<p>what do you predict for Vandy in the next issue of USNews rankings?
I ask this because Vandy is an especially interesting case this year, since it's applications jumped up 30% (highest among all significant colleges) and it's SAT average increased by something like 70 points.
Do you think Vandy will overtake Emory and Rice?</p>
<p>If I am not mistaken, the next issue of USNews college rankings will be using information about students who are currently freshman. If I am correct, the upcoming issue will not reflect this year's increase in applications, etc.</p>
<p>The reason I think this is true is because the SAT scores and the like are supposed to be of students who have actually matriculated, not just been accepted. Given the long lead time of a publication of this sort, the information just won't be available in time.</p>
<p>please never talk about rankings and vanderbilt again. if you are concerned about rankings go to washu</p>
<p>Washu has nothing on Vanderbilt, "the Harvard of the South" I think it will be ranked top 15 minimum. It is definitely a special place to be.</p>
<p>midmo, thanks for the good point</p>
<p>"please never talk about rankings and vanderbilt again"
it was just a curiosity... and an exciting one. jeez some people on here get annoyed/offended way too easily</p>
<p>"Harvard of the South" well, Vandy is not the most selective college in the south. and the fact that it is so noticeably "of the South" isn't what many consider a positive attribute. so I'm just saying it's just a phrase that's thrown around</p>
<p>it is termed the "harvard of the south" because its traditions, legacies, athletics, and academics. that has absolutely nothing to do with its rankings. if that were the case, duke would be the real 'harvard of the south', which it is not. the people that are concerned about rankings and go to vanderbilt because it's the highest ranked school they could get into are quite possibly changing vanderbilt for the worse. </p>
<p>ps if you don't consider "of the south" a positive attribute, again, please don't go to vanderbilt.</p>
<p>Dude, If it isn't selective enough for you then read the blog on the admission stats. Kids are "waiting" to get in to Vanderbilt. Some people have said "I don't want to go to the northeast and drink the cool-aid of the ivies and other LAC's like them." Vanderbilt is a very special place in a very special area. THE SOUTH!
Kids that got into Vanderbilt have been accepted to numerous high quality and higher ranked schools. Maybe that's the case for you but not for the majority.</p>
<p>John, More than "many" consider the SOUTH a VERY positive attribute. Like the rock group Lynard Skynard said about Neil Young, "A Southern man don't need him around anyhow."</p>
<p>wow this thread is stinking up fast
sorry guys, I didn't mean to offend anyone or slight Vandy, and I'm still not entirely sure how I accomplished just that
palmettotree, you're absolutely right. Vandy's athletics and demographics are more akin to Harvard than perhaps Duke is.
Yes, Vandy is a special place--I've visited and was duly impressed. In fact, although I have not made a final decision, I will likely turn down several higher ranked colleges for vandy
I know many of you, especially you southerners, are very very proud of the south and the southern culture at Vandy. My little comment was simply directed at the overwhelming presence of southern culture. I think Vandy is changing rapidly and becoming more diverse, and it is my hope that southerners at Vandy will not only accept but appreciate that change. In fact, I may just be a part of that change and increasing diversity.
but the fact remains that I'm not in the least way drawn to Vandy for its southerness. I'm drawn to Vandy for myriad other reasons, but its southern culture is not one of them. Of course, I don't have anything against southern culture--I'm just hoping that Southerners at Vandy can be as accepting as I'm willing to be. So for me, southern culture is not a positive attribute, and neither is it negative. But comments like "if you don't consider southern culture a positive attribute, then don't go to Vandy" hurt me and my high hopes for what Vandy has to offer. Please tell me I don't have to be into the south to be into vandy.</p>
<p>as for the original post, I was simply excited for Vandy. That is all. It doesn't mean I'm obsessed with rankings. But the numbers I believe do tell a story, and they show that Vandy has made great strides in the past admissions season</p>
<p>I have a feeling that you are a URM that has been fed lines of BS about how people are treated in the South. It is true that human nature dictates that we gravitate towards people like ourselves but in the South and in particular Vanderbilt the culture has become increasingly more diverse and more interesting because of it. You seem to be a smart person but it doesn't take a genius to figure out how to make an experience your own. What you put into it is what you will get out of it. The weather, the people, the city, the academics. What's not to like? Southern culture is much more adaptable than you think. When you come to the south you are taken in as a Southerner. You alone will have to make the south and Vanderbilt work for you and once you do, you will never have any place better on earth to thrive in.</p>
<p>JohnC, my son was born in New England, spent part of childhood there, then we moved to the midwest and lived there until he started at Vanderbilt. We aren't southerners, and he didn't choose Vanderbilt because it is a southern school, but because it had the best combination of many factors he wanted in undergraduate school. It may well be that many of the things he likes about Vanderbilt are due to its southern feel, but that isn't everything he likes about it.</p>
