The University of Chicago

Chicago, Illinois
August 9, 2009

I don’t even know where to begin the account of my experience with UChicago. Just the name gives me goosebumps. Growing up in a suburb of the city itself, it has long been a college on my mind, and is a relatively popular choice at my school, due to its notable prestige and academic prowess. Of course, plenty of people, even in the Chicago area, don’t understand how important the school really is, often mistaking it for the University of Illinois at Chicago and not realizing that the 7th best university in the world (QS 2009) is in their backyard. Even more dangerously, many of my fellow prospective students don’t realize how unique Chicago is. They don’t know enough to understand that Chicago caters to a relatively small, specific demographic of students: those willing to sacrifice a raging social life, extra-curriculars, and their sanity, all for a nearly unmatched academic atmosphere and all around collegiate education.

Let’s begin with just that: the education. The main components of Chicago’s curriculum can be broken down into three sections, each consuming about one third of a student’s time at Chicago; Core classes, or required classes of all undergraduates, major requirements, or classes required for each department’s major, and elective classes, or free choice classes to round out the experience. This is an alarming level of requirements for a modern college curriculum. There are few other top colleges with such extensive core-curriculums, much less ones so rigorous. Courses required of all undergraduates range from exposure to great books and philosophy to more general math and science reasoning courses. Because of these demanding requirements, it is a long hike to earn a Chicago degree. It is a truly stimulating amount of work, and one has to make a lot of personal sacrifices to complete it. However, Chicago is one of the leading schools in terms of sending grads on to get PhD’s as well as other professional degrees. Employers and graduate schools know how demanding the academics at Chicago are, and they look highly upon how well the school prepares its students for academic life.

Chicago’s campus is equally amazing. Located about twenty minutes (by subway, bus, or car) south of downtown Chicago. Though the immediate area surrounding the university’s neighborhood of Hyde Park is quiet and upper class, as little as a few blocks off the campus can put you right in the middle of some of Chicago’s worst south side neighborhoods. The school takes advantage of its location, offering field studies in Chicago and urban studies to study these surrounding areas. Due to the campus’s location, crime is fairly high, and students are always on the lookout. This is a downside to any city campus though, and should be taken with a grain of salt; the immediate area surrounding the university is well policed (by the largest private police force in the country) and well lit, so as to provide a bubble of relative safety around the campus.















Chicago is a city I think everybody should see sometime in their lifetime, and the university only adds to the city’s magnificence; UChicago has a jaw-dropping campus. The reason it is so beautiful and symmetrical is because it was built from the ground up from Rockefeller’s fortune, so the school was planned from its first days as a university, unlike most college campuses, which are architecturally eclectic because they were built over time and on budgets. It simply looks like a place to learn. The campus is still mostly composed of the original collegiate-gothic buildings, but plenty of interesting, modern, buildings add to the scene. When I first visited the campus, I couldn’t help but to just lie down for a few minutes in a quad and stare at the hundred year old oaks and the ivy on the buildings rippling in the wind.

Among these buildings, the Regenstein Library, also known as simply “the Reg”, seems to be a campus favorite. This building has seven full sized floors of material, and the university is expanding the library this summer with a state-of-the-art underground book retrieval system to house even more books. There are plenty of rumors surrounding this building, but nearly all have to do with students “never leaving” to fulfill their tremendous workloads. The Reg is an amazing facility which I really enjoyed my time in, and it provides a great atmosphere for Chicago students to work in, in addition to the many great coffee shops on campus.














Essentially, the best way to wrap your mind around Chicago is that it is a uniquely academic place and that a school can’t have everything. The university has accordingly been nicknamed the place “where fun comes to die” due to its weak social scene and high workload. Though the school is making great steps towards introducing a more vibrant social scene to the campus, it seems almost counter-intuitive to add this element to only increasingly rigorous academics. One of these elements that seems extremely popular is the House system of first year housing. Students are assigned to a social house (think Harry Potter), which becomes their family for the next four years. Students eat meals at their house table, and even after upperclassmen move off campus, many still attend social house events.

However extreme the school might seem, keep in mind that the Princeton Review dubbed Chicago “school of the year” in 2007 for overall undergraduate experience. I see that ranking more political in purpose than genuine (the Princeton Review has for quite some time been labeled as too focused on social aspects of institutions), but the point still stands that this is truly a great place to spend your four years. As long as you have done the research and have truly established academics as your number one priority, Chicago could very well be the place for you. This sort of self-selectivity where students are “afraid” of the school has kept the school’s admissions numbers relatively lenient compared to it’s Ivy League competitors. However, Chicago saw a 100% increase in Early Action applications for the 2009-2010 admissions season, so the school may well be on the track to catching (back) up to the biggest names out there.

The Value of U.S. News Rankings

Whether or not you have used or even seen a college ranking from U.S. News & World Report, you are probably aware of the controversy regarding college rankings; can a college or university really be condensed to a number?

I first read about the issue in Michelle A. Hernandez's "A is for Admission." Though the book is now fairly dated (1997), the impression of U.S. News rankings has been a problem in academia since the rankings' inception in 1983.

The basic argument against the rankings is that squeezing a school into a set number ranking is unfair to the colleges because a number can't represent the "intangibles" of a college. Many colleges believe that such numbers based rankings of schools are making students numbers obsessed and limited in their applications to only the most highly ranked schools, thus eliminating applications to schools that can't compete in the numbers game.

I think that my own viewpoint can be condensed into the following quote from U.S. News Report Editor Robert Morse (2007):

"in terms of the peer assessment survey, we at U.S. News firmly believe the survey has significant value because it allows us to measure the "intangibles" of a college that we can't measure through statistical data. Plus, the reputation of a school can help get that all-important first job and plays a key part in which grad school someone will be able to get into. The peer survey is by nature subjective, but the technique of asking industry leaders to rate their competitors is a commonly accepted practice. The results from the peer survey also can act to level the playing field between private and public colleges." [citation from U.S. News]

"Some higher education experts, like Kevin Carey of Education Sector, have argued that U.S. News and World Report's college rankings system is merely a list of criteria that mirrors the superficial characteristics of elite colleges and universities. According to Carey, '[The] U.S. News ranking system is deeply flawed. Instead of focusing on the fundamental issues of how well colleges and universities educate their students and how well they prepare them to be successful after college, the magazine's rankings are almost entirely a function of three factors: fame, wealth, and exclusivity.' He suggests that there are more important characteristics parents and students should research to select colleges, such as how well students are learning and how likely students are to earn a degree." [Citation NAICU]

Among organizations opposing the rankings, the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) has pledged to make its own system of rankings which will focus on aspects like graduation rate and the actual quality of education, criteria which U.S. News has now preemptively adapted into its rankings.

