College
 

My dad prettymuch shoved a copy of US News's list of top colleges down my throat this weekend, so, I now present for your collective consideration, a list of some of the schools I'm thinking about at one level or another. If I left off any you think I should consider, or think any of these are particularly bad choices... say so.
But no southern colleges. Not even Austin. I can't live in the south, I just can't do it.

California - Berkeley
UMich - Ann Arbor
California - Santa Barbara
UMD
UC Santa Cruz
University of Vermont
Middlebury
Smith College
Bryn Mawr
St. Mary's (MD)

Smith and Bryn Mawr are incredibly bad choices. Well, depending on what you had in mind. They're women's colleges.

Edit. I don't know what people are thinking, trying to go to one of the "highest ranked" places. Your rankings are going to be different from theirs. I started out trying to go to the most competitive places but wound up in a slightly smaller, slightly less competitive place... and it fit me like a glove, because what I really wanted to do was try a little of everything, which was very possible at a tiny college. Otherwise, I wouldn't have become the manager of the radio station, worked on the literary magazine, did layout work for the newspaper... as a Comp Sci major. At a bigger school that stuff would be reserved for Communications/Lit/English majors. It was perfect for me to be at a small place where everybody got to know me... at a big school I would have gotten lost. On this list, St Mary's would be the closest to that experience, but there are about a hundred St Mary's sprinkled throughout the Northeast. You can't throw a rock around here and not hit a quaint little liberal arts college. And they are getting to be more of a bargain than they used to because everybody wants to go to a massive university for some reason.

What do you mean, womens' colleges?
EDIT: shit you're right, i didnt even notice that, hahahahaha.
Fucking college websites are just about the worst fuckin' sites ive ever seen i swear.

And i just used the list as reference for seein' where I may wanna go, I didn't really pay any attention to the actual rating. I think I really do want more like what you just described, but I dont even know how to go about finding one of those. Besides, I'm still what, two years off from having to make a decision?

Yeah man you really need to go on a college visit road trip or something. No articles or websites compare to physically visiting the campus and getting a feel for what it would be like to be a student there. Example: in high school I wanted so dang badly to go to Miami (of Ohio), but when I went to visit my brother there for a weekend I was completely turned off. It is the preppiest school I have ever seen and I would have completely not felt at home there. I know what you're thinking, yeah but the whole school isn't like that, there's going to be people I like hanging out with and become friends with basically anywhere. Which is true, but it's a fact that each school has a certain atmosphere about it and it's awesome when you find the one that fits you best. I've had friends transfer from some pretty prestigious schools just because they didn't like "the feel of it".

I see someone already beat me to the Bryn Mawr thing. You could go to Haverford, which I think shares some classes with Bryn Mawr and just maybe, if you were cool enough, a group of the mildly less militant lesbians would vote you in as an honorary vagina-bearer. Happened to one of my male friends who was in the social work program there. But he did take his wife's name when they married ...

Well that list is useless, no offense to your dad. "Let's see now... should I go to Middlebury... or Berkeley???" Get some idea of what you're looking for. (A large public university? Small liberal arts? Pre-professional? etc.) In general I would not bother with the US News rankings. For the most part what you learn from it is that famous schools are famous. Harvard is Harvard... does anybody (except for some overexcited alumni) care whether it's ranked #1 or #3 or #2 this year?

I agree with Tony. Don't kill yourself trying to get into the most famous school you can. Actually look at the faculty... meet some of them... how to find them? Ask around. I personally would recommend either my or Mrs. Dallas' alma maters, UNC-Greensboro and Gettysburg college respectively. My advice is to study the course catalog carefully and see who teaches courses. Strongly prefer places where the faculty actually teach undergraduate courses, instead of leaving it for the grad students.

You may not have as much time as you think. You probably need to have all your application stuff in by new year's during your senior year.

EDIT:
Haverford students have full reciprocity to cross-register for any course at Bryn Mawr, or even live at Bryn Mawr, and vice versa. They can also cross-register at Swarthmore. Regular bus service runs between the three campuses. It's a very nice place, but you're definitely paying for the name.

EDIT again:
And read this.

I think I'd be down with that?

Yeah, I know, I know - the list as ranking is BS, I don't care what a school's ranked... but it's a list of decent schools, at least, and it gives me some idea of schools to look at, as a starting point, at least.


Just for reference, I'm looking at a bunch of different majors... from journalism to government/political science to psych to... I really have no idea. But I'm mostly looking into Gov or Journalism, at this point, I think, maybe.

I agree with UT about the bigger/smaller colleges. I went to Berkeley as an undergrad, without any support system at all (my parents were 2000 miles away). Big mistake. BIG mistake.

Start with this question ... what do you want to go to college for, then pick a school that does that.

Oh, and the school should be good to okay at other things too, because you'll probably change your major in there somewhere.

Or you can just choose off the Playboy list of top 5 party schools.

I worked with someone who did that. I was recently very pleased to see that the school is keeping up it's rep, as Rider College had some kid die of alcohol poisoning at a frat party yet again.

I would be glad to be a vagina-bearer. I would carry it on my dick.*








*In this case, the word "dick" was used to maximize comedic value. Other words such as "penis", "cock", and "wang" were evaluated but none were found to have the combination of shock and comic awe of a stronger and more vulgar term. Also, there is a "k" sound in it, which makes it funnier. The "k" sound actually occurs twice in "cock", making it one of the funniest words available to the English language, but its former use here makes it a distraction from the humor of the line.

How about a vagina-barer?

I know, I know. You said not even Austin. But I can't help myself.

You should really, really check out the Plan II program at the University of Texas. (Yes, it's the program I graduated from, that makes me informed about it, not biased. :)) If you come visit the school, I will show you around. I am serious. You would love it here.

Did you know that Austin has the second-highest gay population after San Francisco? Did you know that the 78704 zip code has the highest concentration of professional musicians of anywhere in the country? Austin isn't part of the south, man. It's just not.

Yeah, agreed with everyone else. Were you just trying to show off when you listed those bs schools? No one here is going to be impressed with that. Plus you listed women's schools...shows your researching skills, dude. Like everyone said, visit schools, some blue college yellow page book just doesn't do it. College is the best time of your life, don't base it off numbers. It's the feel.

:headshake What about ND??? :headshake

Speaking as one of the few cellar members currently in college, don't throw away any sources of information. Just saying that rankings aren't total crap, they're guidelines to give you a starting point. The biggest things you want from a school are dedicated profs who have personal experience and high achievement in the subjects they teach, and connections to professional organizations and programs that you will want to use during your major. Most of the time, higher ranked schools have more stuff available to students, but do your research and look up what criteria the list is based on.

My personal advice? Avoid tiny schools that keep on harping about personalized attention. A tiny faculty-to-student ratio is really only useful for your first semester freshman year. If you're a good student who's motivated, you won't have a problem developing a relationship with your profs, they're on the lookout for students like that.
Small schools can hurt you in other ways as well. Here at U Pitt, the professors doing research generally laugh at the idea of taking students from tiny colleges because they find them too spoon fed and attention seeking. It isn't always appropriate to expect a personal relationship with your bosses. A big school will get your used to working on your own with a realistic level of guidance, not constant hand holding, that doesn't work in real life.

(Also, our medical school, which is #1 for transplants, really doesn't even consider applicants from the 'hand-holder U's)

Lots of activities might be fun, but after the four years people are going to want experience in YOUR area of focus. Being all over the board and never doing prolonged work in one area (multiple years) is taken to mean you can't focus yourself.