<p>Please do not apply to Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>W&L was a place for southern aristocrats with a few "John Boy Walton" old/rural Virginia types thrown in. It may still be. Not necessarily a bad place to be. Depends on your tastes and world view. The education is excellent.</p>
<p>Harvard does not sound like it would be a good fit for you at all, even with the legacy. Sure, there are the finals clubs, but they're more about collecting old money guys and freshman girls together in a mansion on Mt. Auburn street than the traditional frat scene...which is essentially absent at Harvard. The social life is fine at Harvard...it's just not geared for good ol' boys like you.</p>
<p>You'd probably enjoy yourself much more at Vanderbilt or W&L.</p>
<p>geraldw,</p>
<p>On further reflection you are not all like an URM, you're more like an endangered species. You don't need a college, you need a protected habitat. </p>
<p>I still think Hampden Sydney works, as does Wofford and the Citadel.</p>
<p>figure i'll point out that in your haste to pass judgement on someone that is clearly above you BALLETGIRL, you obviously made some basic grammatical and spelling errors. you don't need a college, you need an 8th grade english class.</p>
<p>sent you a pm gerald.</p>
<p>^ I'd be happy to suggest a place for you as well callingducks, perhaps a place with a nice blind. lol</p>
<p>Glad to see nice things said about HSC,America's finest all men's school.W&L is pure class.What's not to like?</p>
<p>It definitely does. Thanks Tigers. Are you at H-SC now?</p>
<p>GERALD - have you considered William & Mary by chance? I have also heard good things about HSC</p>
<p>Whoa - I'm a bit surprised and worried at the vicious anti-good ol' boy statements made on this thread... "Please do not apply to Vanderbilt" !!? Those of you ultra-PC posters need to step back and reassess. Tolerance is a very important quality that we should encourage in our youth, not elitism. How is that statement any different than the good ol' boys telling African Americans "Please do not apply to Augusta" (as they did until 1990)? Both comments are demeaning. I give the OP credit for being honest about his college interests, despite how non-PC they may be...</p>
<p>This thread is spooking me. I'm printing and filing for future reference of where our kids will NOT be applying!</p>
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And just to get inside my head a little more to offer any advice, I am naturally a huge fan of tailgating, drinking, and anything that involves not remembering what the heck went on.
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<p>SarahsDad, my tolerance ended with this line. Vanderbilt is spending a large amount of money and effort to put this obsolete image of VU to rest. </p>
<p>dke, I'm not sure which end of the conversation you are reacting to, but I can tell you that my son is a student at Vanderbilt and has found nothing about it that would please the poster gerald.</p>
<p>So the kid enjoys his way of life and would like to find something similar for college... I don't think you can attack him for that. That's the same reason I applied to my first-choice school. He wants southern comfort, just like his high school. I want a midwest school that's big on tradition, school pride, and family, which is what my high school is like.</p>
<p>Bottom line, he likes what's familiar.</p>
<p>I agree with you midmo. If my kid went to Vanderbilt I would get freaked out at the prospect of OP choosing Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>My problem doesn't lie with the wanting to be with old money(not completely a bad idea, good connections), but with the 'until they let the minorities in' line.</p>
<p>As someone who is looking at many of these 'top' schools because I run into too much either racism or at least racially held biases where I am, so I'd like to go to a more diverse and open minded area. And considering I looked at W&L(due to Honor Code, not diversity) and am applying to Vandy - that racial undertone bugs me.</p>
<p>Midmo, not to worry. I have a good friend with a daughter at Vanderbilt and she said its not too "good ole boy" either. Not sure about Wake or W and L, though.</p>
<p>Geraldw,
I looked at the website for your high school. Impressive place and hope you have enjoyed your time there, but the college placement wasn?t exceptionally strong when compared to other top private boarding schools, nearly all of which will also send many students to Harvard, Vanderbilt and W&L. Like others have posted previously, I would urge you to scale back your confidence a bit and expand your search. </p>
<p>I may be out of line here and I am not your parent, but from your posts I sense that you have a pretty narrow perspective on colleges and long-term, that is not going to be healthy for you. I suggest that you get out of your comfort zone a little bit and consider some other colleges in addition to your original three. Furthermore, if you want to combat the stereotypes that people will possibly assign to you, then you might want to expose yourself to some environments where you don?t have the advantage or the privilege and see how you stack up. My guess is you could/would handle it just fine wherever you go, but you would probably also personally benefit greatly from putting yourself in environments that are not so familiar to you. There are a lot of good places and good students out there and seeing more top colleges first-hand might give you a higher appreciation for the quality of the schools, the students and the experiences that they offer. And it might give you a little more perspective that will aid you in your college search process, not to mention how you spend your years as an undergraduate. </p>
<p>SarahsDad,
I think I understand where you are coming from, but I have seen midmo posting broadly and PC is not the term that I would use to describe her many helpful posts, particularly about merit aid and how this can lead some highly talented students to great colleges like Vanderbilt. Her son is a good example of how that school has changed and what it has become over the last decade. There is still room for the students to have a good, even raucous, time (even including like what the OP is looking for), but Vanderbilt is decidedly more academic and less financially elite today. And my guess is that that is the reputation that the school will have going forward. </p>
<p>dke,
I think your fears on Wake Forest and W&L are unfounded. It?s true that their environments are more homogenous than most colleges, but the very great majority of the students at these colleges are not cut from that ?good ole boy? mode. They may be preppier than most places and probably wealthier than most of their southern neighbors, but the people are terrific and very welcoming and student/alumni devotion to these institutions is very high.</p>
<p>I think Hawkette brings up some great points about the dangers of going into the college search with a narrow perspective. </p>
<p>However, if he is serious about his family being members at Augusta National - let's just say that he is EXTREMELY well-connected. (Augusta National, along with maybe Pine Valley and Cypress Point, is one of, if not the most prestigious private clubs in the World. Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are among the 300 members at Augusta.)
As a legacy at Harvard with a 2380 SAT, a tri-sport athlete and a member at Augusta National, I wouldn't doubt that Harvard is within his reach.</p>
<p>OP does not doubt his ability to get into any college, period. Basically all colleges are safeties for him. Notice he is also unconcerned about the potential "opening of doors" that the Harvard name would provide, since he is pretty sure that doors would open for him regardless of which college he attended.</p>
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OP does not doubt his ability to get into any college, period. Basically all colleges are safeties for him. Notice he is also unconcerned about the potential "opening of doors" that the Harvard name would provide, since he is pretty sure that doors would open for him regardless of which college he attended.
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<p>Is that surprising considering he's admittedly "old money"?</p>