service to CC.</p>

<p>Not knowing the nature of your disability, I am making a stab here-- but have you considered "balmy weather" places, in light of accessability? I would think some of the western and southern schools might be easier (with no snow, ice, cold.)</p>

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<p>I liked your review of UWash. I felt EXACTLY the same way. I left thinking "I want to love this school. It's absolutely stunning", but alas, it is not a good fit for me.</p>

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<p>Great reports! Wonderfully refreshing to hear about different (for CC) schools and to hear them from a student's viewpoint!</p>

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<p>wolfpiper, these are some of the best college reviews I've read anywhere by anyone! Thanks so much! You've set quite the standard for all! I'll do my best to live up (a little) to this when we return from our east coast college trip in mid August.</p>

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<p>I am an East Coast "girl" who spent some time living/ working in SLC, Billings, and Missoula.It was refreshing to read these reports of schools not often mentioned on CC.
Great job Wolfpiper, and especially glad to read the good review of Univ Of Mt/ Missoula.
I have fond memories of Missoula, except those awful wintry days with the brown, hazy fog inversion. Perhaps banning wood burning stoves has corrected that problem :) ?</p>

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<p>Wolfpiper:</p>

<p>Grest reports. I am glad that you found some colleges that you would be happy to attend and seem to have great support for you. Missoula sounds great. I had not realized how cosmopolitan it is. You'd be able to pursue your interest in Japanese there.
I was surprised that UW did not offer more. It has a great School of Community Nursing, so I was expecting more from it. But, as EK pointed out, a very large campus would present a challenge for you. I recall my own college days racing from one end of a hilly campus to another, and it was not even a large one!</p>

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<p>Very very helpful reports. Lots of new information (well, new to me - Japanese studies in Missoula!) and great detail. Thank you.</p>

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<p>Just wanted to say thank you for all the kind comments.</p>