@londondad is your son happy at Miami? Is he going to stay there?
Yes, he likes it there. The views that I expressed are mine, not his.
I just want to weigh in here as a parent of a daughter who completed her first year at the University of Miami. First off, she completely loves the school and has excelled in all classes thus far. In terms of her friendships, she has intellectually challenging, like-minded friendships of people who are striving to get the best grades possible. Not only has she managed to secure a high paying job on campus, earning close to 4,000.00 in one semester, but she has participated in many school related volunteer activities. She states from experience, that the Greek presence is not overwhelming at all. In addition, my daughter has really developed unique, personal relationships with her teachers for core courses which is unlike the experience her friends have at larger schools. She feels that if she had attended a college such as UCLA or Penn State, as she has heard from her friends, she would be lost in the system. In fact, her friends at larger schools were unable to participate in certain clubs because of the competition for specific spots, etc. At the U, she feels recognized and valued and not just a number. I guarantee, if your child is the kind of person who is intellectually curious, they will attract that type of person. @londondad speaks only of his son’s experience… so I just wanted to offer my take on this amazing school.
It is never a good idea to get information about a school from just one person. So therefore, I just had to weigh in! Good luck making all of your choices.
A great thread - my S18 the musician has Miami/Frost Belmont and USC/Thornton as his top three He’s never be interested in Greek Life and I know its big at the U. Glad to see its not a deal breaker Are people seeing ample internships/opportunities for Music Artist development and Entrepreneur types out of Frost
@JerseyParents I am from Nashville so It’s cool that you are considering Belmont. Nashville is music city for a reason. Greek life is bigger at Belmont than UM but at both places it’s only as big as you want it to be. I don’t have experience with USC but it’s known to be very big there. All three are very good academically and in nice cities with things to do and professional connections. Belmont is very religious through so if that is an issue, take caution.
@netter11 - I am in complete agreement with your analysis. I now have my second child at the U, and I can’t imagine a better place for my children to learn and thrive.
One thing I would like to point out from your post. @londondad admits that these aren’t his son’s opinions - they are his.
@VHFather - Well said, VH. I’m not really sure why londondad enjoys dumping on UM so much (he has very little nice to say about the place in several threads), and if anybody on the fence about UM is using him as an “accurate” source of information, they’d probably run away screaming. Apparently “intellectual curiosity” is his measuring stick of a true college and college experience. Everything else? Meaningless drivel. 8-|
We’ve met many professionals with degrees from The U up here in the NYC/NJ area, so apparently those companies must value a Miami degree and aren’t overcome by a superior snobbery mindset, that would only send them searching for employees with more “intellectual curiosity” from Georgetown, Tufts and the other 1,000 colleges londondad feels are better than The U. BTW, it’s exactly that type of prevailing, condescending attitude that steered my son away from such “prestigious” schools and toward Miami.
I have recently had a chance to speak to other UM parents about the school and the consensus is not too different from mine. Here are some of the salient points:
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As a general rule of thumb, the smaller programs at UM are solid, such as Architecture, Frost Music School, Marine Biology are very strong. Engineering is also supposed to be good. The Business school is average at best, with the quality of the academics brought down by the number of kids in the “junkier” majors such as HR management, personnel mgt, sports administration, and media marketing.
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The A&S school is relatively small for a private university. Within A&S, Econ, Int’l relations and the sciences are very good, but I have not heard of any other majors being highly regarded. I think that the small size of A&S (compared to the preprofessional schools) is partially responsible for the lack of intellectual buzz of the school.
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As with @netter11 my son has been able to find like minded, hard-working intellectual friends, but it took him the better part of the first semester to find these kids.
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The majority of UM kids are hardworking, but there is a large minority of knuckleheads there, either very rich kids whose post UM lives are already sorted out or kids who are in easy majors who spend lots of time drinking and doing drugs.
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The housing and dining are both pretty bad. Most kids move off campus sophomore year. They are building new dorms but the classes of 2020 and 2021 will not benefit from the new dorms.
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The Greek life scene is toxic and has a big impact on campus social life despite the majority of kids being non-Greek. Generally the campus life is poor and based on drinking at frat parties, Coconut Grove or South Beach. Unlike many private schools, clubs do not feature much in campus life and the campus is generally pretty dead with the birds vastly outnumbering the humans (although the heat could be partially responsible)
I think that UM would appeal to kids who like certain aspects of big public Unis at a smaller size school and academically, it is probably comparable to second-tier publics such as UConn, Rutgers, Penn State, etc. It would be hard to argue that UM is academically better than any school above it in the USNWR rankings although it is probably comparable to other preprofessional schools such as Northeastern. It is probably comparable to other 50-75 ranked schools such as GW or Syracuse, which is fine, but one should not compare to schools higher ranked. Obviously, we did not expect UM to be U Chicago, but we were expecting more than a bunch of upper middle class and rich kids who are just going to Uni to get a job afterwards.
@londondad I’m sure all of the people working in HR management, personnel mgt, sports administration, and media marketing and keeping corporate america successful would appreciate your description of their majors as “junkier”. You obviously have made your mind up about what majors and jobs you feel are valuable and those you do not.
I just think that a Uni that bills itself as a “leading private research university” should be focusing on more intellectual and academic majors. Let the future HR drones of the world go to a CC or a state directional Uni and save their parents some money!
as would all the folks at UConn, Rutgers, Penn State 