I think it’s interesting when people think there’s “hand holding” at privates. Even at a small LAC like Bowdoin, there’s no handholding. Students are still responsible for seeking assistance. The difference is that, when they look for it, it’s easy to find and supportive.
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I can see how the term hand holding might come off as a backhanded compliment. Support would have been a better term.
I changed it in the original post.
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Summer beach is better than no beach lol. But yeah, students need to be prepared for the cold at NU.
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I love walking Gilson beach but the Lincoln St beach is a 7 minute walk from my house so that’s my go to, or Light House Beach. Here’s my D strolling with me at Gilson. We do have some months of beautiful weather ; )
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Everyone likes to think that a college that is “supportive” will be a better environment for their kid. But in practice the kids who need that support will benefit and at least relatively speaking the kids who “know what they want and set out to get it” (as I put it above) will have less of an advantage there.
Personally I grew up in an intensely competitive family, where you were never just allowed to win at sports or games like chess, cards or Monopoly, you had to win on merit and be resilient enough to put up with losing every single time until you were good enough to compete. I largely did the same with childhood games with our kids: two thrived on that while one doesn’t enjoy it so much. During the pandemic we’ve had a weekly neighborhood quiz on Zoom, the same two love competing (and winning) and the third doesn’t care for it. It appears to me that sort of personality difference correlates quite strongly with whether you would benefit or be relatively disadvantaged by attending a very “supportive” college.
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That’s kind of an odd analogy. So, competitive people are better at less supportive schools? I’m thinking your sample size is rather small on this.
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This whole discussion of “supportive” environments reminds me of a post 2 or 3 years ago where a student at Williams was looking to transfer because he felt he was getting too much attention from professors there. Even though he was grateful for all the opportunities he was offered at Williams, he felt suffocated and wanted more freedom and less pressure. I guess that was too much of a good thing for this particular student.
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Perhaps so. Or you could interpret it as my family not being as “supportive” as some other families, which works for some kids and not for others.
But other posters seem to observe (not always in a positive way) that schools like Berkeley are full of “gunners” which I assume means students who are very competitive in seeking high grades and are (presumably) successful there.
I have many happy memories of visiting Evanston in the summer and going to Lighthouse beach with my daughter. The calm, warmish water was perfect with a little one and tons of room for sand castles.
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I’m not sure if it’s correlated to competitiveness, or gregariousness, or whatever, but some kids are drawn to large schools and some are drawn to small schools. My three were all interested in large schools, but perhaps that’s because we live near a large university and their parents went to a large university. I’m sure there are a lot of factors.
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Is it very tough because of course content or grading or competitive students or combination of all of these? Right now S21’s first choice is Cal CS and he looked at the first three courses (CS 61A, 61B and 70) including their mid term/ final exams and they did not look very hard to him.
I think it’s tough to get into CS/Engineering at Cal, so those kids are focused, organized, driven, etc. The rest of Cal is smart too of course.
My D reached out to current students, mostly sophomores, at various schools trying to get a feel for them. The kids at Cal, UCLA, and USC were all very happy and loved their school.
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D21 has had a very successful run. 15 admits, 1 WL and one Ivy left to go (she applied wanting to partake in Ivy day as an extreme reach). She received some unbelievable merit offers, and participated in a few scholarship competitions. We also qualify for FA, so admits at meets needs schools scored her aid we are very pleased with. After a lot of careful consideration, she’ll be saying no this weekend to a few more: UVA, W&M Monroe Scholar, Emory, Richmond, and Wake Forest. She already turned down full tuition at Sewanee (invited for full ride, but declined to submit the required video for consideration), Alternate for Duke Scholarship full tuition at Furman, Wofford, Pitt direct admit to DPT, Roanoke, Mary Baldwin. She’s not ready to say goodbye to Tulane or Davidson yet, but 95% they won’t end up being the top choice.
So that leaves her with admits to Rice and Washington and Lee (currently a Johnson Alternate) and on the WL at Vandy as her top 3 preferences. We are going to visit all 3 over the next 3 weeks and participate in many virtual events. She can’t go wrong- each would be wonderful in its own way. At this point she is trying to determine social fit as she would be study something slightly different at each that all sound equally appealing in their own way.
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As many of us have kids on waitlists, and more than one, I found this today from Rick Clark at Ga Tech on his blog about waitlist. Love his last paragraph because that is 100% true!
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I love that - my kids grew up near a large university and we both went to large universities and my kids are both only drawn to LACs. What is that? I am thinking my kids don’t think we are very well educated. 
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So happy, Cornell just announced vaccine will be required in the fall for all students, and an open fall semester! I would expect the other Ivies to follow!
