Son's college list needs help--or perhaps not? (Confused)

Parents Forum
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<p>I posted this on the College Admissions and Search forum, but the Parents' forum seems like it might be a more helpful place to ask for feedback on my son's college list. It's short, and in an ideal world (a world where all LACs offered courses in Chinese!) it would be longer. In the imperfect world we live in, I don't know if the list is fine as it is (son's perspective) or if we should keep looking to add schools, especially match and safety schools (my perspective).</p>

<p>The sticking points, as suggested, are that son wants an LAC and classes in Chinese. Plenty of reachy LACs offer Chinese but among the less selective LACS it's sort of hit or miss. Adding to the difficulty in expanding the list is that son doesn't want to go to a regional LAC outside of the South. (This is explained a little in the orginal post, pasted below.)</p>

<p>So what shoudl we do? Adding a few more reach LACs would be fairly easy (I think Swarthmore will eventually re-emerge as a favorite--right now son is offended that even though we did visit this summer, Swarthmore keeps sending him mail encouraging him to come visit . . .). Finding a few more matches and a safety school would make me feel a lot better, but I have thought pretty hard about this and have not come up with any additional good options.</p>

<p>Here is the original post:
Need some match and safety schools </p>

<hr>

<p>Male, from non-competitive high school in the South.
ACT 31
GPA unweighted 3.8
No sports but good school and community ECs</p>

<p>Wants a LAC or small university, and wants to study international affairs and foreign languages, including Chinese. The Chinese thing is what's making it hard to find a long list of good match schools. The reach schools are:
Middlebury
Carleton
Macalester</p>

<p>Rhodes is on the list too.</p>

<p>At the moment, he is thinking that if he does not go to a top LAC, he wold prefer to stay in the South (hence Rhodes). His reasoning is that the non-top-tier LACs tend to have a lot of in-state students, and he thinks that he would prefer not to be the only (or one of only a few) Southerners at for example a college in Arizona, when everyone else is from Arizona.</p>

<p>What colleges might we be missing? So far Hendrix, Birmingham-Southern, and Guilford have been considered but rejected because they do not offer any classes in Chinese. Also looked at Earlham but again no Chinese. Sewanee does offer some classes in Chinese but it seems much more frat-oriented, conservative and non-diverse than Rhodes.</p>

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<p>Rollins College in Florida has something named the "China Center." Some posters on our boards have had kids attend and speak highly of the college.</p>

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<p>Does he want to MAJOR in Chinese, or just take Chinese language classes? </p>

<p>The reason I ask is, I've got a similar situation with my D, who wants a LAC that offers Japanese. And we've found that it often takes quite a bit of digging to confirm whether Japanese is offered when it's not a department or a major. We've learned not to rule a school out until we've dug deeply into their academic offerings to make sure those Japanese language classes are not hiding under Asian Studies, East Asian Studies, Modern Languages, etc.</p>

<p>I know Reed offers Chinese, and Rice offers Chinese underneath its interdisciplinary Asian Studies major.</p>

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<p>Maybe College of Wooster? (Ohio)</p>

<p>I know of an entering student there who will study Chinese. There is only a minor, but the boy plans to spend junior year in China. He did get a very enticing merit package, but I don't know his stats. I think they were probably quite good, because he took the SAT for some kind of program as an 8th grader and scored in 95th %ile of all test takers. But his family moved away not long after that, and I have not kept in close touch. </p>

<p>My D received a good merit offer from Wooster in '07 but decided to go elsewhere. She had slightly higher grades but lower test scores than your son. She did have some significant EC accomplishments and also geographical draw as we live in Germany. But your geography might be attractive to Wooster as well. It struck me as a good solid school, not strictly regional in appeal.</p>

<p>I think you are realistic about listing the first three as reaches and right about expanding the list. I think Wooster would be a solid match or maybe even safety, with merit aid quite possible.</p>

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<p>Bowdoin offers four years of Chinese.</p>

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<p>I wonder if summer experiences or a junior year abroad could meet the need (or least augment limited course offerings) for a Chinese curriculum. It is so limiting to look for a southern LAC with Chinese! I hate to think of all the great schools crossed off of his list for this reason alone.</p>

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<p>Someone really serious about Chinese might want to spend a year abroad, so you will want to look into the study abroad program as well. Especially in somewhere like China, most students are going to be A LOT happier in a well-established program with American staff on location to help with difficulties.</p>

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<p>Eckerd offers a Chinese minor, a minimum of two years of language plus related courses. New College will begin offering Chinese in 09-10.</p>

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<p>Regarding your primary concern, yes, I think he needs some easier targets on his list. If I understand you correctly, you want a southern LAC that is not a "reach".</p>

<p>Does Texas count as southern? Try Trinity University (an LAC) in San Antonio. Also New College of Florida will have a new Chinese concentration. Both of these would seem to be "matches" for him without some of the objections raised to the other schools.</p>

<p>Southwestern University (also an LAC) in Texas might qualify as a "sure bet" for him. It has a Chinese concentration, too, as does Wofford College in South Carolina, although I know little about this school.</p>

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<p>Wofford is a very good school. Very southern, pretty conservative. Elon has an Asian Studies minor, Chinese language and is big on study abroad, including Semester/Year/Winter programs in China.</p>

