Thanks! What I wouldn’t give to have my daughter be gloriously happy. She’s had a relatively bumpy road so far in life.
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Tough to compare it to where she might be without knowing where that is. The population of Amherst, MA is just over 35K and goes up substantially with school in session. Springfield MA (150K) is 30min away. Worcester MA (200K) is an hour away and Boston is under 2 hours away.
Amherst is a small(ish) city and a big town. The question is always going to be “what is it that you think you want to do that you won’t be able to do there?”
My daughter is a sophomore who grew up in a midwestern college town (100K) that’s located about 40 miles west of a metropolitan area (1M+). She loves Amherst (and doesn’t have a car there, either). She spent last spring break in Boston and is heading to NYC this spring break (taking the bus) . . .
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I went to UMass for grad school in the 90s after growing up in NYC. It never felt isolated to me at all - it’s a really vibrant area even if a little small. It’s perfect for a college student/young adult, in my opinion. We still live in NYC but bought a house in the Berkshires a few years ago, so visit Amherst/Northampton often. It’s even nicer now and there is so much in the greater area. I didn’t think it would end up on my daughters top list, but it seems to have won her heart a bit. I don’t think that it would feel isolated with such a range of students and so many schools in the area.
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Thanks! Besides worrying about political climate (she wants a blue state and I think we are set there), she’s literally thinking about things to do like: museums, live performances large and small, shopping, cultural fairs, exploring parts of a city.
We have an overload of things like pumpkin and berry picking, camping, hiking, water sports and snow sports where we live but that’s about it. She likes exploring and activities and road trips.
We are about 2.5 hours from a very large urban city and that’s not close enough for her with so little to do in her home town.
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This is something our daughter would love. Visiting Boston and NYC for breaks. Curious - does she stay with friends or in a hotel or other? Just factoring additional costs in.
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So last year she and her roommate went to Boston for a concert, and they stayed at a hotel (which is more difficult than you might think to find, as both girls were 19 and lots of places won’t rent to those under 20).
This year in NYC my daughter and a friend she is going to live with at UMass next year are definitely getting a hotel.
I think the bus to Boston/NYC is fairly cheap. When she comes home, we do have to pay for a shuttle from Hartford airport to Amherst. But she really only comes home at Christmas break (stayed in Amherst for Thanksgiving this year).
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We live very close to nyc, I have a daughter at school in Boston, some of my kids have visited many places where other students live. Over winter break a friend of hers from Seattle came here to visit and they went into NYC (and Hoboken). I’m sure she will meet a lot of other students from these areas. I have a 20 year old in SC who loves road trips, she’s been to several other schools in other states with her college friends who have friends there (she doesn’t have a car).
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I’ve lived in MA all my life (about 1/2 way between Worcester and Boston). If you can get beyond the colder winters one of the things I’ve always loved about this area is accessibility to just about anything you want within 3 hours drive - and mostly much less than that. Ocean, mountains (hiking, skiing, etc), multiple world-class cities (Boston, NYC, Hartford). The vibe of the school is going to be something any student should experience to make sure its a fit for them but I would never say there’s not enough to do around Amherst.
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I have to laugh at this because it is all relative. I lived in upstate NY and Chicago suburbs for 15 years before I moved to MA (just East of Worcester). I consider the winters here quite mild.
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Thank you that’s another reason I asked - it’s hard for young adults to get hotels and rentals sometimes. We are fine with the Hartford shuttle - I did look into those. And airfare is surprisingly reasonable for us into Bradley.
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Everything she could need is walking distance, just like a city. Because of the sheer number of college students, everything of importance is open super late. I love love visiting my friends there. It really is its own city, especially if you consider population density. There’s ALWAYS something to do.
I live in a small town of 12,000 in Mass - 30 mins from both Providence and Boston and 45 mins from Cape Cod. I am much more isolated here at home than I feel when I am in Amherst. I have to drive everywhere. They roll up the sidewalks at 8pm. It’s awful. I get it.
The only reason I’m considering school elsewhere is that I want out of Massachusetts. Otherwise, UMass is a no-brainer and probably where I’ll end up anyway :).
Good luck! I’m sure it’ll all work out the way it’s supposed to.
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This is what she would be hoping for! Plus just making some wonderful friends in general to do these things with! I’m pretty sold on UMass for her . . .
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Agreed, for our daughter the winters there would be quite mild. Similar actually to her hometown. But she loves winter. For awhile she was thinking she wanted MORE snow - i.e. college in Maine, Michigan or Minnesota!
Thank you for this!!
Agreed it’s all relative - not knowing where the OP was hailing from it’s tough to tell how much of a change winter in MA might be. The last 10 years particularly have been fairly mild but again, it’s relative.
Sorry, I’ve probably said in other discussions where we are from but lately I’ve been working on being more discreet for my daughter’s sake.
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I’m a current student - UMass, Smith, Mount Holyoke areas especially have vibrant live music scenes and lots of smaller museums and boutiques. It’s not massive - I grew up a half hour train ride from Boston and do sometimes feel stifled - but there is always something going on if she is independent enough to use the bus system, seek out events, and sometimes go to them alone
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Thank you so much!
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My D is a college sophomore and her advice to her twin siblings who are HS seniors was to not place to much emphasis on location b/c you won’t have time to do much off campus anyway. Much more important to love the campus and the people on it. That will be your life for 4 years. She takes excursions on breaks to NYC, Boston, and Europe, but doesn’t actually even get into Northampton much from Smith when school is in session b/c she is BUSY.
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