<p>One thing he does not like about the south in general is high summer heat and humidity, but even that has not prevented him from staying on in Nashville over the coming summer to do research with a professor. </p>
<p>Based on my son's experiences, and those of the many non-southerners he is friends with, you will find Vanderbilt to be a friendly, welcoming place that also offers top academics and a lot of activities from which to choose.</p>
<p>thanks for the responses.</p>
<p>I'm Asian, which oddly may actually be considered a urm at vandy</p>
<p>"When you come to the south you are taken in as a Southerner."</p>
<p>Thank you, bballl2008. You just described my experience here over the past 4 years.</p>
<p>The truth is, JohnC63, if you embrace the South and its traditions, it can quickly come to feel like home ... so much, in fact, that 4 years after matriculating at Vanderbilt you sometimes wish you were born here.</p>
<p>Vandy is not the Harvard of the South. If there is such a thing, it is Duke, by far and away. But that kindof a term is stupid anyway - Duke is Duke and Vandy is Vandy. It's not like the South needs to have its "Harvard," it has Duke and Vandy.</p>
<p>That said, Vandy is an outstanding school, and growing fast. But fellow posters from the North, Midwest and West, don't be fooled. You have to be brilliant to go to Vandy these days, but that doesn't mean its anything like Harvard. It's got some similarities, but mostly - culturally - it is much different. And we aren't talking about the differences between Duke and the ivies, either. </p>
<p>Duke is very much like the Ivies, but with less intellectual ********, less liberal hegemony and a "just-get-it-done" attitude. It's the Ivy's little, bad-ass brother. </p>
<p>Vandy is the old Southerner, not without intellectual bragging rights but without the culture Duke and the Ivies share. I remember talking to one of their admissions counselors over coffee up at my boarding school. She told me she hated the "World Hard, Play Hard," attitude of Duke and the Ivies. She asked, "Why does everything have to be hard?"</p>
<p>Well, Southerners, there you have it. If you focus on the "south" part, Vandy may really be the Harvard of the South. In the South, I've learned, people take time to smell the roses. And there's no time for that in the North, or at Duke, or in the rest of the world, you know, where important things are happening. </p>
<p>So no matter how much you think of Vandy, keep this in mind: There is a difference between the questions of how one approaches education, and how important that education is to you.</p>
<p>"Vanderbilt is considered the Harvard of the South" Fiske Guide to Colleges. Never ever ever has that been said about Duke. But ultimately, who cares? Well I'll grant you that the level of snootiness and elitism at the Ivies and at Duke probably are on a par with one another. To escape that one must venture a litlle further south to Vanderbilt.
Jct30 said:
"Duke is very much like the Ivies, but with less intellectual ********, less liberal hegemony and a "just-get-it-done" attitude. It's the Ivy's little, bad-ass brother." That, Jc is a joke!</p>
<p>Back to the original post from John and rankings and how he will fit in at Vanderbilt. John, were you born in an Asian country or live there now or are you an American with Asian background? You sound like an American that probably speaks a foreign language and English and have parents that were born in an Asian country. If so, you are like me except I am an American with a latin background. I know how the colleges like to label us for their statistics and such and who we are is a very real thing, but when you go to school at a place like Vanderbilt in a region like the South you will be first welcomed as an American. If you aren't American then you will be welcomed as someone who wishes to share American values, or why would you bother to try and get educated in an American system, and that is all good.</p>
<p>I've grown up in the US (wow i believe this is the first time I've disclosed my race on CC, kinda scary)</p>
<p>Why must I be taken in as a southerner? Why must I embrace southern traditions? Am I expected to do this? Fact is, I will seek to understand and explore and try to accept Southern traditions, but Vandy should not expect me to embrace it. I'm not coming to Vandy to be converted in this way into a southern man.
I want to be taken in as an individual. Instead of Vandy asking me to embrace southern qualities, will Vandy students attempt to embrace my qualities?
This is getting a little philosophical and maybe useless. But I'm just trying to gauge the mindset.</p>
<p>Dude, relax you have to bring it first. If you're not bringing it no one will pay any attention to you. That could be good for you if that's what you want. You can make the Vanderbilt a better place by being a groovy guy but if you think you're going to show up and scream, "here I am, embrace me" you have the wrong idea, PERIOD. </p>
<p>What if no one likes you? Is that their fault or your fault? You have to adapt to the environment, the environment will not be adapting to you. Be cool and don't sweat the small stuff and you will be great no matter where you go.</p>
<p>Remember what Billy Joe said, "It's something unpredictable but in the end there's right. I hope you have the time of your life."</p>