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<p>Check out Furman's Department of Asian Studies. They have plenty of language & culture classes, and they have an excellent study abroad in China. D was at Furman last year & heard good things about the program.</p>

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<p>You may want to take a look at Tufts as a reach school ... great international relations and Chinese too:</p>

<p>Department</a> of German, Russian & Asian Languages and Literature - Tufts University</p>

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<p>While Rollins doesn't have a Chinese major, it does have a study abroad program in China, and the below courses.</p>

<p>My S is a soph at Rollins and LOVES it: small classes, administration that looks for ways to say "yes" to students' ideas, faculty and administration who care about teaching and are easy to know, beautiful campus nicely located by a lake and in a lovely town that's a suburb of Orlando (eateries and other things are just off campus), due to the excellent merit aid, there also is a core of academically-inclined, bright students.</p>

<p>Courses in Chinese:
CHN 101 Introduction to Mandarin Chinese I: Introduces students to the fundamentals of the Mandarin Chinese language.</p>

<p>CHN 102 Introduction to Mandarin Chinese II: Develops student's vocabulary and grammatical skills in the Mandarin Chinese language. Prerequisite: CHN 101 or equivalent.</p>

<p>CHN 201 Intermediate Chinese I: Reviews the basic structure of Mandarin Chinese grammar and the rules of pronunciation. Develops vocabulary, expression building, reading, and writing. Prerequisite: CHN 102 or equivalent.</p>

<p>CHN 202 Intermediate Chinese II: Enhances student's skills in writing, reading, and comprehension of Mandarin Chinese. Prerequisite: CHN 201 or equivalent.</p>

<p>CHN 301 Advanced Chinese I: For students with intermediate level of Mandarin Chinese to develop their all-around skills of the language, with particular attention to speech and reading skills. Prerequisite: CHN 202 or equivalent.</p>

<p>CHN 302 Advanced Chinese II: Enables students with an intermediate level of Mandarin Chinese to further develop conversation and composition skills. Prerequisite: CHN 301 or equivalent.</p>

<p>Rollins has long had a rep as a party campus, but that decreases every year due to the caliber of students whom the merit aid is attracting, and due to the college's innovative efforts to help students connect by doing things other than drinking. For instance, every freshman has to take a RCC (Rollins College Conference) course fall semester. RCCs are seminars on interesting subjects.</p>

<p>Students are guaranteed to get in one of their top 6 picks. Subjects change each year, but this year include things like "Being Chinese, Lives and Longings of 1.3 billion " (This RCC is also a living community meaning that participants live in the same dorm), "Environmental Political Action" (another living learning community RCC), "The Maturation of Harry Potter", "Making Movies," and "The Emerging World Order in the Era of Globalization." 17 or fewer freshmen are in each RCC, which gives students a great chance to make friends with similar interests. Rollins</a> College Conference</p>

<p>Rollins also has very strong community service opportunities and got a state award for this last year. CS is included in freshmen week activities, too.</p>

<p>Rollins</a> College - Class of 2012 Helps Local Elementary School Prepare for the School Year</p>

<p>Rollins has had a strong international focus dating back to its beginning in the 1800s.</p>

<p>It also has excellent merit aid that your S may qualify for. My S got merit aid with lower gpa, higher scores than your S, and had excellent ECs particularly community service. I suspect that your S might have a shot at Rollins' top merit aid -- full rides, something my S's gpa kept him from getting.</p>

<p>I notice your S doesn't play sports. Sounds like my S, who is delighted that Rollins lacks a football team. Interesting, S did get into an unusual, culturally-based club sport at Rollins that requires more physically than do sports like football and basketball, so he is finally getting physically fit. Until going to college, S had been a couch potato, though he was naturally lean. </p>

<p>PM me if you have questions about Rollins.</p>

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<p>We know kids who have done Chinese at Hamilton and Kenyon. I don't know how these would qualify under your non-regional criterion. I think you'd find a good geographic range.</p>

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<p>Not in the South, but Vassar offers Chinese and is very strong overall in foreign languages.</p>

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<p>Bennington in Vermont offers Chinese. It draws students from allover. It is probably less selective in terms of academic criteria, but the applicants are self-selecting because it is such a unique school. We loved it.</p>

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<p>In VA, he might consider Roanoke (East Asian concentration), Randolph-Macon (Asian Studies concentration), University of Richmond (Chinese minor), Washington and Lee (East Asian Langs & Lits major). </p>

<p>Depending on what he means by a small university, he might also consider College of William and Mary in VA (Chinese Lang & Culture major). Similarly, Wake Forest in SC isn't that big a university, and has a Chinese major.</p>

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<p>As you help your S select his colleges, keep in mind that most college students change their majors twice. Consequently, being able to take Chinese may be good enough for your S. He may not need to be able to major in it.</p>

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<p>Connecticut College in New London, CT, and Trinity College in Hartford are less selective than Swarthmore, Tufts, and some of the other colleges named on this thread but are more selective than many of the others ... thus perhaps good middle-of-the-pack options. Both draw national (well, even international) student bodies.</p>

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<p>Check out Lawrence University Lawrence</a> Academics Chinese and Japanese</p>

<p>Opps, didn't see region restriction....but LU has a good many internationals and students from out of the region.</p>