There are still a plethora of problems with the rankings, though, notably how seriously they are taken by readers. From a Stanford University School of Education article,

• within 3 days of the rankings release, U.S. News website received 10 million page views compared to 500,000 average views in a typical month
• 80 percent of visitors access the ranking section of the website directly rather than navigating via the magazine’s home page
• the printed issue incorporating its college rankings sells 50 percent more than its normal issues at the newsstand

Stanford University President Gerhard Casper criticizes the rankings in the following letter in which he demands to know how a university like Johns Hopkins could shoot from 22nd to 10th in a single year. In this sense, the rankings are more like football team rankings, including the most outrageous of leaps simply to sell magazines.

For me, the quantity, quality, and consistency of U.S. News and World Report's yearly rankings has kept me coming back to subscribe to the "premium online version" for three years now. The websites wealth of information (not just statistics!) is far better than any comparable site's, including the College Board's. Much has changed since the two Stanford University sources above were written in 1996. Their arguments still stand to a a lesser degree, but the magazine has become much more stable in its rankings. Overall, I'm impressed with the way the rankings have changed in the past few years, now including a peer survey and focusing on more "intangible" aspects of colleges rather than merely admissions numbers such as test scores and yield rate.

Book Review: The Gatekeepers, by Jacques Steinberg

This book is essentially an outsiders account of the college admissions process. In 2001, Jacques Steinberg, then a journalist for the New York Times Review on Higher Education, took a few months off of his desk job to shadow a college admissions officer at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.

Steinberg chose to shadow officer Ralph Figueroa, a Stanford grad who attended UCLA Law School before ending up at Occidental College (Obama's Alma Mater) in California as an admissions officer. The book is constantly revealing more about Ralph, from his relationship experience and connections within the college admissions field to the way he fits his Mexican-American heritage into a traditionally "WASPy" field.

A lot of what I deduced from the book was in fact the diversity of the readers in admissions offices and that as a general rule, especially at schools that have a committee decision process, there will usually be someone to speak out for your application. Many times during the admissions round at Wesleyan, counselors got personally attached to applicants and there was a surprising amount of give and take in how the admissions process works. On one hand, this can be seen as more random and less formulaic, but in general I think it speaks to the desire to bring interesting people to the campuses of elite institutions, culminating in genuinely diverse campuses.

The race card came up several times throughout the book, especially in respect to Ralphs Mexican-American heritage and the role of one African American young woman who ends up at Yale. After reading the book, I believe that I have a further understanding of how ethnicity and geographic location really play into the process. In the example of the African American and another Native American applicant, it really all boils down to the unique cultures and hardships that those applicants have gone through that culminates in them being interesting. Likewise a white applicant who has gone through financial hardship or problems at home has an equally unique story to bring to the campus.

The format of this book is really what made it so enjoyable. Though much of Steinberg's observation occurs in the traditional college admissions office, a lot of his story is told through profiling six or seven individual students from across the country. It's interesting to see where the students apply and how the college admissions officers interpret the paper representation of each person.

Overall, this was a really fantastic book that was able to squeeze the rough details and objective advice into an easy to read and ultimately enjoyable package. Now I'm even considering a career in the admissions field, as an interesting way to funnel all of your experience in life to evaluating others - each person in their own way.

Breakthrough Webcast in College Admissions

Jordan Goldman, founder of leading college site Unigo.com recently coordinated a panel of leaders on the college side of admissions to give students an inside peek on the college admissions process.

The Webcast features admissions officers and deans of admissions from some very prestigious colleges, including Bryn Mawr College, Grinnell College, Marquette University, Princeton University, University of Pennsylvania, University of Vermont, Wesleyan University, and Williams College.

I found the Webcast extremely helpful and many of the answers extremely telling of the way in which applications are viewed. Pointers on how to complete applications parts like extra curricular lists and Standardized testing were very informative. Much of the information and general comfort with the process used to be limited to lengthy books about the process; this is a great opportunity to get ahead and to build your understanding. At least part of the ninety minute Webcast should be worthwhile.

The video is linked below:
WSJ On Campus | Unigo

Jon's Favorite College Sites

Favorite College Sites

Now that I'm starting to look at colleges and help out friends with their college choices, I have come upon a few sites that are really worth checking out.

Unigo.com

The highlights of this site are that has a ton of content and that all of the content is completely student contributed. The entire premise of the site fascinates me. A few years ago, a Wesleyan University grad got the idea to make a site out of all student generated content to provide a middle ground for prospective high school students and college students to learn and share their perspectives on their college experiences.

Reviews with the pink "recommended" tab are quite thorough and are genuinely helpful in grasping the essence of a college, beyond the level of a guidebook. It really takes guidebook-level raw information and translates it into what it actually means in terms of social and academic atmosphere. Another quick feature is the best and worst aspects of each college, which are short, one sentence responses written by students that tend to be pretty helpful grasping the big-picture of a school.

Unigo also provides a good glimpse of the average student through video clips from around campus and student responses and perspectives. Users should take all content with a grain of salt though, since it is pretty subjective in that students can say whatever they want. It definitely provides a one of a kind view into college life and how students feel about their final college choices.


StateUniversity.com

StateUniversity.com has also been a fantastic resource. Although this sounds like a tacky site for local schools, I assure you that it offers a comprehensive view on colleges of all levels of competitiveness. They also offer their own ranking system based on things like professor salary and test scores - things that tend to suggest career success and student satisfaction. The site also contains information such as demographics and entering class statistics in a way that's easy to understand and allows for easy comparison of schools.

I think that's what I appreciate most about everything on this site: it makes everything easy to compare and to digest. Objective information such as rankings or special honors a college has earned appears in a straightforward way alongside subjective information about general academic programs and the intellectual focus of the college community. Overall, it gives the best overview of a college of any online resource, and is only matched among books by Fiske's Guide to colleges, which I also strongly recommend.


About.com : College Admissions
http://collegeapps.about.com/

Rather than providing profiles of individual colleges (which this site also does for a smaller number of schools), this site is really a road map for common questions that families have about college admissions. Examples of topics include things like "What is Early Decision?" or "ACT or SAT?" The site is extremely helpful with how to begin the application process and with help regarding standardized testing. I also like that the site provides a lot of information about what test scores mean, and where you can go with them. The host of the site also manages a very interesting editorial blog in addition to providing FAQ and basics of admission. Topics go into different things like "Taking a year off," or "How colleges are reacting to the recession." This level of information is very helpful for getting into the minds of college admissions staff and for the advanced intermediate who is interested in learning a little bit more about the admissions process as a whole.

Carleton College

Carleton College
Northfield Minnesota
Visited October 23, 2009

Beginning our trip to Northfield, we stayed in a normal midwestern hotel chain across town from the College. From the window of my hotel room, the town of Northfield looked like a bleak midwestern manufacturing hub off of the highway. This impression of the town quickly faded, however when we drove through historic, riverfront Northfield, and I began to appreciate the scenic beauty of this area. Northfield itself was a really nice town with a great old town river-walk area just blocks from the college. Newer retail spaces also existed on the outside of the town, compromising a target and plenty of other necessities. This riverfront area reminded me of East Dundee, the quintessential midwestern town with beautiful water fronted, plenty of elevation, and beautiful nature.



