Road Trip!! Rutgers, James Madison, Virginia Tech, UVA

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Took the spring break road trip to four colleges with my D and thought I'd pass on some impressions from our trip. Here goes,</p>

<p>Rutgers. Spent a day here trying to figure out this megalopolis of a university. We were in New Brunswick, but were told that there was also Rutgers Newark and Rutgers Camden as well. In NB, there were four widely scattered campuses as well needing a bus to get around. Campuses were mostly old 70s style construction, poor if any landscaping, and had no rhyme or reason to the architecture (I'm and architecture buff). The city of NB was also somewhat dicey as well. Since we're from VA, this University--which has relatively strong academics and is close to NY for internships--was not worth the 32K it would have cost to attend. We also got the distinct impression from chatting with others on our bus tour that RU was where Jersey kids who couldn't afford to go out of state/private went. </p>

<p>James Madison. This was a great day with beautiful weather and a nice ride in the Shenendoah Valley to get there. New facilities, a beautiful campus, with lots of what looked to be happy kids milling about "the quad'. Campus was nice and compact and the school did a nice job in its information session laying out the campus, history, stats, retention/graduation rates. D really like the campus and although it has approx 19k students, it didn't feel like a large school at all. Two things that we didn't like were the lack of diversity we saw in the student body and the fact that I-81 cuts the campus in half. You could pretty much hear the trucks on the highway from most parts of the campus. Very impressive and definitely an up and comer. </p>

<p>Virginia Tech. Egads this school is in the middle of nowhere and is BIGGGGGG (30,000 plus students). The campus is nice and new in a kind of faux Disney/neo-Stalinist style and the limestone VA Tech has clad ALL its bldgs in is striking at first, during the course of our day there it grew tiring and made the school feel somewhat "cold". At one pt I thought I was at the US military academy from all the gray. The intro session was ok, but was not that informative. For example, it was the only school on our tour that didn't give us its retention/graduation rate and when I asked, I was only given the five year rate of some 70 percent (I checked online later and the 4 year was around 60 percent). I thought the student tour guide was informative and did a great job scaring my kid to death when he mentioned that he had a freshmen class with a lecture that had THREE THOUSAND other students. So, for us VA Tech was way too BIG, in the middle of nowhere, and was somewhat cold in appearance. It did, however, have dang good food (the best of the trip).</p>

<p>University of Virginia. The last school on our tour, and the best by far. This school is beautiful, with wonderful architecture and plenty of nooks and crannies to explore throughout the "grounds." The information session was great, touching on the Jeffersonian history of the school, and provided stats we wanted to hear (rank, grades, SATs, grad rate, etc.). The student guide was nice and witty and really did her best to have us interact with some of the students along the way. UVA struck me as being similar to an Ivy League campus (I've been to all of them as a student) in terms of appearance and the academics are definitely up there as well. The school also has a healthy Greek scene and much more diversity than we saw at JMU or Tech (Rutgers had the greatest) Although the food wasn't as good as Va Tech's or JMU's, UVA made up for it in every other category. </p>

<p>So, final rankings were 1) UVA, 2) JMU, 3) VA Tech, 4) Rutgers</p>

2

<p>For Rutgers NB, your daughter would never go to Camden or Newark campuses. They are all a part of the Rutgers family but are completely different schools in very different areas. Additionally, if she lived on College Ave Campus, she would (if in a liberal arts and science major) have most of her classes right there. This is the most desirable area to live on because of that and because it has a city feel to it. Also, old Rutgers is right there down the block past the fraternities and RU grease trucks. The area around NB is not the prettiest, but it is full of college students only and that is what college students will do while away from their own homes – make student housing homes crappy. Overall, RU is a great school and its location is great (in between Philly and NYC), but it does have a very divided campus that requires bus routes at times and is a very large school in a NJ city.</p>

<p>A lot of Jersey kids do go there because of the cost factor – they’ll pay in-state tuiton for a good school instead of out-of-state or private. A good portion of people in the top 5% of my class went to RU because of the cost and programs available. These students were also accepted to Ivy and other top 25 schools.</p>

3

<p>Hope you enjoyed your trip. Were these schools your daughter was accepted to or just where she is planning to apply? Either way, what was the common thread of interest? I wouldn’t consider them to be peer institutions.</p>

4

<p>Hope you enjoyed your trip. Were these schools your daughter was accepted to or just where she is planning to apply? Either way, what was the common thread of interest? I wouldn’t consider them to be peer institutions. </p>

<p>Yes, we did enjoy the trip despite all the driving (and the rather EXPENSIVE GAS). No, she wasn’t accepted to any, she’s a HS junior who’s trying to build her list of schools for next year. We’re originally from Jersey but now live in N. Virginia which is why we visited all the VA schools and threw in Rutgers because we know several people back home who graduated from there, had great academic experiences and, more importantly, spun them into jobs in NYC. Except for UVA, I believe they are all somewhat similar in terms of grades/SAT requirements, etc. UVA is my D’s reach school, she really loved it (we did too, truly stunning campus, great college town & restaurants, national reputation, strong academics) and has her fingers crossed (like most VA kids). The others are pretty much safeties given her SATs/GPA (1325 so far, GPA 4.0 w). </p>

<p>We still have William & Mary and Wake Forest to go, but those are weekend trips.</p>

5

<p>Hi cooldad (love the screen name!)…sounds like you had a valuable trip with your d. We will start this process next year all over again with #2 and it will be interesting to see the differences btw a boy and a girl! </p>

<p>I thought I would post this link here. I thought it was a great site for school comparisons. It is [College</a> Results Online](<a href=“http://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■%5DCollege”>http://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■). </p>

<p>From my work, I also was privy to a publication by the American Council on Education about Graduation rates published last fall that gives a very helpful explanation to many of the stated statistics. If you are using that as a data point for your d’s choice, it is worth reading. Here is the link:</p>

<p><a href=“American Council on Education”>American Council on Education;

<p>From the collegeresults site referenced above, the 5 yr grad rate for UVA is 92%, JMU is 80% and VT is 75%. With the size of VT, its large Arch programs (5 yr program), Engineering (many do a co-op and go 5 yrs to grad) and students coming from more of a working class/blue collar background, personally I think they are doing well up there with the graduation rate, but to each his own.</p>

<p>I have a kid-3rd year- at VT and know many, many students who go there. While I know it is a big school, I have never, ever heard of a class with 3K in it…300 maybe, but could the tour guide have been exaggerating just a bit for fun? Most kids love it there and really feel the school shrinks when you are in your major. Mine is from a small town and has never once complained of Tech’s size, which I was scared of myself when he applied! Even with his few big classes he just got there early and sat up front. As he says, it doesn’t matter that way if you have 10 or 100 behind you! :slight_smile: </p>

<p>Hope those links will help some. Like yours, I hope our d will be able to see what she likes on the visits and can narrow down the choices. Just think the gas money spent may be less than those extra application fees…then again, maybe not :)</p>