@ucbalumnus - Deferred from EA.
@intparent - yeah it is a bit of pride but if you have done your pre-admissions homework all of the schools you apply to are good options ;).
Sure… but it is still kind of silly if the school is a good fit and the cost is right. Your kid will never see the admissions people who delayed your kid’s admission again. Remember that the early pool is a lot of athletes, legacies, and URMs – so what if they put your kid into the RD pool, then decided to accept them? It might be the best school of all for your kid – treat this like a business transaction (as the colleges sure do) and review all your options. Don’t let emotions that aren’t relevant to your kid’s long term happiness at the school get in the way.
I wouldn’t pay for my kid to go to a school that:
- is crazily expensive and doesn't provide even half-decent financial aid (that takes NYU, BU, WUSTL, and UMiami off the table automatically - in addition to me personally finding them vastly overrated)
- is located in the Deep South. The ONLY possible exception would be Tulane.
- has a social scene featuring MASSIVE Greek Life dominance. And I say this as a prospective rushee next fall.
- denied me when I applied. They're free to apply if they're okay with the fact that I certainly wouldn't pay a single cent of my own money if they want to go to any of those schools.
- has a history of scandal; guess that's double jeopardy for some schools that denied me!!
- is located in Texas (only exception would be UT-Austin)
- is located in a barren, desolate state (most Midwestern states)
- is located in my home state; Princeton, Stevens, and Rowan would be the only exceptions.
- is named East Carolina, William & Mary (terribly overrated) or High Point.
Other than that, they would be free to go wherever they choose.
Just realized Rice was located in Texas…I’d pay for my kid to go there. And just in case Georgia is considered the Deep South (I don’t), I’d pay for Emory, GT, and UGA.
Have you actually been to the Midwest???
As long as it is within the agreed upon cost, I trust my D’s choice, no other restrictions.
Student and parents both agree on these so not sure I should say we wouldn’t allow, but rather they wouldn’t attend if:
Intellectual level is off for student (and both student and parents feel it)
No direct admit to a competitive major (like CS)
Inability to change major with relative ease
Safety issues and too big a housing struggle after freshman year
Odd demographics
A non-progressive/old school mindset
Cold climate (see user name)
Boring location (small isolated town)
D13 wanted a coop (Chem E major). We toured Vanderbilt and during the info session the presenter flat out said that they didn’t do coops and that the school believed you should graduate in 4 years. After the session D said “that’s a deal breaker”. We never even did the campus tour. Vanderbilt had been on her radar since her sophomore year. I’m kind of surprised we missed that detail while researching the institution.
D made her own list of what she wanted in a school and then made the list of schools to visit. Although we visited every one of them, I took two off her list because of the neighborhoods. Unfortunately, one was her initial first pick but she got over it in time. Cost came in a close second, we set a budget and it was firm. Again, her first pick didn’t come in at budget so I vetoed it. That was a tough choice for me, everyone thought it was a fantastic fit, but no one else was paying for it. Finaid that followed study abroad was very important as well. In that aspect, she knew if it didn’t follow, she wouldn’t be studying abroad.
@wisteria100 no question that real assaults happen, and likely outnumber the questionable cases. For me, it is all about how a university handles these issues. Is it a knee jerk reaction to automatically suspend or expel someone, or is there actual due process. I do not think a university kangaroo court should be handling these issues; bring in real law enforcement and the legal process. Read some of these cases. It is scary how little actual data there is, and sometimes absolutely all of the evidence supports a consensual encounter, yet the school has already destroyed someones academic record for 2-3 years. I think more multi-million dollar countersuits from the falsely accused/prosecuted/expelled students are going to be needed until colleges take the hint that they should not be adjudicating these issues.
Regarding the coed bathroom issue. It’s important to remember that there are 2 general set-ups. One is the kind that serves, say, 6-8 kids and isn’t appreciably different from sharing a hall bathroom at home with opposite-gender siblings - you can brush your teeth next to them and it’s rare that multiple people are in there at once. The other is the kind that might serve 30, 40 kids on a floor and has rows of toilets, sinks, showers - more like a large gym or large public restroom.
It’s of note to me that the posters who consistently say coed bathrooms are no big deal typically lived in vintage dorms in some kind of suite setting, experienced the first type where it was indeed like a hall bath shared by siblings, and aren’t thinking of the second type.
It’s also of note to me that there are no other large public facilities (gyms, health clubs, stadiums) that are built with coed bathrooms.
LBad, the Midwest covers a range of geographies just like the east coast (or the south, or the west). Are you picturing tumbleweeds or something? Where do you get your notions from? Other New Jerseyites?
I sure wish my kid at Northwestern didn’t have to go to school in a desolate, barren place, and could have gone to a vibrant place like Rutgers…
…the poor kid is so tired of spending Friday nights on the front stoop whittling, just praying for an invite to a barn raising or a church social.
Wow. Would never occur to me that my kids couldn’t go to s school that turned me down.
I wouldn’t rule out any entire regions of the country either. I’m not the one who has to live there. I mean,
And I just don’t care about bathrooms.
Why is the co-ed bathroom scenario different if there are differing numbers of showers, etc? I lived in the biggest frosh dorm at Michigan and there were four showers in the bathroom on our hall. Single sex – but at the co-op with the co-ed bathroom a couple years later, there were 3 showers in our bathroom. My D1 says hers was shared by the whole hall, too, and was no big deal. I guess I don’t see the distinction – and also think it is generally much more common than parents realize.
I remember a mother/daughter on our Vassar tour having a heated and very audible argument about the gender-neutral bathrooms. I think it was more of an issue for the daughter than the mom. It never occurred to us that this would be a deal breaker. There were stalls for toilets and showers, after all.
As for deal breakers, my daughter wants to go someplace that has seasons and where it’s green part of the year. So we’re targeting those barren, desolate Midwestern states.
While co-ed bathrooms may be no big deal for some individuals, they may be for others. I know my current 11th grader would not like that living arrangement. Her older sister wouldn’t have cared. They have very different personalities and different lifestyles.
Not sure why the presumption is that every person should agree with every perspective? My kids are incredibly dissimilar. Not surprising that random posters with different backgrounds have different criteria.
@CDK - absolutely agree with you that these cases need to be handled by law enforcement and not campus security. That is why so many of them have been bungled - the evidence was not collected in a timely manner or the victim faced pressure from the school not to report. These are crimes and should be handled as such. Interesting take on the Columbia situation as the article you reference takes the side of the accused. Most other reporting favors the girl’s side and there is plenty of evidence to support her story. It’s a bad situation for all involved, but I do give her a lot of credit for bringing attention to the issue
Co-ed bathrooms sort of reek (sorry) of trying so hard to be sophisticated and blase’…like “look at us, we don’t subscribe to those puritanical customs of our fore-persons; men and womyn are the same, and if you have a problem dropping a deuce 10 inches from somebody of the other antiquated binary gender difference, then you probably shouldn’t be in college at all.”.
I once lived in a grad dorm with co-ed bathrooms, and while it was tolerable, I think it should be a last resort, rather than something to strive for or be proud of.