@Fifty- when I mentioned the Berkshire Medical Center to S, he was astounded that the college nurse had told him the nearest care would be in Bennington and the next nearest in Pittsfield!
It was interesting that, after your post, I was able to find the info about it on the website, but only in the “Parents” section of the health care section, not in the other parts of the health center section that are aimed at students!!! No kid (esp. one who is sick and in pain and running a fever) is going to think to look at the Parents section of the website, esp. having been told in person where the nearest care supposedly was.
Regardless, as parents we do think that a college should be able to arrange a prescription for a kid over the weekend. At $70,000, it is outrageous to expect a kid to travel to an ER, wait in the ER waiting room, and pay for an ER visit, for something as simple as an antibiotic that should have been able to be arranged through a phone call with an on-call doctor after the RN looked into the ear and diagnosed the ear infection. Why on earth wouldn’t such a well-endowed college be able to provide such a simple service?
(Luckily, S convinced his physician near our home to call in a prescription to the nearest pharmacy to the college, so he avoided the ER visit.)
To us, this is one of our mounting concerns with quality of life at his college, right up there with arriving to a dorm room where half the furniture was broken and could not be used until the college repaired it, and other issues of this sort. My spouse is getting quite angry. For $70,000 a year, these quality of life problems should not exist. (Yes, there is a lot else to love about the college, and the education is superb. I am not saying it’s bad. I have, after all, been a big cheerleader for Williams, praising it in many other College Confidential posts. I am just saying that they need to pay more attention to quality of life for their students.)
I appreciate everyone’s sharing of information about what other colleges provide. This is very helpful to us.