<p>I really despise Counselor-O-Matic and would never recommend it for two reasons: </p>
<p>1) It doesn’t allow you to select multiple choices even when you may fit multiple categories. For example, under “How large a student population would be right for you?” it offers four choices (<5000, 5000-9999, 10000-14999, >15000) and will only let you choose one. What if you are interested in two or three of those categories?!</p>
<p>2) Some of the student body questions are really confusing. You are supposed to “rate the importance of the focuses below from Very Important to Not Important At All”, but this is horribly unclear. Example: “How many out-of-class hours do you spend studying each day?” is probably very important to students who want to work hard, but it is also important to slackers who really hate studying. A question like this is a bad choice for this purpose because it doesn’t specify exactly what “important” means. Do you need to like it, or can you just really care about not having it?</p>
<p>What about University of Connecticut? Some of the other SUNYs might be worth looking at (Fredonia, Geneseo, and Brockport are all in western New York not too too far from Buffalo, and she might not want to go as far as Binghamton but that’s in south central New York), and Rutgers. Cornell is a reach, of course, but it <em>is</em> in western New York. Also, Ohio State and Ohio Wesleyan. If you reach a little further, there’s Michigan and Minnesota, but both of those might be more than a day’s drive. Illinois and Wisconsin are relatively close, so what about Wisconsin-Madison and UIUC? If she’s willing to do Michigan State, than Michigan, Wisconsin and UIUC shouldn’t be too far.</p>
<p>Also Bowling Green (Ohio), Duquesne (a little smaller than she wants – they have 10,000), University of Scranton. And Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Also, Purdue. And I know Temple and Drexel are in the middle of a city, but…</p>
<p>She could also look at the University of Kentucky or the University of Tennessee, or the University of the South-Sewanee (which is Tennesee, but I think that may be a little smaller) and Vanderbilt (they’re really Greek there, though, and they dress up for class, so she may not like this.) Is Maryland-College Park too far for her? What about Johns Hopkins (reach) and University of North Carolina? I’m just looking at surrounding and nearby states, but I know it take forever to get from western PA even just to New York (where I live) so she may not be willing to go as far as some of these schools.</p>
<p>cherryhillmomto2, I have heard that 1/3 of the students commute, but that includes ALL of the students who move into off campus apartments within 2 miles of campus. 1/3 of students are nontraditional (whatever that means). I think it means that they commute from home, or live on their own. Many are on the 10 year plan toward gradutation. UNC-A has very low 4 year graduation rate. Barely 1/2 of their students graduate in 5 years. This bothers me about the school. Still, I have read a lot positive comments about the area and the classes/professors.</p>
<p>U of MO (Mizzou) fits the bill of lots of majors, is in a cute college town with lots of coffee shops and college-type shopping in the downtown, which is adjacent to campus–but out-of-state total costs come in at 30K for next fall.</p>
<p>It would be a long one-day drive to western PA, although I’ve done it quite a few times.</p>
<p>Well I think UNC-Asheville is an excellent school and if you really put forth an effort academically in your studies and picking the right classes, you should have no problem graduating in 4 years if you really want to.</p>
<p>pierre, stats show that most students are not thinking that way, or something is slowing down the progress towards a degree. I don’t understand it.</p>
<p>I don’t understand it either, however I have read nothing from many reviews about having bad advising or having difficulty getting the classes that the students need to graduate so I am thinking that it must be the attitude of the students there that is leading to the low graduation rates.</p>
<p>pierre, that is the exact conclusion that I came to as well. I do think that attitudes can be contagious, and I think that a fair number of students are taking less than a full time load. I called the school and inquired about the graduation rate. I was told that a lot of students do go part time. I was also told that some students are involved in the 3/2 programs, so after so many credits they transfer out to finish their degree. Somehow I think the latter does not account for the low graduation rate. Afterall, a lot schools also have those programs and many have higher graduation rates.</p>
<p>As far as my understanding is, students that transfer contribute to the graduation rate in that they don’t “graduate”.</p>
<p>Again as I stated, as long as the OP takes a full workload and does not allow any of the attitudes of at least a quarter of the students affect the OP, then I think UNC-Asheville would be a great school for the OP.</p>
<p>pierre, I agree about not allowing oneself to be influenced by 1/4 of the students regarding workload, and that takes a lot of will power and fortitude to study more than those taking a lighter course load. This takes a lot of maturity, but it definitely can be done.</p>
<p>Thanks northeast mom! Another thing to check when looking at schools!</p>
<p>Any other campuses for UNC OOS you would recommend? According to Naviance, our high school rarely is accepted to Chapel Hill. I know my son would love NC for college, but I don’t want to get his hopes up with UNC-CH</p>
<p>Well cherryhill, I am from NJ, so not from NC. We looked into a couple of NC state schools. We are still interested in UNC-A, but the graduation rate really really bothers me. We did look at UNC-Wilmington and that school is lovely too. It is hot there in August! It is also just a few minutes from the beach and the airport. The negative there is that they do get hurricanes and have periodic hurricane evacuations (you have to leave campus and stay somewhere else that is a bit safer). The kids told us that during their 4 years they only saw a tree limb or two down, but no serious damage from the storms. The campus is beautiful, but it does have 4-5x the number of students that Asheville has (about 10,000 students I think).</p>
<p>cherryhill, NC State is part of the UNC system and is an excellent school for a very cheap price! Also look at UNC-Greensboro which I think is better than UNC-Wilmington.</p>
<p>What about West Virginia University as a safety (apologies if it has been mentioned before). It is a large school (28,000 or so) in a very cute college town, offers lots of majors, not a particularly warm climate and has a 52-48% male/ female ratio. It costs about $25,000 a year and is obviously within a day’s drive of Western PA. The sorority/fraternity scene is not very big (under 10%), and although it has big-time sports, it is not particularly preppy. While it might be challenging to graduate in 4 years, it definitely can be done.</p>