You guys keep us posted! But I’m thinking both should go to Hampshire - haha
I wonder if it is better to go on an overnight visit, as opposed to accepted students day. That way, you really get to see how things run ‘normally’ as opposed to a somewhat contrived day when the college is doing its best to expose you to as much as they can. Our daughter could not make accepted students day, and instead arranged for an overnight visit. She attended a couple of classes where the prof had the expectation that she would contribute, and that probably sealed the deal for her. She also met a number of outgoing students who wanted her to hang out with them.
^^^ our son had the same experience. We weren’t able to make it to one of the accepted students’ days so he did an overnight that sounds similar to ALF’s daughter. In our son’s case, it sealed the deal for him as well.
So it just occurred to me: if you don’t have a major, what goes on the resume? Bachelor of Arts in _______?
My son will graduate next month with a Bachelor of Arts. His concentration is theater so that’s I’m sure what he’ll put on his resume.
Here’s a diploma: http://americanaframe.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Amherst-Circle-Diploma-01.jpg
It’s round, of course.
Many moons ago I graduated (not from Hampshire) with a self-designed interdisciplinary major, and that’s what goes on my resume. In casual conversation I’ll tend to give the name of the standard discipline that was a big focus, but that’s just because it’s shorter than naming a five-word major followed by an elevator pitch about what it involved LOL. Professionally, no one ever seemed thrown by the non-standard major. They liked the skills it developed, though 
BTW Hampshire is a college S is interested in checking out; will be curious to read what responses are to admitted students days (and any other visits).
We had a really good day at admitted student day yesterday. Although it was an admissions ‘event’ the key thing was that son was able to talk with a couple of professors - brilliant- in his interest area and really understand what each of the 4 years might entail as far as courses and projects. He attended a class on his own as well. It seems like a great community focused on student growth. Professors during the day and at the very nice lunch were approachable and helpful. Overall he loves the school and feels it fits him - he’s right. He hasn’t committed yet though - that’s him, he takes his time right up until the deadline!
@Snowdog - thanks for the update. My son will be doing an overnight on the 21st. I’ll be very interested to hear what he has to say.
@Awesomekidsmom, likewise. The president of Hampshire has made clear in his editorials and in what he said yesterday that the college is focusing much more on identifying not just good students but likely Hampshire students. Anecdotally it seems to be working; my informal survey of the prospective students at our table at lunch - so what do you guys think so far? was 100% “loving it.”
The new R. W. Kern Campus Portal building, under construction:
http://collegeconfidential.com/vibe/hampshire-college/?entry=image_0_2gv7jtoh
Hampshire finally completed their new website (https://www.hampshire.edu/), and I’m pretty impressed! I am on the committee that works on the website for my little college, so I’ve spent quite a bit of time looking at college website details. Very clean, simple and dynamic. Time will tell if it works well for prospective, entering and current students/families.
My favorite college website, though, is still this one: http://monstersuniversity.com/edu/index.html
That’s very good - modern and clean. Should be very interesting to prospective students. Applications as well as yield seem to be on the rise? From what I heard during move-in, yield was higher than expected this year and there was some scrambling to fit all of the new students into living quarters.
Hampshire just announced that they are planning to become the first college to generate all of its own electricity, from two fields of solar panels: https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2015/10/28/hampshire-plans-to-be-the-first-us-residential-college-supplying-100-percent-of
I’ll be interested to see how it all works. As in most of these electrical power-sharing agreements with local utilities, all the electricity generated by the solar array is dumped into the regional power grid, as opposed to strictly powering things on the campus. This makes some sense because otherwise the college would have to invest in a storage system to power the campus when the solar array isn’t generating enough electricity. So, really what they are talking about is the solar array generating more power than the college uses from the regional utility grid.
Wonder if that would have been helpful when they experienced Snowmageddon??
I’m thinking that it would not have helped, as all the solar power gets dumped into the regional grid. There is probably no way to switch the electricity to only feed the campus. I’ve been learning about all this, because I’ve been looking at installing a solar array at our house. The equipment needed to switch over, along with the required batteries, are cost-prohibitive. Apparently, switching equipment is also potentially hazardous, as power company workers don’t know whether or not a line is ‘live’ or about to be switched on/off.
We looked into solar at our house as well - it’s so complicated! I think you’re probably right about Snowmageddon and it not helping. It’s very expensive here as well. According to best estimates, it will take us 13 years to recoup the cost of the initial outlay - at that point we might not even be living in our house as we get closer to retirement. We would have had to cut down trees (extra $$$), etc. We would have loved to but it’s still so cost prohibitive.
According to the article, “This Just Might be the Greenest College in the World”, by EcoWatch (http://ecowatch.com/2015/12/23/hampshire-college-solar/), the solar panel project will include storage batteries, supplied by Tesla. The article claims that the batteries have, “…10 kilowatts of storage to provide back up power during periods of low generation”, which doesn’t make any sense. Battery storage is quantified as kilowatt-hours (kWh). If they meant that the batteries will have 10 kilowatt-hours of storage, that too doesn’t seem right. I have a Nissan Leaf electric car with battery capacity of 24 kWh. I’d like to think that the storage capacity of Hampshire’s solar-charged batteries will be a lot more than about half of my little car.
It’s a lot of fun to read about the changes happening at Hampshire and about current or recent students. I am class F85 and my husband is F72. No, we didn’t meet while we were at Hampshire. We both loved it and are thrilled that it is thriving. So far, none of our kids have been interested in applying, but maybe our last (#4) will for F18!
Hampshire just broke ground on the construction of the two solar panel fields:
https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2016/08/05/hampshire-breaks-ground-on-solar-arrays-aims-to-drop-co2-emissions-by-3000-metric
I will be interested to learn how much of Hampshire’s electricity demand will end up being satisfied by these panels. Obviously, electricity will be supplied from the power grid during the evening, but the solar panels will presumably make up for that during the day.