This might be the saddest and stupidest reason I ever heard of to reject a college.
Ha! My kid passes 3 Starbucks on his way to his dual enrollment CC in the morning (3 miles).
Hampden-Sydney seems to be doing OK. Possibly because there are so few all-male colleges left that guys who seek that environment have relatively few options.
You know, all the hand-wringing over the “30 minutes from a Starbucks” line is missing the point of the person who made it—it was simply, when read in context, a way of underscoring how remote and isolated SBC is compared to its peer institutions. It’s not saying that college students want to have a Starbucks within shouting distance, it’s saying that they generally want some of the trappings of modern life nearby.
^I agree: “Starbucks” here is a signifier…
Not all students place a high priority on the “trappings of modern life”. However most students (and thier tution paying moms and dads) want a quality education. SBCs head hancha seems to blaming the landscape for a problem inside her own house. Deflection of the first degree. No wonder the alum ore out raged.
It doesn’t have to be all students, but if enough students don’t choose this school then isn’t that a problem in and of itself? I doubt there’s just one reason; it’s probably a set of reasons – the location may alienate people who are OK with everything else.
As far as the Starbucks thing – full-pay families have an embarrassment of options when it comes to college. Exactly how many threads do we have along the lines of, “My D rejected XYZ college because of something that happened on a tour”? Eventually when you have too many options to seriously and objectively consider you have to start ruling them out based on arbitrary criteria.
(Really, not having a Starbucks is no more arbitrary/silly than, “Oh, we went on a campus visit in February and it was cold!” or “They sent us too many letters after my son took the PSAT”.)
There’s, what, 3000 4-year universities in the U.S.? How many families seriously and carefully considered all of them? Chances are 99% of them were cut from the potential list without more than a cursory consideration or even any consideration at all.
That might be part of SB’s problem. It’s possible that a lot of students who may have been interested never even thought about them even briefly.
“I had never heard of Washington & Lee before CC, and I would still have never heard of it if outside CC”
Washington & Lee has the highest SAT/ACT scores in Virginia. Pay attention.
?? There may be some confusion here. I did post that Babson and Olin aren’t that close, but I don’t think I said anything about the town. In my experience, the town of Wellesley has a lot more to offer than most people here seem to think it does. 
Back in the day, it even had a head shop, LOL! I guess I felt perfectly fine with the rich suburban feel because it felt a lot like New Canaan, although New Canaan had a LOT of liquor stores per capita and Wellesley was dry. B-) I also found it exceedingly easy to get into Boston/Cambridge, and Boston/Cambridge was hog heaven for students then.
^^My two daughters never even thought about Sweet Briar, even briefly. If it would have been free, it would have been a hard sell, not really because it is all female, but more because of the size and how rural it is. We looked at Presbyterian College and that school, at 1200 student, was very small for them.
“most students (and thier tution paying moms and dads) want a quality education.”
– which is available at probably hundreds of schools that cost less, and offer more than SBC, @momneeds2no. How hard is this to understand?
“Man, you guys must all be from the east coast… Lol. I’m cracking up at how you all think Sweet Briar is so rural. I just looked at a map and it’s less than a mile from a town of 32,000 people, and a mere 10 miles from another town of 78,000 people. Less than 15 miles from a Target, Olive Garden, etc.”
Which is completely inaccessible unless someone has a car. To be accessible to college students means walking or possibly biking distance.
People are being deliberately dense re Starbucks. It’s the concept of accessibility.
Consolation - I know you didn’t say anything re the town! I was just commenting re SBX!
"Not all students place a high priority on the “trappings of modern life”. "
But a lot do. SBC wasn’t differentiated academically.
I have to agree. “15 miles away” is not accessible. A lot of these residential colleges discourage or prohibit freshmen from having cars on campus. Where I grew up (in Virginia – admittedly on the East Coast), I never had to drive 15 miles or even 5 miles just to find a Target. None of these are inherently dealbreakers at least for me but we can’t really minimize that as something that couldn’t possibly affect someone’s opinion. Even if it were true that only East Coasters consider Sweet Briar a rural school (which I don’t really buy but I can’t really disprove), that’s still a lot of people who could potentially care. It all adds up.
The town of Lynchburg apparently once had that ritzy Lily Pulitzer sort of vibe but now it is more like a depressed and depressing part of Appalachia. It is not at all quaint and cutesy. Staunton where Mary Baldwin is is much nicer.
What about a “We serve Starbucks” deal? Any of those in the Sweet Briar area?
Oh good grief! This is a metaphor! It isn’t specifically about coffee access!
Or is it…