Through the town and on the top of a hill sat Carleton, immediately recognizable by its huge gothic cathedral. I really can’t do the campus justice with words; everything was gorgeous. The immediate neighborhood was just breathtaking. Wide streets arched over by huge trees really complemented the beautiful houses. Carleton itself was also a sight to behold. The campus has a really nice clustered layout, with one central quad known as the “bald spot”, which is overlooked by the campus cathedral. The buildings were all very well maintained, but maintained the collegiate, gothic look. I really loved all of the quirky buildings they took us through. All of the humanities and social sciences buildings looked really nice and personable, and the science buildings had really impressive lab space. Though I’m not particularly interested in the sciences, I was really impressed by their Geology department, which takes up a whole floor of the main science building. Apparently Carleton has one of the best Geology programs in the nation. The tour highlighted the great resources available throughout each department, and the bulletin boards throughout the academic buildings seemed to suggest the same with their fullness. I also really liked their housing system, which seems to have a lot of great options from old fashioned dorms to lots of senior living arrangements in apartments and theme houses just off campus.

Buildings in general were very nice and there was plenty of space around them for walkways and parking. I really liked their two gorgeous new dorms built in the same style as the old academic buildings that are found elsewhere around campus. The two main dining areas were highlighted on the tour, and I got to eat in one of them. The Language and Dining center put on a great lunch for my father and I, with different islands of food category scattered around the room all set in a very modern and comfortable area. I should also mention the great attention to the landscape here, as most academic buildings overlook a steep drop-off to Carleton’s lake, which is surrounded by beautiful foliage. I loved the emphasis on the outdoors here, and think that dealing with a cold Minnesota winter would be worth it to see this natural beauty. Furthering the schools outdoor emphasis, the school has an 800 acre arboretum set off in the woods behind campus. Facilities such as the new fitness center are set off in the woods and make for a really interesting outdoor experience for the college.



While I was at Carleton, I was able to sit in on an Anthropology class called Ethnographies of Africa, in which the students read early English-Colonial ethnographies and compared them to modern ethnographies of the same groups. The learning that occurred in the class was phenomenal. Students were constantly engaged in discussion, and we were able to analyze the difference in the Anthropological perspectives and learn something from those interpretations. The teacher also frequently called the class back from the domain of speculation, which is an important point to emphasize in Anthropology. Its simply amazing how different this class was from my experience at Northwestern this past summer. Even though there were only six of us in my class at Northwestern, the professor was totally detached and never once initiated any discussion with the students. In the Carleton class of around ten, the professor was constantly questioning students and was an extremely interesting person. I feel that her approach to education was pretty consistent with the rest of the colleges. We sat on the floor and acted things out around the room for a good deal of time, all trying to alter our sense of prejudice and point of view to better understand the African cultures.

However, it wasn’t just the professor or the school that made this level of learning possible, it was the students. These students are definitely some of the most intellectual, most engaged people I have ever seen on a college campus. The result was extremely impressive. I loved the midwestern, homey feel of the campus with such a friendly and noncompetitive learning atmosphere prevalent. This is definitely one of those purely intellectual places where people just succeed and do whatever they want to do. The student body seemed extremely motivated and diverse also, really fueling this strange energy around campus. This friendly nature was furthered by the continued reference to the college as “quirky” and “not to serious”, which I literally heard several of times each (very strange).

One thing I did notice was the great emphasis on the study abroad options available at Carleton. Every school has study abroad possibilities, but it seemed unusually common at Carleton, due to their unique trimester system. Carleton operates on three ten week trimesters throughout the year, which enables students to take one more class per academic year than at a semester school, and allows the students to engage more in-depth with the material for a shorter amount of time. It seemed like a really successful system, namely because there are so many options for students to do three week study abroad possibilities between Thanksgiving and New Years, which constitutes Carleton’s main break. I really think this system would be a great way to balance out your life and to avoid the staleness that could result at a university school after a long semester. Also, I liked the real accessibility of these possibilities. It seems that scheduling a three week study abroad program or scheduling in a mentored thesis hour with your major department is no big deal, and that students get plenty of guidance.



It should also be noted that all students are required to complete a senior thesis project known as a “comps” project. I really like the idea of this project, because it doesn’t have to be specific to your major. It really fulfills the purpose of the broad liberal arts education as being an interdisciplinary application of all of your learning at Carleton into a project that falls into any field of interest.

Overall, this appropriate and relevant level of education seems to be highly supported by a rich intellectual and social atmosphere. I love the balance of work and play at Carleton, and I really think this is one of the few places I’ve been to where the college’s goal just clicks and makes sense to me. Great people, a highly appropriate calendar system, and a true intellectual community make this obscure college in Northfield Minnesota a world renowned college.

Hamilton College

In the case of Hamilton College, unlike that of most other schools in this log, I came upon the college before I experienced its respective town of Clinton. As I drove through the college (tiny at seventeen hundred students), my first thought was how spread out the campus buildings were, but in the sense that the school is so much smaller than I was used to, that somewhat larger spacing had little effect. The original side of the campus had a lovely New England feel to it, although I must say I did not find the brown flagstone buildings quite as appealing as Colgate or Middlebury’s, both of which have paid truly remarkable attention to appearance and consistency around their campuses.
















As I walked into the admissions office, I was immediately approached by an older woman who pointed out the office’s huge array of complementary refreshments, great informational materials, and upscale sitting area. The room reserved for the information session was quite fancy, and really set the tone for the rest of the college. The admissions assistant who gave the presentation put himself in my place and offered some perspective on the whole selection process since he himself went through the same process about ten years ago, in which he ultimately chose Hamilton. Realizing of course that many neighboring colleges offer much the same experience, he differentiated Hamilton quite nicely.

Academically, Hamilton is built around a fairly intense system of oral presentations and rigorous essays instead of the traditional college test. This was supported by a peek into a few of the classrooms, all of which presented very comfortable ways to foster discussion and debate, both of which are highly valued as part of the teaching method. Hamilton is often known as having a writing based curriculum, and thus requires several classes with writing elements for graduation.

This writing requirement is easily fulfilled, as almost all level two or three classes that count towards a major contain a writing element. Besides that one requirement, Hamilton offers a completely open curriculum with no distribution requirements or required classes. Although the admissions director explained that academic advisers may push students into a well rounded course load, the thirty two classes required for graduation are completely up to the student’s choosing. For this reason, it is essentially very easy to double major or double minor at Hamilton, since students can dedicate so much time to classes of their fields of interest.


















On the subject of academic opportunities, the school seemed to have a very good handle on study abroad and internship programs, which although not as extensive as Colgate’s, still had strong ties to some rather prestigious universities all over the world. Among study abroad programs are new programs in Fiji and Australia, both of which were prompted by student interest in marine biology research and are completely funded by the administration.

While many student are way for one semester their junior year, those remaining at Hamilton seem happier than at any other school in terms of their housing situation. When a student matriculates at Hamilton before Freshman year, a student is given a survey on their personal living style as well as their housing preferences. Hamilton then matches students up with extremely suitable roommates that seem to get along very well and do their best to make sure each student gets into whichever dorm facility they want and gets an appropriate double, triple, or suite accommodation.

