<p>Does anyone have any inside information on U-Maryland/ Baltimore County.</p>
<p>Taxguy you always have good information on the MD schools so I hope you have insight here.</p>
<p>Thanks in advance.</p>
<p>tom-- what would you like to know? UMBC is in my backyard, & I was just there last night watching son in a lacrosse tourney.</p>
<p>Overall, UMBC is more of a communter school than UMd College Park, and has solid technical academic departments. I recruit there for engineers, like chemical & mechanical, and they are well-schooled. Campus is very modern with new buildings and kind of a beltway road surrounding most of the academic facilities. They are reknowned for their computer science focus as well as their chess team, which has won nationals several times.</p>
<p>I knew one kid who enrolled there and hated it.</p>
<p>The problem was social. Even those who live on campus tend to go home on the weekends. For the few who don't, there seems to be little to do.</p>
<p>I have heard the school is trying to become less of a commuter school- kind of like George Mason- is that correct? The academics seem fine I just want to get some feel for the "college like feel" My D has solid grades ok SAT scores-should be 600 range in each area. She would like schools in a city or surrounding suburbs. We are looking in Balt. DC and Philly. She likes LAC's but I want her to have some other options. She is only entering jr yr so we have time.</p>
<p>tom1944, check out Towson. It is near Baltimore and is another MD state school. When you are there you can look into Goucher (private LAC) at the same time. tom, I also thought that my son should have different options. Kids change between now and the spring of senior year. I had my son apply to a couple of larger schools, mostly small privates, and some medium sized schools. I did not think that the larger schools were a good fit, but I wanted my S to have the option of going to one if he decided that is what he wanted to do. He will be going to medium sized oos public this fall (James Madison University).</p>
<p>northeastmom- I have been following your posts and was aware that your son was going to JMU- a coworkers D is there and loves it. My D and I went to Towson and Goucher in April. She loves Goucher and most likely will be a strong candidate but one never knows or her tastes may change so I want more options. During Oct we plan to look at G Mason, UMBC, American and maybe back to Towson/Goucher. In Philly we will look at Ursinus, Arcadia and St Joes</p>
<p>tom, I hope that you know that GMason has been more of a commuter school in the past. I read something about new dorms going up, but I don't know how residential it will be next year. Also, for American, you might want to check with them about merit aid. I have been told that their #s a few years ago were above 3.5 (uw) and 1300 (old) for merit money. On this site I have seen a few students with lower stats receiving $, but the students I read about on cc were from the west coast (I am guessing that geographic diversity played a role).</p>
<p>Thanks- I am trying to get feedback on GMU and UMBC that is why visits will be very important. I am not real concerned with merit aid for American since I should be in a position to pay the bill if I have to. I will have to decide if it is worth the $ though.</p>
<p>As far as UMBC and commuting goes, most kids dont really live in the dorms. I see more and more UMBC students renting at nearby houses...after working there for a while and living right across the street from the campus...I've seen that the social life isn't too bad there, although most of it is mainly off campus in the surrounding neighborhoods. And most students have cars. def more of a science and engineering oriented school...</p>
<p>tom, You may want to send a PM to Marny1. Marny1 and her D were considering GMU, but chose another school. They did like it, but I know were unsure about the commuter situation.</p>
<p>I have been wondering if a small LAC keeps most of its students on campus but only has 1400 students(say 90% stay on the weekend) and a mid sized school UMBC has 3100 resident students and 50% go home on the weekend the feel of the place may be different but the pool of kids for social activity is pretty much the same. At GMU there are even more resident students since it has higher enrollment. Would the feel of the empty campus (even if actually more kids were at that school) be a significant negative?</p>
<p>I have thought about that too. I just don't know the answer. I can tell you that I have read numerous complaints about GMU being a commuter school, and about how social life is impacted.</p>
<p>I remember having a conversation about that with a friend of my kids last year when she was a freshman at Millersville U. I told her I had heard that quite a few kids went home on weekends and she said that since freshman were not allowed cars that most of them did stay and that there were many other kids that lived a distance away that made leaving impractical. At my daughters tiny college the majority of students stay on campus on the weekend because they are mostly from out of state (92%!) so the place is always seems full.</p>
<p>When we were looking at colleges we were looking for colleges that had a large out of state population for that reason. I know that the kids that go to a nearby state school often come home on weekends and that wasn't the experience my kids wanted.</p>
<p>Hi Tom1944--My d did consider GMU as Northeastmom said- but d felt that too many kids might go home on weekends so decided to go instate to SUNY Cortland. I can tell you that 2 of d's classmates will be attending GMU (we're from Long Island) and I have noticed some bumper stickers. So I do think GMU is beginning to draw some more OOS kids. I really liked the campus and it's proximity to DC was a big plus.<br>
I spoke to one of the mom's whose kid is going there and she said that GMU will consider a kid who lives off campus as a commuter, so in actuality there are really more kids who live on or near campus then the stats suggest. They are in the process of building new dorms- so I can only think this will add to a vibrant campus environment.
I gotta admit, my d is not the most adventurous of kids, so going to an OOS school may not have appealed to her. Personally if my choice were SUNY Cortland or GMU, I would have opted for George Mason- but then again I was a political science major and going to school near DC, would have been wonderful. We also looked at other OOS public schools including Towson and Temple (Philly). Temple may be a little too urban campus for some- but I liked that school too.<br>
I believe CSdad's d is going to start GMU. He is from upstate NY. You may want to try and track him down on these boards. Good luck.</p>
<p>Frankly, this is one school that I don't know about. I do know some people who go there, and they love it there. In addition, unlike Towson University, you do get a diploma from the University of Maryland.</p>
<p>Their reputation is pretty good on academics,but sadly this is all I know.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for the replies- we will need to visit to see what each campus is like. Does anyone know of schools for the avg. student that would not have a commuter feel to it. I would think only the top schools have national student bodies- I was on U of South web site and most of their students were from Tenn and at Lawrence most from Wisc. so even these schools could lose significant chunks of students on the weekends.</p>
<p>I assume that you are talking about state schools. I can tell you that UDel has a lot of OOS students. I think the issue is not just if it has a commuter feel, but also enough oos students so your D does not feel out of place. I would not want to send my kids to an oos school that has 90% instate students.
UDel-67% oos
UVM-72%oos-Burlington is nice, but cold
UNH-46%oos-cold too
I am sure that there are more. Towson is 1/3 oos I believe. You can double check these and search more by clicking onto the College Board's site and clicking "at a glance" for each school.</p>
<p>But a student could be out of state in Delaware and his home could be 30 minutes away in Maryland or Pennsylvania. I don't really get the point in going to a state school oos unless the tuition is lower or the in-state college is not as good. We did look at Delaware (daughter did not apply) and my son did look (and was accepted) at Towson but when there was no finaid or merit aid we took it off the list. There are so many good private LAC's that have better facilites and are much more generous with merit aid then any state school, in state or out of state. Jmho!</p>
<p>A lot of NJ kids look to UDel, b/c they don't like our instate schools. Many of the student's parents earn too much for financial aid, and many kids like the sports, so they prefer UDel to an LAC.</p>
<p>Makes sense northeastmom, just didn't make sense for our family because we do have good schools in PA and no interest in sports. sorry for slight hijack.</p>