What other boards besides DCUM do you use for college info?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCUM is the best among all forums. It’s particularly relevant for private school kids as there are still some private school parents staying around. It’s also an excellent place if your DCs are working towards T20 schools. At the same time, it’s diverse, having discussions on a very broad range of topics. Because it’s anonymous, we have some snarky comments but at least some are funny.

I actually think DCUM is the worst one out there. The anonymous nature of this forum allows people to say some crazy stuff without providing good reasons/facts.

Yeah some of the most ignorant takes I’ve ever seen regarding college have come from this site.

Why ? Because their experience & opinion is different than yours ?

The other main college website is essentially an echo chamber and a good portion of the advice is objectively incorrect. Also, it is a website full of cliques.

DCUM is a great resource with honest thoughts posted because users aren't vying for more "likes" than other posters.

I’ve only looked at CC a few times and found it very cliquey as well. The anonymity of DCUM definitely prevents that. Same with FB groups and A2C.

How can a forum be cliquey?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
a good portion of the advice is objectively incorrect.

Really? Any examples?

I don't always agree with some posters on CC but I can't say what they wrote is "objective incorrect." For example, I dislike the "all ABET engineering schools are similar" view, but there is some truth to it – if a student is not aspiring to anything more than working at an average engineering company, where they graduate from make little differences.

Agree, that ABET phrase and "go to premed wherever it is cheapest, undergrad does not matter at all" CC repeat leaves a lot unsaid. It could work depending on the undergrad school's premed track record, but without due diligence is a recipe for disaster. For true top highly motivated premeds it could cut the student out of any reasonable chance at a top-30ish research based med school where one needs to be if they want the best chance at certain subspecialties. You have to be at a med school that has those subspecialties in order to match into those fields for residency. For capable but not super-top premeds, many schools have too small a premed population and/or poor advising with large weedouts and lots of Cs. These students would be better off at LACs.

CC also does not do well for students who are above-average 1100-1250 SAT kids who will not get into in-state flagships but need to find the best schools within range that will fit them.

Other than those quibbles, CC provides solid accurate advice for most students who are targeting T50 private or Top 20 publics, and frankly has excellent advice on LACs both selective and less so. Dcum only cares about WASP and is oddly anti-LAC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tell me!

College Confidential. The rest are very dubious. Especially A2C.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCUM is the best among all forums. It’s particularly relevant for private school kids as there are still some private school parents staying around. It’s also an excellent place if your DCs are working towards T20 schools. At the same time, it’s diverse, having discussions on a very broad range of topics. Because it’s anonymous, we have some snarky comments but at least some are funny.

I actually think DCUM is the worst one out there. The anonymous nature of this forum allows people to say some crazy stuff without providing good reasons/facts.

Yeah some of the most ignorant takes I’ve ever seen regarding college have come from this site.

Why ? Because their experience & opinion is different than yours ?

The other main college website is essentially an echo chamber and a good portion of the advice is objectively incorrect. Also, it is a website full of cliques.

DCUM is a great resource with honest thoughts posted because users aren't vying for more "likes" than other posters.

I’ve only looked at CC a few times and found it very cliquey as well. The anonymity of DCUM definitely prevents that. Same with FB groups and A2C.

How can a forum be cliquey?

(DP)

With usernames the posters know one another and communicate via PMs. The clique group is obvious and includes several mom moderators.

[Anonymous]

The posters who trash DCUM on this website consistently endorse and promote the dying CC website while DCUM is growing in viewership.

CC is dying for a reason--actually for several reasons.

[Anonymous]

DCUM is the best forum out there. Tops in anxiety, status obsession, prestige chasing, groupthink, general snobbery, and elitism.

Reflective of the general social climbing mindset of the greater DC area, which is a unique amalgam of economic striving and ambition alloyed with risk aversion, conformity, and a bureaucrat's box-checking approach to life.

The Ivy league and top SLACs are the lodestar for such people, making this DCUM forum by far the most entertaining source for information and and disinformation on the absurdities of elite college admissions.

[Anonymous]

agreed! I started coming here when I had trouble breastfeeding and am proud to have graduated my way to the colleges and Universities forum.

[Anonymous]

I like DCUM because the context is the same (DMV). It is more relevant than national sites. (I know not everyone here is DMV.) If there are other DMV-specific forums, that would be great.

[Anonymous]

what's the LA version of this site? Or NY?

[Anonymous]

I have Niche useful. Not for definitive admission chances or anything like that but just patterns on what people like and don’t like about certain campuses

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wish there was a place for regular kids. Ye s there is the awesomely average FB group—but those kids are mostly below average. Everything else is T20 or bust. There is nothing for the in between kids.

I think part of it has to do with the school your child attends. At our public we have lots of kids that are "average" and few that are candidates for T20. Honestly, maybe the top 10% have a shot at Top 20? And this is even less since we have so many kids who have parents that are professors at Pitt or CMU that they go there almost automatically for the fee tuition. At Pitt they are probably getting merit on top of the free tuition, so it is basically free. I think the issue is that some of the NOVA schools have too many parents that think their kids are T20.

We really don't have kids going to Tulane, BU, Buckell or Lafayette or other attainable privates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wish there was a place for regular kids. Yes there is the awesomely average FB group—but those kids are mostly below average. Everything else is T20 or bust. There is nothing for the in between kids.

College Confidential is a great source for information when it comes to more typical kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tell me!

College Confidential. The rest are very dubious. Especially A2C.

Agreed, A2C is full of high school kids who are 'self affirming' and completely off base regarding actual chances. If I was still that age I would probably behave the same but it isn't helpful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wish there was a place for regular kids. Yes there is the awesomely average FB group—but those kids are mostly below average. Everything else is T20 or bust. There is nothing for the in between kids.

College Confidential is a great source for information when it comes to more typical kids.

There was a dad on College Confidential who I felt always gave the best advice. I wonder if he's still around ...

[Anonymous]

CC I like sometimes but it seems to have way less traffic - lots of schools have mainly old threads and the laptop interface is AWFUL. Pop ups galore.