I later discovered that the surrounding town of Clinton is nearly nonexistent and though in good condition, lacks the community center and the environment that makes a good college town stand out. Whatever the case off campus, the facilities on campus were truly breathtaking for such a small school. A recently completed sixty million dollar science complex was recently donated to the college by alumni, which are in the highest percentile for post graduation giving and alumni involvement. I think the alumni statistic really speaks for itself: the students really love the experience at Hamilton. Facilities such as the science center were brimming with internship posters and research opportunities as well as customized lab setups for each study and state of the art equipment. Overall, a lot of recent construction has left the campus with several outstanding new facilities including a new social sciences complex with a very impressive layout and execution. My only major disappointment is the main library on campus which judging by the orange carpeting, dates back to the seventies. The building was overall unimpressive and its contemporary yet dated look looked very out of place amongst classical New England and strikingly modern glass and metal facilities.















My tour guide, being a male very interested in the athletics at Hamilton, was adamant in showing us all of the stellar athletic facilities, which were fantastic for a Division III school. Hamilton seems to have a lot of school spirit and pride in its athletic teams and conference, most noticeably in the hockey team and a few other standouts such as men’s swimming. Amid the less competitive athletes, intramural activities are a very popular choice, as shown by the awesome “fitness” facility. 
Essentially your traditional neighborhood gym, this gym is geared more towards average level students and professors, since the varsity athletes have their own upstairs training facilities and excellent athletic trainer and physical therapist along with a highly lauded contemporary juice bar.

On top of its outstanding athletic programs, the school has a really awesome social scene that I think really tops off it’s college experience as more well rounded and enjoyable than most. The student activities board is in charge of the latest great speakers campaign to bring in huge names and bands to the campus. On top of this great program, the school hosts tons of small performers of all sorts and seems to always have something of interest for students to do, including its own college pub, which hones in a snug campus atmosphere. I essentially believe that it is these touches on top of a very strong and student oriented education that makes the Hamilton experience unique. The students seem to be enjoying themselves beyond belief and loving the experiences open to them.

Admissions to Hamilton ran an percentile SAT scores of 1280-1460 and an ACT range of 29-33. The overall acceptance rate was 28%, and the Early Decision rate was 45%.

Middlebury College

Middlebury, VermontMarch 24, 2009

Although Middlebury comes off as just another New England college in another pretty New England town, I found that Middlebury was one of the few colleges on my list whose academic reputation was really justified by its outstanding campus and student body. As we drove around Middlebury for a couple of minutes looking for our hotel, I was amazed by the hustle and bustle town and its very nice main street area. An old fashioned inn took center stage, followed by several ornate churches and a fancy old post office. The houses in Middlebury were extremely nice and well maintained, unlike those in Ithaca. The thing that I perhaps enjoyed the most was the towns impressive size compared to Colgate’s Hamilton, and the way the towns wealth and good maintenance seemed to spread all the way to the outskirts, not just stopping beyond the immediate town as in most other small villages. For dinner the night before the college visit, we found an eclectic local restaurant and bar with very fine food for a great price. It was the kind of town where I really felt at home and comfortable but still intrigued by the town's expanse. Its newer section featured quite a few shopping centers with a few major chain stores.

Moving a few blocks from the heart of town, I shortly came across the campus which sort of blends into the town due to the high number of nearby houses that the college owns for its co-ed Greek houses and for its language immersion houses. The college is immediately noticeable as a mass of grey stone academic buildings that literally looks like a shot out of the colonial era, with the exception of the giant grey marble, aluminum, and glass concoction resembling the Death Star that is the college library. As my tour guide explained, the oldest three buildings on the campus are right in the center, including the gorgeous colonial style chapel. The choice of slate-grey stone became immediately popular and spread all over the campus. The effect is simply awesome. As some famous architect was quoted on a plaque, “"If anyone had told me that gray stone boxes set in lawns could be so beautiful, I would have said they were crazy. Middlebury looks like what everyone thinks an American campus should be but seldom is." As strange as it might sound, the effect of the campus was really jaw-dropping.

I ran across a deer and several red-plumed woodpecker while on the campus and several campus buildings provide fantastic views of the Adirondack Mountains and the Middlebury valley. Along with this fantastic affiliation with the outdoors, the Middlebury Outing Club is among the oldest and most active clubs on campus and provides a ton of opportunities to experience the outdoor beauty of Vermont, including Middlebury’s own ski slope and lodge just a few minutes from campus.
















The campus buildings aren’t just old and pretty though, the campus is overall extremely state of the art and almost every surface of the college buildings has been renovated within the past five years. Unfortunately, the schools now beautiful campus and state of the art facilities have left it with considerable debt and the college has made plans to alter its need-blind admissions process, cut almost one hundred staff members, and close a dining hall to limit its debt exposure. Hopefully this won’t be an issue by the time I get to the college, but the facilities are really so nice that I wouldn’t dare question Middlebury’s alumni giving sources, which seem extremely liberal in their support for the college.

I was absolutely astounded by the money all around campus. The students jokingly call it "Club Midd" due to the many luxurious facilities around campus. The school owns its own ski club about half an hour away, which is remarkably cheap for students, in addition to its own beach a few minutes off campus. Perhaps my favorite of these facilities was the student center. At Middlebury, the regular student center for club meetings and such is separated from a really impressive student lounge that looks like a state of the art bar with jumbo televisions for video games and a whole loft full of pool tables.

The language labs seemed especially impressive and the library looked big enough to offer everybody their own space but still personable enough to be easily accessible. The ultramodern library just built two years ago is an especially amazing facility, much larger than you would expect from a school this size. The tour through it took a long time and I loved everything I saw.

Academically, Middlebury is mainly known for its rigorous foreign language programs which are very nicely accompanied by a plethora of study abroad opportunities for students. The combination of foreign language, study abroad, political science, and history, culminates in Middlebury's most popular major; International Studies. The school was especially interesting in its hugely popular study abroad opportunities in that it almost plans on students studying abroad since nearly two thirds of the students do go abroad in their junior year. If a student doesn’t, they just get a little bit more time at the campus to work on their degree. Along with the study abroad options, which are incredibly popular for foreign language majors, the school actively uses the foreign language housing and lunch table programs to wholly immerse the students in their foreign language. The school also turns into a language institute during the summer months, furthering its international reputation for foreign language excellence.

Another interesting academic program is Middlebury's 4-1-4 January Term (J-term), in which the school offers a month long condensed academic program for the month of January and returns to spring semester in February. Courses for this term aren't meant to be very serious, but they allow an interesting opportunity to totally invest in some obscure or interesting field at a time when it doesn't really matter like a semster does. Around fifty classes are typically offered, with subjects in every department such as American Sign Language, Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism, and Ethnographic Writing.


















Middlebury is also putting a lot of resources into its Environmental Studies program. This major really fits the campus and student body well and typically suits a more liberal slant. The school also has a strong focus on environmentalism and has gone so far as to get its own windmill and recycling center. Nearly half of the food served in the dining halls is grown locally, much of it from the college's own farm.

