<p>Millersville is NOT in south Philly. Millersville is in Lancaster county(85 miles from Philly). Villanova is North of the city in Montgomery County. Immaculata is in Chester County.</p>
<p>Not that any of these are too far to visit but kind of random grouping.</p>
<p>thanks eveyone for all your suggestions.</p>
<p>I think we will see the three schools on the way home- Muhlenberg, Lafayette and Lehigh.</p>
<p>I can let anyone know our impressions if your interested when we return mid august - just post here.</p>
<p>Thanks again</p>
<p>Luliztee,
Glad to hear that you are looking in the Lehigh valley but I thought he wanted, "rural or small town NO URBAN schools." Location-wise, all are less then two hours from NYC.</p>
<p>But, as I said in post #11, "There are six universities in the Lehigh Valley area. Three of them: Lehigh, Lafayette and Muhlenberg are located in the cities of Bethlehem, Easton and Allentown respectively. I don't think any of them would be considered rural or small town campuses." While the campuses themselves are pretty and not urban like Drexel or Temple, they are NOT small town or semi-rural. oh, well...</p>
<p>How about Moravian?</p>
<p>Moravian is in downtown Bethlehem, across the river from Lehigh. Nice college and has a great local reputation. This weekend is the start of Bethlehem's Musikfest, and Moravian (most of it - it has a seperated campus) is smack in the middle of it. <a href="http://www.musikfest.org/%5B/url%5D">http://www.musikfest.org/</a> It ends Sunday, August 13.</p>
<p>Yes, I have to agree with kathiep that Lafayette, Lehigh, et.al are not really rural anymore. The Bethlehem, Allentown, Easton area has been one of the fastest growing in PA. However, it might be rural enough for the op's son. Only way to know is to visit.
If you want really rural, you need to head up to the Poconos (n of Phila) or further west into Lancaster, Berks co. and out toward Harrisburg, but then you are talking a 2 hrs drive from Phila.</p>
<p>"Moravian is in downtown Bethlehem, across the river from Lehigh. Nice college and has a great local reputation"</p>
<p>This is good to know. My daughter has her heart set on Moravian (I mean really and irrationally set) and we liked it too. She had seen in with hubby last fall and when we visited Albright a couple of weeks ago, the visit was so awful that we literally scooted down on our knees and snuck out of there and went to visit Moravian instead and had a lovely time in historic Bethlehem.</p>
<p>Why was Albright horrible? I've never seen it, but I have a good friend who went there (15+ years ago) and loved it, and is one of the smartest people I know. I didn't mention it in this thread because I doubted that it would qualify as "rural".</p>
<p>We went to Albright a couple of weeks ago on Saturday for the open house. We got a teensy bit lost (no biggie, we were early) and toured lovely Redding. Now, I'm from New York City and live in a mixed neighborhood so not much bothers me, but I was shocked/horrified/appalled by the area surrounding Albright. The men hanging on the street corners with bottles at 10:00 a.m. and the rundown quality of the area. We got to the college which was in a marginally better neighborhood and appeared to be a nice campus. The tour guide picked up our group and took us on our way. She walked through the grounds of the college without entering into any of the buildings. After passing the library and other buildings, a parent finally asked if we would actually be seeing the college. She took us inside one building, up to the second floor where all the rooms were locked and she had no keys. In the dark. Let that sink in for a minute. Two flights up in the dark because the little genius wasn't able to figure out that she should flip a switch or two. The tour continued and the guide was just awful and had nothing intelligent or helpful to say. My daughter and I literally crawled out of there and left. Childish, I know, but that was not the right college for her.</p>
<p>Wow, sure goes to show you that the tour guide can really make a difference! My co-workers son was very close to picking Albright and she had said the campus was very nice. One of my daughters friends is a rising senior at Albright and loves it. She even works in the admissions office and gives the VIP tours. Otoh, we did not even consider it because I'm not fond of the Reading area anyway. We had a similar bad experience at Bloomsburg where the student passed most of the buildings without taking us in. We were there at an open house so sneakily jumped into another tour. Best thing there was the lunch.</p>
<p>The town of Bethlehem where Moravian is located is very, very nice. I like going out to dinner there and just window shopping in the daytime. My husband's boss is part owner of the Hotel Bethlehem and his company has their holiday dinner at the hotel every December. It's a treat to sit up high and see all the shops decorated with holiday lights and watch horse drawn carriages pass by. They have neat toursity stuff going on all year long too. Lehigh is on a hill closer to the not-so-nice part of Bethlehem. But, they are working hard on cleaning up that area also.</p>
<p>Check out the Main Line. West Chester University, Immaculata, Villanova, Haveford, several others.</p>
<p>kath, I'm from MD, not PA. Those were schools I remembered seeing signs for on a vacation to Philly a couple of weeks back.</p>
<p>F&M, Elizabethtown, York College, and possibly Lebanon Valley College can all be completed in one day.</p>
<p>F&M is in the city of Lancaster, but very close to rural areas in Lancaster county. Elizabethtown is in well...Elizabethtown in Lancaster county. It is the home of M&M Mars and would be closer to fitting the bill of 'rural'. Not sure about Lebanon Valley College, but I know someone who graduated from there ~10 years back and really loved it. Fendergirl would be able to tell you more about the location of York College, she is an alum (I'm more well versed on Lancaster County schools since I grew up there).</p>
<p>Main Line schools are not rural. They are suburban Philadelphia.</p>
<p>Frostburg, I wasn't trying to pick on you, but it doesn't make sense to post about something that you don't really know about. If the op didn't have much sense you would have him going in three different directions and missing a dozen schools along the way. You are probably a very nice person and knowledgeable about Maryland schools and I didn't correct your post to make you feel bad, I did it because you gave bad advice.</p>