“Dear Cornell Community,
Although we all appreciate that the COVID-19 pandemic is not over and that we must remain vigilant around public health measures to protect ourselves and our community, there is reason to be hopeful as we plan for the future. More than 90 million U.S. residents have safely received one or more doses of a currently approved COVID-19 vaccine, and recent data indicate that these vaccines not only protect those inoculated from serious infection, but also are protective for asymptomatic infection and the risk of transmission of virus to others.
With the recent announcements of expanded vaccine eligibility in New York and other states, and increasing vaccine production, it is likely that all members of our community will be able to obtain vaccination sometime this spring or summer. Accordingly, Cornell intends to require vaccination for students returning to Ithaca, Geneva, and Cornell Tech campuses for the fall semester. Medical and religious exemptions will be accommodated, but the expectation will be that our campuses and classrooms will overwhelmingly consist of vaccinated individuals, greatly reducing the risk of infection for all. Individuals who are not able to obtain vaccination prior to arrival for the fall semester, or whose vaccination is not recognized by New York state, will be expected to be vaccinated as soon after their arrival as possible, and Cornell is investigating ways to facilitate this process.
It is critical for the university to have accurate data on the extent of community protection from COVID-19 in order to make informed decisions about safe campus operations. We have now established an easy way for members of the Cornell community to register their vaccination status through the Daily Check using the COVID-19 Proof of Vaccination tool. Beginning April 15, such registration will be required of all Cornell students, faculty, and staff once they have completed the dose schedule for their vaccination. Once we have better data about the degree of community protection that has been achieved, we will offer additional details regarding full campus reactivation in a safe and responsible manner.
Plans for Fall 2021 Instruction
Although the current pace of vaccination is promising, uncertainty about the prevailing conditions in the fall remains. While we predict very high levels of immunity, we are planning for several possibilities:
Herd Immunity
With the increasing availability of vaccines and the vaccination requirement for returning students, we anticipate that our campuses will operate in the fall under conditions in which the degree of immunity is sufficient to prevent the spread of virus within the community (herd immunity). Although New York state regulations and CDC guidelines are yet to be released, with mandatory student vaccination we anticipate that this is the most likely scenario. If the science indicates that the extent of immunity of our community provides for safe campus operation, and relevant regulations allow for in-person classroom instruction, classes normally taught in person will return to that mode of instruction, without any routinely scheduled online option. All members of our community – faculty, staff, and students – should begin to plan for this return to in-person teaching and learning in the fall of 2021. We will also continue to monitor visa and travel issues that might affect our returning international students and we will implement adjustments to address their needs as much as possible.
High Levels of Immunity
Modeling by Professor Peter Frazier’s group indicates that the risk of in-class transmission in fully occupied classes will be equivalent to that of de-densified classrooms as long as vaccination rates of students, faculty, and staff are above 50%, seating adjustments are made, and students and faculty wear standard quality masks. We will continue to track vaccination levels, evaluate the science, and carefully monitor CDC and New York state guidelines; if it is determined that we have not achieved full herd immunity, but nearly all faculty and staff and the majority of students are immunized, we will begin the semester with normal in-person instruction without a routinely provided online option, but with enhanced safety measures (e.g., mandatory high-quality mask wearing, special seating, additional ventilation, surveillance testing, etc.). Reasonable medical accommodations for students who are unable to return for in-person instruction will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
Lower Levels of Immunity
Although we do not expect this to be the case, if less than 50% of our student population has been vaccinated by the beginning of the semester, we will begin the semester in de-densified classrooms, with a mix of instruction modes similar to the current semester, until critical thresholds have been met. Once sufficient herd immunity is reached, we will fully institute in-person classroom instruction across all campuses.
In the coming days, we will add the vaccination status of the Ithaca campus community to the COVID-19 Dashboard. Additionally, we will hold a virtual Town Hall open to all members of the Ithaca, Geneva, and Cornell Tech campuses on Thursday, April 8, from noon to 1 p.m to answer questions about our plans for the fall semester. Questions may be submitted in advance via this Qualtrics survey.
Thanks to all for your continued efforts to create a safe learning and working environment during these extraordinary times.
Sincerely,
Martha E. Pollack
President
Michael I. Kotlikoff”
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“Religious exemptions” will be accommodated? Really?
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Well there goes the requirement…
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I find that curious, since NYS wisely got rid of religious exemptions about 2 years ago
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I have been doing some reading on this and if you can show why you are a good fit for the school, it’s very helpful. So, understanding the ethos of the school and doing a deep dive into it and then showing how you would fit with this can be a big help in getting off the WL.
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