Middlebury operates on a very unique system of Freshman housing similar to the house system at Hogwarts. A Freshman’s house is chosen of the colleges five main neighborhoods based on their choice of freshman writing seminar. The students corresponding house will include the professor of the seminar and all of the other students in the seminar, which I feel really provides a solid foundation in the college from students who are just getting acquainted. As the very articulate dean of admissions presenting the information session went on to say, the administration is very well connected with the students at Middlebury. Instead of having the usual detached, centralized deans office, each housing group has its own student government and very involved deans that can enact a lot of change and progress in a short period of time, and in such a way that the students and staff are really satisfied at the end of the day.











Overall, this very appealing student-administration relationship is what really put this college over the top. From the outstanding campus, to the very athletically inclined student body and outdoorsy location, to the rigorous academic programs and very worthwhile academic requirements, Middlebury simply seems like a place geared one hundred percent around the students.

Beyond the beautiful campus, the school also justifies its high tuition cost by offering all food entirely free on campus. No meal plan, no campus credit system- take it and go free (with tuition). The whole mentality of being about the students- providing extremely connected and appropriate social activities and an in-tune administration- ultimately sold the school for me. On top of that, the Princeton review has given the school extremely high marks in several categories for the quality of education and professors as well as the overall undergraduate experience for several years in a row. The culmination of the schools fun-loving and spirited student body, convenient institutional size (2,500 students), an involved administration, and true academic rigor make this a standout school.

From U.S. News and World Report

For the Middlebury class of 2012, the average SAT score is 1395 and the ACT range is 30-33. The acceptance rate is just about 20%, with an Early Decision rate of 25%. Also, 71.1% of classes are under 20 students. 44% of accepted applicants enrolled.

From Unigo.com

Whereas the two ends of the spectrum seem to be “uptight preppy white kids” and “environmental hippies,” there are also hundreds of students who fall between the two extremes.

“Students do a lot of work here, it is just the way it is” — this sentiment is echoed across the student body, and nearly all students have had at least one experience being totally stressed out by the Middlebury workload.

“Because the classes are usually pretty small, professors are more than willing to you give you personal attention and most, if not all of them come from amazing academic and worldly backgrounds.”

“Student life at Midd can be idyllic,” writes a freshman, “but also can be boring when stuck indoors with work on a cold, winter day. Many complain about the lack of things to do; in truth, the College does offer a multitude of performances, lectures, and events everyday, but the cold weather and work often are detrimental to large attendances.”

Cornell University

Ithaca NY
March 22, 2009

First and foremost, Cornell is a mammoth institution. As my family first stumbled upon the surprisingly mysterious architecture and New England town feeling of Ithaca, New York, Cornell’s picturesque campus atop a hill overlooking the entire Lake Cayuga valley seemed to beckon down to the measly town below.

As seen in the aside photo from the top of the campus hill, a huge variety of architecture, elevations, building materials, and colors adorn the cramped-seeming campus. Despite the campus’s great size, a tour guide explained most of the modern academic buildings were haphazardly planned and themed around fluctuating budgets and influxes in students after the second World War. For this reason, the dozens of impressive gothic and ivy covered buildings dating back to the nineteenth century are surrounded by many less ornate, modern buildings. Although this slightly dilutes the beauty of the campus, the overall effect is still extraordinary.

Among these buildings are the traditional college president’s house, clock tower, and chapel (all of which are stunning), but also huge modern classroom facilities and one of a kind scientific laboratories. Including the worlds second best nanotechnology center, theses facilities are both large in size and of an incredible structural caliber. Again, the size of the campus is simply immense. Sidewalks are two to three times wider than usual and the campus has something like two hundred and fifty academic buildings. To manage the size and make the campus accessible to pedestrians, all of the academic buildings are hoarded into the center of the campus, and different bunches of student dormitories and graduate schools flank the central campus on all sides.
















To explain the large size of the school, let me explain a little bit about the school’s history. Founded on a land grant from the New York state senate, the school was designed as the state’s first university. Over time, parts of the school broke out of the states control and the school divided into seven distinct undergraduate schools and several other graduate schools, all of which function totally independently for funding and admissions. Currently, the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences (CALS), the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, and the College of Human Ecology still receive some public funding, making them the only public schools in the Ivy League. For this reason, in-state residents enjoy a tuition break only at these three schools. The Universities wholly private colleges include the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning, the College of Arts and Science, the College of Engineering, and the School of Hotel Administration.

The school’s affiliation with the state of New York explains why it offers so many unique programs, many of which are world renowned. The School of Hotel Administration, for example, is the only program of its kind at a prestigious University in the United States. Along with programs such as Cornell’s School of Hotel Management, the University boasts many strong programs in unique sciences, both human and environmental, as well as the nation’s finest veterinary program.

This eclectic nature is what defines Cornell. It might not have the best teachers or the most well known professors, but I truly believe it has the best facilities and some of the the most diverse and strongest programs of any University in the United States. I should also note the broad music program.
















As one would expect, such a strong reputation as a diverse institution brings in a huge variety of students. Cornell is home to about thirteen thousand undergraduates and another seven thousand graduate students, which brings the universities total student enrollment to just under twenty thousand students. The only real anomaly in the student demographics is the highest concentration of East Asian students in the Ivy League and subsequently very strong programs in Asian culture and languages.

On my campus visit, I experienced a wide variety of student demographics and was pleasantly surprised to find mostly confident, intellectual, and very friendly undergraduates. Just from peeking into the library, I could tell that the students are people who know where they are going in life and are intent on getting there the best prepared. Academics were described as extremely tough. Students in rigorous programs allegedly never leave the library. My tour guides were both very warm and spunky but still very driven individuals who both lined up jobs and internships within their first year at the University. Although they said that academics can at times get overwhelming with large classes and high workloads, each student has an assigned academic advisor as well as a wealth of tutoring opportunities available from within their field of study.

Taking a break from academics, my tour guides also added that the University has arranged for no classes to occur between 3:30 and 7:30. This allows a specific time every day for students to participate in athletics or clubs, take a nap, catch up on work, or meet with friends for dinner. This time seems integral to avoiding a meltdown amidst Cornell’s very intense and competitive environment.

As to my overall impression of the University, I found Cornell to be immediately lovable in its beautiful campus and warm students yet intimidating and deceptive in its huge size and focus on research rather than undergraduate education. The town of Ithaca was surprisingly urban and upbeat, if not slightly past its prime, and seemed to fit nicely with the college and the several other colleges in Ithaca, giving it an appealing atmosphere. Cornell seems like the quintessence of the big school that students fail out of because they get lost amidst the universities demanding academics and uninviting atmosphere . Students also seemed to have a darker side of being constantly overwhelmed by a dearth of academic pressure and competition, although I genuinely believe that Cornellians are truly happy and that such an intense experience is invaluably rewarding later in life.

