Web site or book with how to figure out what type of college

Parents Forum
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My D is looking for resources on what types of colleges work for what types of students. For example, she doesn’t know if she wants a big school or small school. I guess she’s wondering what are characteristics of students who do well in the different environments. (Her first instinct was not wanting a small school or small town but seems to be questioning that after visiting some schools.)

In addition, she is back to undecided about course of study after having thrown out two general options over the last year.

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I do not know of any such resource.

Broadly speaking, the transition from high school to LAC (small colleges) is easier than the transition from high school to a university. This is not an assertion that academics are easier, but that there is less to adjust to at an LAC due to the small size of such schools.

Otherwise, privacy or any degree of anonymity is difficult to achieve at an LAC where almost everyone knows your business.

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It’s an interesting question. The large books - like Barrons which we used - will have the school details and will have some intro pages - which won’t go into depth.

I think the best case is to get her to an area with multiple colleges - and just walk around - a couple big ones, a couple medium, and couple small. The reason i say a couple is - we took my daughter to Dennison and she hated it - it’s so spread out. Her current school is larger population size, but more compact (or it seems to me).

I think by going and seeing - wow, there’s so many people…or on a football day…it’s overrun. Do I want that? Seeing the big sorority houses like at Alabama - do i want that…or it’s too much. This one is an hour from a city. This one is in a city.

Not saying to sign up for tours. Maybe just a few Saturdays now that school has started - or a weekday if she hasn’t yet started school - go visit a couple colleges a day over 3 various days - walk the campus, have lunch nearby or in the student center, see the surrounding area (grab a bagel or do a little shopping). See if an overall environment clicks.

From there, you can narrow down - because you might say, she likes the bigger schools but not 300 person classes. Well many big colleges today have Honors colleges where that can be narrowed down, etc. In other words, you can make a bigger place small but not vice versa.

As for no clue in what she wants to study, that’s no problem. Most kids don’t nor should they - that’s why you explore. For those that do, many change.

If she’s unsure but it’s a liberal art or science (pscyhology, english, chemistry), you can pretty much go anywhere.

if it’s soil management that’s a possibility, then you pretty much can focus anywhere.

Different schools by admission level or requirement might behave differently. In other words, a student at a large elite school like Michigan, that is residential, might be different than a non-elite large school like Middle Tennessee, which is less residential, etc.

Students at Swarthmore (elite, small) might be different than students at Eckerd (small, but on the beach and while solid, not elite) - different in study habits, party habits, personality, political-ness, etc.

Personally, I’d casually find the alleged fit from size, geography, weather, sports, greek life (not that you have to participate - but some schools it’s huge, others it’s non existent). My son goes to a huge greek school, joined…wasn’t for him. Left…it’s no problem, etc.

So i’d start with some casual visits to 6 or so schools - and see if there’s a “pull” toward one type. If there is you can verify it.

If you vacation, you can add a half day “on the way” if you drive - or do a nice parent/daughter field trip - mix a hike with let’s spend an hour walking around here, etc.

Good luck.

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We’ve done some summer visits but there were few students on campus so she didn’t really get the vibe. I guess we need to fit in some visits this fall when students are back. We are also in Texas so visiting schools isn’t that easy. (I think she was surprised at how much she like my LAC alma mater in spite of it being my alma mater.) We will make an effort to get to different types of schools this fall - Southwestern, Trinity, U Texas Austin. I can’t imagine her at Texas A&M or SMU although I know A&M has so many students that she could find her people. She’d probably love Rice but it is so hard to get into. The pandemic wasn’t kind to her GPA.

To be honest, I think that a LAC would be a good fit for her and I think she suspects the same but is wary of a small school because she is tired of her high school community after 4 years with the same group of students. She isn’t interested in Greek life or big time sports. She’d like to play Ultimate or maybe intramural soccer. I guess the key is for her to figure out if that is really the case or whether she is ready to do what it takes to reach out more at a big university.

I did just find this that provides summaries of the usual advantages and disadvantages of college locations and sizes.

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I’d suggest reading “Colleges That Change Lives”. It could give her a sense if that type of school (mostly small LACs ) is appealing.

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You may want to read How College Works, by Daniel Chambliss and Christopher Takacs. This appears in a description from the publisher:

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The Insider’s Guide to the Colleges is my trusty resource for firsthand accounts of student experiences and college fit. It really helped us narrow the college tour list and focus only on those colleges where mountainkids felt they could thrive.

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Re: “Great teachers were more important than the topics studied”

It may not be a very satisfying academic experience if the student finds insufficient offerings in the student’s topics of interest, regardless of how great the teachers are in other areas.

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As the parent, have you done the financial planning to come up with a college budget, and informed the student of what the budget is?

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Yes, we’re prepared on the financial end. We’re able but not thrilled to pay what comes up on the net price calculators. This is our second child going to college. Older son will be starting his junior year in a couple of weeks. He had stronger ideas of what he wanted in a school and a better idea of what he wanted to study. He is doing a combined major in engineering and CS so it was a different type of search. Theoretically our daughter’s search should be more similar to our past experiences in college but things have changed a lot over the last 30 years.

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Be sure to run net price calculator hypotheticals for when the second student is in college after the first student graduates.