<p>Hello,</p>
<p>I just wnated to ask you guys what type of questions woudl you ask a college to help you decide on which one you want to attend? I have a list of colleges that accepted me so far, but I cannot decide. What are some good questions to ask?</p>
<p>Will the school that you attend prepare you for the career after your first career?</p>
<p>Beyond the obvious issues like size, location, financial aid, etc. I would recommend trying to get a handle on what kind of students each of your colleges appeal to. If there is a dominant campus culture, will you fit in? Is it the kind of campus culture that appeals to you. There are no right or wrong answers; it depends what you are looking for.</p>
<p>To get a snapshot of a college, I like to look at the following information available from the USNEWS premimium online edition or from the college's Common Data Set:</p>
<p>Diversity: percentages for each race</p>
<p>Socio-economic: percentage of students qualifying for financial aid. If you can find it, percentage of Pell Grant recepients will tell you the number of very low income students.</p>
<p>Greek: percentages of students in frats/sororities</p>
<p>Athletics: percentage of male and female varsity athletes</p>
<p>Class sizes: the Common Data Set forms give the number of classes offered by the university to undergrads in each size: between 2-9, 10-19, 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-99, 100+. You'll have to do a little math to convert to percentages so you can compare schools.</p>
<p>Endowment: look at size of the endowment, especially on a per student basis. (this has a huge impact on the quality of just about everything and perhaps should be the deciding factor if you are really stuck deciding between two schools).</p>
<p>Information that is not published but is available to every college if they choose to answer your questions. What is the surveyed "binge drinking rate"? Every college knows the answer to this and knows how it compares to the national average of 44%. How many transports to the hospital were there for alcohol poisoning were there last year? [BTW, you might rock some adcoms or deans back on their heels with these two questions, which can be fun.] If you are looking for a "party school", higher numbers in these answers would be good. If you are looking less drinking, lower numbers would be good. </p>
<p>And finally, I would look at freshmen housing. There is a difference between schools where freshmen live in the same dorms with upperclass students and schools where they do not. </p>
<p>Hope some of those suggestions help. You have to be a little careful comparing some of these numbers among dissimilar schools. But, if you are choosing between two very similar schools in terms of size and region of the country, the sum total of this data can give you a really good snapshot of the "campus culture", which you can then compare to your ideal college lifestyle. Do you prefer wealthy and white? More diversity? An "Animal House" drinking scene or "prefer not to smell vomit in the dorm, thank you very much"? Frats or not? Jocks or geeks?</p>
<p>Jason, stop asking dumb questions and just go to WUStL :P</p>
<p>LOL shut up matt</p>