Winter 2014/Spring 2014

<p>Update: My son received an e-mail yesterday from his advisor which listed many courses (several for his major) which had sections added due to overwhelming demand and to mitigate frustrations from the registration process.</p>

<p>That’s great to hear bkbmom. I suppose it is hard for them to know ahead of time how many students will want what kind of classes, especially when they are freshmen. I’m so glad to hear that Elon is responsive about that kind of thing. Elon’s reputation for that is one of the reason’s we chose to send her there. :)</p>

<p>About winter term: our daughter was hoping for some offerings that weren’t there (she didn’t test out of French so we were hoping for a French I class, or else something interesting in one of the majors she’s considering). But it turned out great – she ended up in the theater workshop which she’s very excited about – it fulfills her expression requirement and it’s something different and fun.</p>

<p>Supruwoman;</p>

<p>Would love to know how you ended up with a son at Vandy and a daughter at Elon. I have a daughter at Vandy, trying to encourage her sister to look at Elon. Vandy’s admission rates are beginning to worry me…</p>

<p>Thanks.</p>

<p>Hi swim4school,</p>

<p>Vandy was our son’s dream school and he worked very hard to get in there. It’s been a perfect match for him and we’ve been thrilled. I know – the admission rates at Vandy are unbelievable and getting tighter every year. My son says that there are a lot of siblings at Vandy and he thinks that Vandy admissions does give them extra consideration, so your second daughter should apply if she wants to go there. </p>

<p>Our daughter visited him there several times and loved it, but didn’t have any desire to attend there herself; the atmosphere was too high pressure for her. She did learn that she likes being around intelligent people and that she loved the size (around 5000-6000 undergrads) where you know some people wherever you go, but there are always new people to meet, with reasonable class sizes that are taught by professors instead of graduate students. She also knew she wanted a residential campus with a lot going on. </p>

<p>So, having her brother at Vandy did affect her criteria for a college search in those ways. We started with those things, and searched for a school whose ACT range would be comparable to hers. That ended up being a narrow list, and Elon was on it. When we read about Elon’s commitment to engaged learning we were intrigued – she’s very people-oriented and not terribly bookish (though she is a good student). She’s always been hands-on – wanting to apply what she’s learning. The icing on the cake was that Elon’s dining services are very good, and cater well to students with food allergies (which she has). Once she stepped on campus she fell in love with it and applied ED. After a semester she’s very happy there.</p>

<p>She says that there are quite a few students at Elon who have older siblings at Vandy. There also seems to be a lot of crossover between Vandy & Wake Forest, and Elon & Wake Forest. </p>

<p>We fell in love with Vanderbilt when our son started there and continue to feel very blessed that our son has been able to attend such a high level university. He has flourished there. I was worried that nothing could match it but we are just as in love with Elon for our daughter. It’s very well run with great leadership, vision and opportunity. She has already grown so much in her first semester. </p>

<p>I don’t know what your daughter is looking for. Check the US News rankings – Elon does very well there. I also found this pretty impressive when we were looking:</p>

<p>[Elon</a> University Rankings and Recognitions](<a href=“Elon University - America’s Top-Ranked Teaching University”>Elon University / About Elon / Rankings & Recognition)</p>

<p>I’ll send you a PM with my contact information if you have any questions or want to chat about it.</p>