Admissions to Cornell culminates in an average SAT score of 1395 and an ACT range of 28-32. The overall admission rate was 21% last year, with the Early Decision rate hovering around 37%.

Colgate University

Hamilton, New York
Monday, March 23, 2009 (my birthday!)

My experience at Colgate began in the lovely New England town of Hamilton, New York. Driving through the rural Finger Lakes region of New York state, I began to appreciate the heritage of the area- even the somewhat unkempt rural townhouses seemed to have a story to tell. As we drove into the initially quaint and past-its-prime village of Hamilton, I was at first somewhat dismayed but after the initial outskirts, the town got really lovely. Hundred year old colonial style houses in perfect upkeep graced the sides of the main two streets of the town. Doctors offices, mom and pop florists, bakeries, and law offices handily nestled in amongst the lovely houses, creating a really positive cultural environment. Flower pots and village banners hung from the ornate iron lampposts that dotted the tidy sidewalks. Old churches with heavy oaken doors, copper topped colonial style steeples, and fancy stone facades topped off the New England feel of the town.















Turning onto Broad Street, the Universities namesake domain, I noticed the Greek life and themed houses before I saw the school itself. The Greek Life at Colgate is very large and the school is well known for its party scene. As my tour guide explained, since the school owns all of the fraternities and sororities and coordinates the parties and activities themselves, the social setting is very inclusive and welcoming to all of the students on the campus, not just those in the fraternity or sorority. Likewise, in such a small town, the administration knows how to keep the students happy with plenty of social activities and parties on the weekends. The school also facilitates a “campus cruiser”, a campus shuttle which operates until three in the morning on the weekends so that students don’t have to drive after a long night of partying. The school also spends very liberally on student activities. Just a few weeks before my tour, the school set up a fully funded ceramics house off of campus that is completely free to all students.















The admissions building came off as an upper class home of the turn of the twentieth century that had been converted into a posh office space. A spacious parlor with almost ridiculously lavish décor was the space intended for the information session. As I sat down, I was immediately immersed in shallow conversation from arrogant white upper class parents and their preppy children. The greeters shook hands with all of the parents and did their privileged connections routine However, seating became limited, so we moved to Colgate’s largest lecture hall, which was relatively small with just over one hundred seats. The entire campus seemed to be recently built or refurbished, and the lecture hall was no exception. With a concentration on light woods and other bright materials, the whole facility seemed to possess an inviting glow.
The ensuing information session hosted by an associate dean of admissions was one of the better ones I have heard. The quirky yet dean possessed a sense of realism that the rest of the lofty staff seemed to lack, and it really made her stand out as a beacon of credibility in a sea of New England liberal arts colleges. She orientated her speech around setting Colgate apart from the other nearby colleges and really played upon Colgate’s advantages. Due to Colgate’s large size (about twenty eight hundred students) for a liberal arts college, it essentially offers more majors, more research opportunities, and more extensive internship and study abroad opportunities for students, including a program at the London School of Economics. The extensive major an minor list really appeals to me in particular because of how limited concentrations are at other, smaller, liberal arts schools. Colgate’s academic rigor also seemed fairly impressive. With two required classes in western civilization, the college has a loose core curriculum with a few loose distribution requirements that seem very easy to avoid. Also required are a scientific perspectives course and a freshman seminar. The professor of a student’s freshman seminar also becomes the students academic advisor. The tour guide I was with was quick to note how accessible professors are and how they all live in the Hamilton area with their families and love their jobs. All staff also have open office hours in the cafe or lounge a few times a week, making them even more approachable. It seems very difficult to slip through the cracks at Colgate.
The alumni network was also very impressive, and it became immediately clear that there was no problem lining up jobs during senior year. Also impressive were the school’s research programs, which professors complete with upperclassmen during the summers. Nearly one in five students is involved in a piece of published research work by the time they graduate, which needless to say opens up a lot of doors. In past years, financial services companies and education systems have sucked up most of the seniors before graduation, and the school’s name seems to hold a lot of weight among major corporations, possibly due to its larger size and potential relevance.













On my student lead tour, I got an overwhelming feeling that this is a school for preppy white kids with deep pockets, and this was completely supported by the fantastic facilities across the entire campus. The new science facility and library look especially impressive, both containing a mind-blowing amount of glass and metal on the inside while maintaing the campus’s classic New England grey stone theme on the outside. Every building I saw at Colgate looked very upscale and comfortable, especially the dining halls. With excellent meals programs and tons of school provided food choices at several large cafeterias as well as a few smaller cafes, students seemed to really enjoy the food choices and got plenty of great food to eat. The dorms looked equally comfortable, just as one would expect. Colgate also has a notable policy of single sex dorm facilities separated by class year.















Overall, I got a sense of a confident and sophisticated student body (despite my slightly aloof tour guide), an overwhelming majority of which is made up of wealthy New Englanders with a somewhat stuck-up aura about them. Although I feel like I would fit into such an environment, it got a little overwhelming. What really stuck with me was the rare balance between personable professors and an inviting campus environment and strong opportunities in research and internships. This rare balance along with a picturesque campus on a hill and a really great college town place Colgate among my favorite colleges of the trip, however its unusual focus on athletics was a drawback.

Colgate's admissions for last year ran an average SAT of 1340 and an ACT range of 29-32. Acceptance rates ran at 25.6% overall and 54% for Early Decision.

Bates College

Lewiston, Maine
March 25, 2009

I visited Bates right after I visited its neighbor, Colby, and I think this had a lot to do with my impression of it. Whereas Colby came off as a place with nothing unique to offer, Bates came off as a one of a kind community in an unnoticeably small package. With just under seventeen hundred students, Bates is a remarkably small place- the smallest on this list. The campus atmosphere of Bates is difficult to describe. Though not quite urban, it’s definitely clustered and fits on a small footprint. Its main academic buildings are pretty close together, separated by well groomed pathways reminiscent of those at Columbia and Brown, with one huge athletic quad in the middle. Though the architecture at Bates comes off as plain, the ornate details on the original buildings make the campus stand out. On top of being appealing on the outside, the buildings were very modern and classy on the inside. In one word, the campus was “bustling”, as was Bates’ Lewiston just a few blocks down the road.





With the campus already making a positive impression on me, my tour guide lead me inside two of the dorms- one new and one old. I was stunned at the quality of both facilities and how even though these buildings look dated and classic on the outside, the interior living space could be so nice. Each freshman dorm consisted of groups of eight or so doubles dorms grouped around one common study space and a junior resident advisor’s room. The system seemed to work very well and the rooms all looked really top notch. There were also large lofted lounges with refreshments sitting out at each dorm room on top of some very nice laundry and kitchen facilities.

On from the dorms, we proceeded to look into a variety of academic buildings. With most of the buildings being recently renovated, the materials were bright and really eliminated the dated feel of the building. The furniture was also very versatile and allowed for a variety of classroom layouts. The class I sat in on was one of the largest classes offered at the college with about thirty students. Located in the basement of a brand new facility, the classroom space was fantastic and I felt that all of the students were well positioned and exceptionally comfortable in the state of the art classroom. The building we were located in was perhaps one of the most impressive buildings I have seen so far. Designed as an academic hub for several social science departments, this huge new building features a great slew of classroom spaces and lounges for each department and really stuck out as being customized for each department. The atrium of the building was also very impressive considering the size of the school, and the building had a number of small study spaces tucked away for each department. On another note, the campus library was similarly huge, but somewhat dated.



