Beloit vs Macalester vs Carelton
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Anonymous
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I would luv luv for my DD to go to Carleton, but she doesn't have the grades or the $..lol.. My good friend is from up in that area and attended St. Olaf, and speaks highly of it.
They have a FB page, like it and look around. Can he throw a Frisbee..lol |
Anonymous
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I went to St Olaf and being in Northfield can feel isolating but that is not a bad thing for studying. Carleton is right in town which I always envied and is certainly a stronger institution all around though much smaller that St Olaf (and St Olaf is pretty small). Not a bad idea to apply to both. Certainly visit both if you go all the way out there. East Coast kids are more numerous at Carleton - I was one of only three New Yorkers at St Olaf which draws very heavily from the Twin Cities and surrounding states. The number of St Olaf students who were also accepted to Carleton is surprisingly large - in my experience they tended to be Minnesota kids who felt out of place in the heavily Eastern Carleton. Carleton is very much a top New England LAC located in southern MN. Carleton is widely seen to be a stronger and I'd probably recommend it over St Olaf.
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Anonymous
| My goddaughter is at Macalester and loves it. But it is very small. Very small. |
Anonymous
| My spouse went to Carleton and loved it. We're now in DC obviously but I think for college a small town is good. Has very high alumni giving rates -- people seem v connected o the school. |
Anonymous
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I went to Carleton in the late 80s and had an amazing academic experience: top-notch professors who really cared about the students and who knew them. It was a bit of a grind, though. The trimester system meant we moved through a lot of information quickly and covered more in a year than would be covered in a semester system. More finals, more mid-terms. The classes, though, were great, and I don't regret my time there, although I was pretty stressed and not very happy, and I wasn't alone in that. It gave me a kind of toughness and confidence I could draw on for years afterward.
If you kid likes to work really hard, Carleton is the place. |
Anonymous
Is Beloit crazy woke, or could a more conservative student attend and not feel out of place? |
Anonymous
Beloit has a very cute renovated downtown area -- there's not a ton there, what's there is nice. I think I expected downtown Appleton to be a little more robust based on what people told me. I liked it fine, but there were plenty of empty storefronts downtown. OP, I have visited all. They're very different! Carleton is the most intellectual and intense. Kind of nerdy in a good/charming way. Filled with very smart kids who are at once driven and laid-back (Ben Wyatt from Parks and Rec went to Carleton and that felt perfect!). Cute, small downtown. (Worth seeing St. Olaf while you're there. It's beautiful, the kids are smart and hard working, but on the whole seemed less quirky than the Carleton kids. Great merit at St. Olaf, pretty sure there's none at Carleton.) Macalester is nice, a little crunchy, in a safe and quiet part of St. Paul. Felt like a lot of women who wanted to work in international relations, but maybe that's just the people we met and saw. Supposed to be quite strong in the sciences, too (maybe all the STEM kids were in the lab). I didn't like the campus as much -- felt kind of oddly 1980s. I kind of fell in love with Beloit. The place felt infused with heart. It's the kind of school that wants its students to absolutely love learning, a good place for curious kids who march to the beat of their own drum, maybe some of whom hadn't hit their full stride in high school could really blossom there. Surprisingly international student body. Can't say enough about how nice everyone was. A beautiful new science center and student center. Older dorms but I think they were starting on renovating some. They give great merit. Lawrence was interesting. It's a big music school, which brings something really nice to campus -- there's fantastic music everywhere. I didn't think the campus was especially pretty, but it was a grey day when we visited. Felt almost like a miniature state school, with tons of different kinds of kids. Great merit. |
Anonymous
It's woke-ish, but maybe without the intensity of some of the northeast schools. The vibe is just different than the east coast. |
Anonymous
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Ole grad myself. Had a highschool friend go to Carleton from my year and she went off the deep end. They have a wet campus policy of sorts and a significant drug scene. Pair this with the whacky trimester calendar system with, a huge aimless break between thanksgiving and January, and seasonal depression and you have a recipe for issues. The academic rigor also comes from things like an additional writing portfolio everyone has to do just for the sake of it.
St. Olaf has a dry campus policy on paper, students still do what they do but when there are issues there are consequences which kept people from getting stuck too far into the deep end. For example I worked for residential life and one evening there was a drunk student on the roof. He got mad about being caught and broke a bunch of mirrors. He got kicked out within the week and put into a treatment program instead of languishing at the school burning out. If that had happened at Carleton there is no way the student would have received treatment in a timely matter. Carlton's ranking is higher sure but depending on your student you may want to consider the culture of the campus. |
Anonymous
Carleton really isn’t in the middle of nowhere. Northfield was on Money’s top 50 places to live this year and is 45 min from one of the 15 largest metro areas and the top rated (for traveler satisfaction) airport in the country. The campus sits on the edge of the main street, so a couple min walk to the nearest restaurants, stores, and hotel. There’s a hospital in Northfield but also arguably the best in the world an hour away. Its rival college is about 1 mile away. Yes there’s a lot of (stunning) nature and rural land in and around Carleton, but you are conveniently close to quite a bit. |
Anonymous
| Never heard of any of these. Your kid will be fine. |
Anonymous
+1 Carleton is an amazing school. It's on our list. Have heard very good things about Macalaster, depending on the intended major. No zero about Beloit, doesn't seem to be at all in the same category as the other two. |
Anonymous
| My sister (now a successful vet)went to Carleton, she did love it, but the small town/remote experience got in her head a bit and she took a semester off part way through. She smoked a LOT of pot and felt she was spiraling a little. Another friend (now a successful cardiologist) had similar experience and transferred out. It’s a really great school with amazing professors, but got to be the right fit. |
Anonymous
| We visited Carleton and St. Olaf recently and thought they were both really pretty but my DC thought the town felt too remote. It was pretty area in warm weather but DC thought it would be too big of a production getting home for breaks by airplane in the middle of the winter due to the long drive to the city in snow and ice. I'm sure there are carpools and shuttles going to the airport, but DC crossed them off the list due to the overall logistics issues. |
Anonymous
Minnesota has a lot of experience keeping roads open and safe in winter weather but Carleton’s academic calendar minimizes the times there’s actual winter commuting. Winter break for Carleton starts before Thanksgiving and lasts 6-7 weeks. (I think St Olaf starts about 3 weeks later though.) Spring break for Carleton starts in mid March and last about 2 weeks. I don’t think it ever took more than 45 minutes for our kid to get from the campus to the airport or vice versa in their four years. There are shuttle services for about $35 but usually our kid took a taxi or got a ride from a friend with a car. They loved their time at Carleton and would’ve been delighted to stay in MN after graduating, but got their first job in our home state (CA). |