Listening to my son’s thinking as he processes college visits afterwards, and reading posts on this forum, I am struck by how the college search process really helps an individual define his or her values.
Picking a college is like picking a spouse. What matters most to you?
Some people want a wealthy spouse who will keep them in comfort. That is equivalent to searching for colleges by the types of jobs its graduates tend to land or how much its graduates earn on average.
Some people want a “trophy” spouse, whom others will be impressed you married because they are so beautiful or famous in their field. That is equivalent to seeking the highest rated college into which you can be admitted.
Some people want a spouse who shares their worldview. They will go to an echo-chamber college where most people share the same religion or political outlook.
Some people want mostly sexual thrills. The college equivalent is a party school.
Some people want a spouse who makes them happy and whom they can make happy-- someone who will provide a great balance of emotional support, intellectual stimulation, etc. These are the posters who are concerned with “fit.”
This analogy, however, only goes so far. College lasts only four years and you always can transfer. A spouse is a much more momentous and consequential choice.
Community college is that steady, reasonable, non threatening gf/bf that kept you focused and let you be selfish in your pursuit of your education only to be dumped when you were through with them and ready to move on to bigger and better.
Interesting analogy but I would not compare marrying someone of the same worldview the equivalent of going to college in an echo chamber. I would call it wise. James Carville and Mary Matalin are the exception, not the rule.
I do see similarities between picking a college and a spouse. When you’re dating, you may only see the “after” look. Your date can be on their best behavior, dress nice, smell nice, is very good looking, etc. Your friends will tell you your date has a great personality. You may not get to see the “before” look until after you say I do. Then your date/now spouse can turn out to be slobs, idiots, snore, etc. Similarly for colleges that you’re looking at, often you only see the “after” looks, (eg the pretty glossy brochures, the trained tour guides telling you how wonder the school is, others telling you how the two of you would be a great fit, a college is really attractive (highly ranked by USNWR) etc)). After you move in on campus, however, things do not turn out to be all unicorns and rainbows (crummy dorms and food, poor profs, poor scheduling, people you just don’t like, etc). Fortunately in both cases, if you do commit with spouse/college and things go south, you can eventually split up, perhaps with only alimony/student debt as a lingering reminder.
Interestingly, I would argue that both are oversimplified here. Most people don’t go about picking a spouse on the basis of one quality - their income, their shared worldview, their trophy status, etc. Most people realize that humans are complex creatures and they may want many things from their spouse; they realize that people are imperfect and they are willing to trade some things off. Also, most people would probably be happy married to any number of people; they just happened to end up reasonably content or happy with the person they DID marry.
Same thing with colleges…most students are going to want a variety of things from their eventual college, and realize that making a choice is about trading off the pros with the cons and prioritizing the features that are important. Naturally, most students would also be happy at a variety of different colleges - so selecting is really about picking one that has the best combination of the factors that are important to them.
We actually had a discussion about this in one of my introductory psychology courses. Carville and Matalin are actually more alike than they are different - their political views are different, but they have similarly passionate feelings about politics and commentary and the methods used to persuade others. They’re probably more alike than they are different. (They also say that they don’t talk politics at home, which is probably wise).
I don’t think husbands and wives with different political views is really an exception; I think it’s simply that successful couples have decided how they will handle disagreements in a way that works for them. Similarly, I think students can either go to a college whose worldviews.