Onto the rest of the school’s facilities, the dorms looked especially nice and I think the housing situation might be one of the school’s best features. Considering that nearly two thirds of the students will study abroad, the process of housing selection and trading spaces seemed to flow very nicely. Housing also goes hand in hand with the college’s single dining facility, which was built within the last two years. With an unlimited access meal policy and a focus on quality local food, food doesn’t seem to be a problem at Bates. With the dining hall being so new, several spinoff dining rooms offer different settings from the main dining room, which also looks well furnished.

Since the new dining hall has been built, the old one has gone to use as a student activities center and the students are loving it. With a tradition for outrageous student activities fairs and mass involvement in athletic school spirit, Bates certainly has a lot to entertain its students. One great tradition is the winter ice jump into what students call “the puddle”, a pond on one corner of the campus which is used throughout the year as a center for the outing clubs winter carnival in the winter and as a regular hangout during the summer.

Academically, the Bates calendar revolves around a regular two semester system with an added one course term in the spring with some unusual course offerings. Although Batesies are required to take two of these terms, many students use this time to get a leg up on internships or study abroad programs. The campus career development office seems to have a lot of experience with getting students into the internships and other programs they want and has a history of great selection among programs. Further, I noticed the bulletin boards all around campus were literally packed with internship and summer abroad programs in nearly every major the college offers. Although it may have been junk posted just to fill up the boards, the effect was very impressive and I felt like opportunities were really flourishing in the departments that encouraged such participation. The economics department is also particularly strong and involving.



During my class visit and my other wanderings around the campus, I felt like the students here were really happy to be a part of the Bates experience, and at such a small school, it really showed. Random people smiled at me and I head a lot of solid interaction going on in the quads. Strangely enough, the college seems to book classes in chunks of time so that students move around to some sort of inaudible tardy bell creating the feeling of a high school passing period, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In the class I sat in on, sadly only a few of the students participated again and again and I became aware that many students were just going through the motions. For the ones who did though and certainly for the professor, the class seemed to be extremely involving and the professor had a really great way of teaching and encouraging class input. Jumpy discussions carried the class lesson for the day, and the professor was very alright with that, as long as either he or one of the students continually referenced back to the text in hand. Bates stands out to me as a really great community, considering the caliber of the students and the small size of the college. Some really great traditions and a small school feel on top of top notch professors and opportunities really sealed the deal marking Bates as a solid choice.

For the class of 2012, the average SAT is 1335. The average ACT range at Bates is 28-32 (25-75 percentile). Overall Acceptance rate is 29.6%, with Early Decision also offered.

Bowdoin College

Brunswick, Maine
March 26, 2009

As the liberal arts college I have had on my list for the longest, I specifically designed my schedule so that I would have an entire day to fully experience Bowdoin. On this clear, beautiful day, I arrived at the campus at a brisk 8:30 a.m. confronted with the issue of finding the location of Adams Hall, the building of my class sit-in. I jumped out of the car and immediately found a helpful student who walked me all the way to my classroom and on the way engaged in some interesting discussion about the college. Sociology 101 was about as dry as courses come at Bowdoin, but the professor still found ways to impress me. Though she was presenting basic information for the first half of the lecture, the examples she chose to elaborate on and the insightful responses she got back from the students were definitely a plus.

The students in this class also seemed the most like me- mostly driven, intelligent looking people with a MacBook in one hand and a KleenKanteen in the other. Though I spotted some rather grade-grubby note taking and questioning during the class, plenty of students sill found time to laugh or go on Facebook if they got bored during the lecture. While I walked around before and after class, the campus was really thriving with diversity, though in a good way. Really diverse students on campus trace back to the college’s origins as an abolitionist institution and really seemed to blend in to the student body. Also, all of the students looked especially happy and students seemed to have a level of tact that I have not seen at any other school. I especially enjoyed not having to watch the mindless jock conversations, which I think really speak to the caliber of the students.














My tour guide at Bowdoin was a junior from Montreal who really appealed to me as a motivated and well spoken individual who really had her own special flare to offer the college community. This type of student, rather than the stereotypical prep school student from twenty minutes outside Boston, is what I think Bowdoin hopes to ultimately achieve in its entering class, though some sixty percent of students still come from the Northeast.

The tour was definitely the most enjoyable one I have experienced. The tour guide was extremely personable and I felt comfortable asking her any question that popped into my mind. She was from Canada, as much of the student body is so far north, and she seemed to lack the sense of arrogance that graces the students of most prestigious schools. The down to earth justification of why people go to Bowdoin being merit instead of wealth really appealed to me. Though I only got to go inside a few buildings, the campus as a whole really impressed me. Starting with Bowdoin’s famous art museum, this facility really exemplified the caliber of Bowdoin as a school and how the community interacts with it. The fact that student and professional art are shown alongside one another and the museum is still extremely popular and well used really sat well with me. Wandering throughout the rest of the quads, I quickly discovered how tight-knit the campus really is, and I loved every bit of it. From the iconic Hubbard Hall, which houses the social sciences, to the freshman dorms, which had really innovative organizational policies, I loved the prestigious yet homey feel of the campus. Of all of the campuses I have seen so far, only Middlebury’s could compare with Bowdoin’s standout architecture, yet only Bates could compare with the unifying and dense flow of the campus buildings into a really cohesive campus feeling. I really experienced a unique fit with Bowdoin’s campus that I cant adequately describe with words. The view of Hubbard hall through the main quad’s pine clusters really just set the tone that Bowdoin is an old place with a lot of history but still very comfortable and woodsy.





Bowdoin’s people really made the difference for me. With social sciences among the most popular majors, I also saw a huge draw to Bowdoin’s intense academic programs and felt really humbled by the dedication of the faculty I heard about on my visit, all of whom went out of their way every day of the week all of the students. Bowdoin seems like a fit for me because I think I value the academics this school has to offer coupled with the initiative and passion that marks Bowdoin’s diverse student body.



Looking back on my visit, something just stuck with me when I entered a dorm room to see a carpeted hallway painted bright colors with cubby holes for shoes all over the floor. The effect was pure coziness and what looked like an extremely comfortable place to be. On top of the amazing food, I really consider this school to have the best usable facilities of the liberal arts colleges up for consideration.

Adding to this comfort is the proximity of Bowdoin to the town of Brunswick, which it nicely meshes into. Though not in the heart of the town, local sidewalks go past the campus and the community seems like it has a nice blend into the campus. Houses in the immediate area were very nice and victorian, unlike the ones I saw at Bates and Colby, which were lacking a real New England theme. In aerial shots of the campus, you can easily see how easily the campus flows into the nearby town. Brunswick was really fantastic also, with a wonderful view of the bay and a great selection of food and shops.

