Thoughts on Wash U in St. Louis?

[Anonymous]

Seems to attract very bright kids from our HS. Never really heard of it until DC's college search. Does it have a midwestern vibe to it? Does is have enough brand name recognition outside of the midwest? What are your thoughts/experiences?

[Anonymous]

It has a fairly good reputation, but it does engage in some quasi-sleazy tactics such as aggressively encouraging kids to apply whom it has no intent of admitting, for no other purposes than trying to make the school seem more selective.

[Anonymous]

Excellent school.

[Anonymous]

30 years ago nobody outside the midwest had heard of Wash U. Since then, it has raised its profile, primarily by awarding merit money to coasties. Now it draws a ton of very strong applicants from this area, as well as other metro areas along the east coast.

[Anonymous]

Great school, good reputation, in nice area of St. Louis.

[Anonymous]

It's no better than U.Va. or College Park but popular with kids who can't get into Ivies, Stanford or Duke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:30 years ago nobody outside the midwest had heard of Wash U. Since then, it has raised its profile, primarily by awarding merit money to coasties. Now it draws a ton of very strong applicants from this area, as well as other metro areas along the east coast.

It depends on where you are from. I graduated from a HS in the greater Boston area 30 years ago, and it was well known among my peers. Several from my class went.

[Anonymous]

Wash U is an excellent school but recently the San Francisco chronicled confused it with the University of Washington in a story about the law school and I think that still happens today with some frequency. It has one of the highest endowments in the country and is in a very nice part of St. Louis. Great medical school and I think you can get a fabulous education, as is true at so many schools, but a lot of people might be annoyed by its lack of brand image. Shouldn't be a big deal but to some people it would be.

[Anonymous]

Ranked ahead of some of the lesser ivies, WashU is among the most selective schools in the country. WASHU has always been highly regarded, but seems to be coming into greater prominence in the DMV recently. Very strong pre-professional programs and strong business school. The campus is beautiful – right next to Forest Park

[Anonymous]

That's where William Masters worked. Lot of horny people there.

[Anonymous]

It's a very good school. Washington University in St. Louis is ranked similarly to Cornell, Northwestern, and Brown. The School of Social Work is #1 in the country, the law school is in the top 20, and the medical school is in the top 3.

The college campus is pretty compact and collegial. Students live in dorms on the South 40 or in apartments near-by. The dorms are nice. Several are new.

It's a pretty friendly campus that promotes good relationships between students, and cooperativeness over competitiveness. Greek life is present, but not dominating.

Campus is located near Forest Park, the largest urban park in the US, and near the Delmar Loop, which is a shopping/restaurant/bar/arts area. Both the campus and the Loop are very pleasant places to hang out.

If students are OOS, they can fly into St. Louis and take a Metro train from the airport to campus. There are two train stops near campus that go to the airport, downtown and elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Really tops in many scientific disciplines, one of the best medical schools/biomedical research programs in the country (far ahead of some Ivys for instance in NIH grant funding awarded). Have had many Wash U prior students in my laboratories, medical school precepts over the years, they are very well-prepared and educated. They do engage in some questionable tactics (lots of merit aid, counting incomplete applications etc) in the admissions lottery, but seems like all the top 50 but not perceived top 10 schools do it (see recent publicity about practices at Claremont, GW, Washington and Lee, Tulane, Emory etc). Nice size, big enough and with enough top grad schools to have lots of opportunities and wide variety of classes available, small enough to not feel lost in a huge university. From my 2 DD's recent classes, kids ended up at Wash U in two groups, some that truly aspired to be there, were in top half or third of the class at "big 3/5" and often applied ED, and the other were kids that truly were really at the top of the class, and had real chances at HYPS, but in the randomness of admissions, some ended up not getting into their first choices, and did get into Wash U (some with merit aid) and went there (in some cases choosing over Dartmouth, Cornell, Northwestern, U Chicago and the like). Most seem very happy there. Some have found the preprofessional emphasis/competition a bit much, along with some very pampered classmates attracted there by all the bells and whistles.

[Anonymous]

Seems to attract very bright kids from our HS. Never really heard of it until DC's college search. Does it have a midwestern vibe to it? Does is have enough brand name recognition outside of the midwest? What are your thoughts/experiences?

I have several very bright friends who have graduated from there in recent years. These people are from all over the country (East Coast, West Coast, and Chicago area), so it definitely has a national appeal. It is a very selective school and has some great programs. As far as the people who say it is on par with UVA or UMD College Park they are uninformed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:30 years ago nobody outside the midwest had heard of Wash U. Since then, it has raised its profile, primarily by awarding merit money to coasties. Now it draws a ton of very strong applicants from this area, as well as other metro areas along the east coast.

Really, I think you're mistaken. I went to high school in Virginia over 30 years ago, and it has always had an excellent reputation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:30 years ago nobody outside the midwest had heard of Wash U. Since then, it has raised its profile, primarily by awarding merit money to coasties. Now it draws a ton of very strong applicants from this area, as well as other metro areas along the east coast.

Really, I think you're mistaken. I went to high school in Virginia over 30 years ago, and it has always had an excellent reputation.

I went to Sidwell 25 years ago and one of my classmates went there. No one had really heard of it then (that was before US News rankings of course). Now it's one of the most popular schools for Sidwell students to attend. Definitely changed.