So she is drawn to the idea of a liberal arts college and would like to be in a smaller but interesting city like Nashville? And you’d like her to get out of the Midwest for that experience?
How about Smith College? CS is very good there. Northampton isn’t Nashville, but it’s very artsy and is the 2nd biggest music booking venue in New England.
The University of Vermont is more like a private college with less than 30% in state enrollment - and that’s shrinking. This year’s freshman class is only 24% in state and the class just accepted for next year is only 20% in state. Maybe that private college feel is why it showed up on the original list of “Public Ivies” 30+ years ago. At 10,000+ undergrads, it isn’t much bigger than Vanderbilt and Burlington repeatedly shows up on various lists of best college towns. On the shores of 125-mile long Lake Champlain, it’s beautiful setting is enhanced by the Green Mountains to the east and the Adirondack Mountains to the west, one of the rare settings where mountains and water come together. And it’s strong in CS.
I think she’d love Vermont, so that’s a good one to add to the list. For some reason Smith isn’t catching her eye, I’m not sure why just yet. In general she hasn’t been drawn to New England, but I think she would change her mind after visiting. We’re hoping to get out to Boulder at some point this summer, but maybe a few days on the east coast can be fit in somewhere, too. I’d also like her to look at Cal Poly, not sure of her chances there, but being a California native I wouldn’t mind if she ended up out west for college.
@FreshCoastal Fellow IL parent here… if your daughter is into LACs for CS, how about Carleton, Macalester, Grinnell, Hamilton, and Wm&Mary… since you like VA? UIUC would be worth a visit, as well as Purdue, to see what she thinks about BIG. Rose Hulman is a tight niche for stem. My son is in the same boat, getting to know and wrestling with different types of schools for CS/ENG.
W&M is on the list, too — I think she’d like that atmosphere! We visited UIUC since she’ll definitely apply there, though maybe not CS due to her stats. Maybe iSchool or CS + X. It’s big, but I reminded her that big schools like Purdue and UW Madison can be made to feel smaller. I think the rural location of Grinnell would not appeal to her, but it’s still on the list. The list is long! It’s hard to know what’s really a safety for her that could also be in an interesting place.
@FreshCoastal Not to totally hijack the thread (@JackH2021), but since CS is such a hot field, your daughter’s list can really explore so many different types of schools. I suggest you post her list, stats, etc, and the experts here on CC can give you good advice on safeties, reaches, matches, etc. For my son, UVM, Rose Hulman, and VaTech are in the safety category, but he’s heading more towards Eng over CS at the moment
Not sure why UVM is seen as good for CS. Their CS grads don’t have close to the same outcomes, on average, as most of the other schools mentioned here.
TMDuo28, were the CompSci students still maintaining a leader board for who stayed logged on to the mainframes the longest when you were there (of course, by the time you arrived students were no longer shackled to the DEC20s)? When I was there the record was 32 hours. Suffice it to say, there were many pizza boxes and liter Coke bottles strewn around that work station.
TMDuo28, They stay logged on so long as a competition or for bragging rights, not because they had to to get their work done. That’s why we called CMU “The Nerd Farm”. What do you expect from a school that required English majors take Pascal programming as a core class?
Small range, high absolute number. I’m old and doing this whole “kids applying to college thing” late. Most of my friends from college are empty nesters.
Fwiw, SCS has admitted 50:50 for several years. I believe engineering has been fairly close. In my class of ~60 MechE’s, I think we had maybe five women.
On average, there are 160 sunny days per year in Pittsburgh.
And the O’s closing is indeed a tragedy. Along with PHI and their Purple Hooters.
Iirc, CMU’S football cheer started:
“Secant, tangent, hyperbolic sine,
Three point one four one five nine”
I went to maybe two games total, so I don’t remember the rest.
And when the other team scored… “that’s alright, it’s OK, you’re going to work for us some day”