For the class of 2012, Bowdoin's average SAT score was 1385, with an ACT range of 29-33 (25-75 percentile). The class had an acceptance rate of 19% overall and 30% for Early Decision.


From NewsWeek- 25 New Ivies...

Location's high on the list of reasons students flock to Bowdoin. The star attraction: the Atlantic. The school owns 200 acres of beautiful research property on Orr's Island, off the rocky coast of Maine. In winter, students have plenty of space to ski cross-country. Not surprisingly, Bowdoin draws many mountain climbers, kayakers and hikers. Bowdoin's students work hard, but the atmosphere is not as intensely competitive as at comparable schools. The most popular major is government and legal studies, followed by economics, English, history, biology, sociology and environmental science. Bowdoin phased out its fraternities a decade ago, and most students now live on campus. Dorms are small—about 30 to 50 students per building—and feel more like apartments. Students praise the food. The school even serves fresh lobster at the first-year banquet. Overlap schools: Williams, Amherst, Brown, Dartmouth and Middlebury.

From Wikipedia:

Location:

Bowdoin College, founded in 1794, is a private liberal arts college located in the coastal New England town of Brunswick, Maine. The college enrolls approximately 1,700 students and has been coeducational since 1971. It offers 33 majors and 4 additional minors; the academic year consists of two four-course semesters, and the student-faculty ratio is 9:1. As of 2009, U.S. News and World Report ranks Bowdoin sixth among liberal arts colleges in the United States.

Brunswick is located on the shores of Casco Bay and the Androscoggin River, 12 miles north of Freeport, Maine, 28 miles north of Portland, Maine, and 131 miles north of Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to its Brunswick campus, Bowdoin also operates a 118 acre coastal studies center on Orrs Island in Harpswell, Maine and a 200 acre scientific field station on Kent Island in the Bay of Fundy.

Dining/Popularity:

Bowdoin is particularly well-known for its dining services, which the Princeton Review has ranked first in three of the last four years, including the 2006-2007 school year. Bowdoin also does well in other lifestyle categories; in 2004 it ranked 10th in dorm quality and 14th for quality of life. In April 2008, College Prowler, a publishing company for guidebooks on top colleges and universities in the United States and written by students, named Bowdoin College its "School of the Year" citing excellence in academics, safety and security, housing and dining.

Frat/Social Life:

Since abolishing Greek fraternities in the late 1990s, Bowdoin has switched to a system in which entering students are assigned to one of eight "college houses" correlating with their first-year dormitory. The college houses are physical buildings around campus which host parties and other events throughout the year. Those students who choose not to live in their affiliated house retain their affiliation and are considered members throughout their Bowdoin career.

Academics:

Bowdoin is consistently ranked among the top ten liberal arts colleges in the United States by U.S. News and World Report. In the 2009 edition of the rankings, Bowdoin ranks sixth, behind Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Wellesley, and Middlebury. Newsweek described Bowdoin as a "New Ivy," one of a number of elite colleges and universities outside of the Ivy League. As of April 2008, Bowdoin was the first college to be named "School of the Year" by College Prowler.

The Government Department was ranked the top small college political science program in the world by researchers at the London School of Economics in 2003. Government was the most popular major for every graduating class between 2000 and 2004.

Williams College

For some reason, Williams College just sprang into my mind a few days ago, and I can't seem to stop thinking about it, so I will give it a little blurb.



First of all, this school is unbelievably elite. It really does rank with the ivies in the caliber of its student body, and in my opinion, surpasses them in overall quality of education. It is ranked No. 1 (tied with Amherst) for Liberal Arts Colleges in the US, and it has a massive endowment of around a billion dollars, a number many huge universities can't even imagine. For two thousand students, this campus in rural, woodsy Massachusetts (It's almost New Hampshire) is unbelievably beautiful and has unbelievable resources. This is really one of the few liberal arts school's whose resources can match those of large universities. We're taking TOP tier professors and amazing networking job opportunities after graduation, not to mention a huge portion of students going on to elite grad schools.

Williams is well known for having a strong music program (rare for a liberal arts school), among other strong programs in social sciences, particularly Economics and Political Science.



To quote Wikipedia (the best source ever)...

Williams is ranked # 8 in the most recent Washington Monthly rankings, which focus on key academic outputs such as research, scientific grants won in the natural and social sciences and the number of B.A. graduates earning PhDs. The survey also measures public service contributions. Williams ranked fifth, after Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford, in a 2004 Wall Street Journal survey of the "feeder schools" to the top fifteen business, law, and medical schools in the country. Williams ranked fifth, after Princeton, CalTech, Harvard, and Swarthmore, in Forbes' 2008 ranking of America's best colleges.

Again, really great opportunities. Another nice thing (for me at least), is that they are a notoriously Early Decision biased school. Their ED acceptance rate is almost 40%, while their regular rate is a typically competitive 18%. This seems to promise an awesome opportunity for admission to an extraordinary school if this is your top choice. Though I haven't actually visited this school, I have read a few guidebook profiles on it, and have gone through a viewbook the college sent me.

The academics at Williams are the real show:

Tutorials and Winter Study, two unusual academic opportunities, largely define a Williams education. Tutorials pair two students with one professor (read: lots of individualized attention). The students meet with their professor each week and alternate writing papers or doing problem sets and critiquing their partner’s work. During Winter Study, the month in between the fall and spring semesters, students can choose from a wide range of off-beat classes, go abroad for the month, or work on an independent project. (Unigo.com)

In general, this school is one of the "preppiest" and most elite of small liberal arts colleges. It has an athletic and social tinge that's hard to come by at smaller schools, but it's certainly refreshing. This can probably be explained by the rural location and outdoorsy feel of the campus. After reading a few student reviews on Unigo.com, I have basically come to the conclusion that Williams is worth your money. The school has a great balance of social activities with academic priority. Truly innovative academic programs make the experience extremely rewarding and also serve to quickly integrate Freshman into the college experience.

The Princeton Review gives them a 99 (highest possible) rating for both Academics and Admission. Average SAT score is 1430, ACT range is 29-33 (25-75 percentile).

An Introduction

Well- I'm just going to throw this content out there and see how this goes. Most of this research I would do anyways, so I like the idea of making my findings public. All of my friends know how "college-obsessed" I am, but usually its in a good way because I help a lot of people out in a way that's more encouraging and structured than a "college freak out". Yesterday I got railed for being so preoccupied with heading off to college, so I hope I don't offend anyone. However, I also helped a friend start the common app early (July) in hopes that it would provide some future direction and support. Hey its a start right?

I'm only going into my Junior year at Barrington High School next year, but I really like that there's something bright ahead of me, and its still fun at this point (a whole year before I really have to start worrying). Hopefully this wont be horribly revealing or repulsive to anybody. Again, this caution is in response to me getting called "the problem with middle class America" to my face yesterday. Yes, I'm rather conventional, and realistically I think it's a constructive pastime for a teenager.

College updates will follow!