These schools scream...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Help me to help my daughter. I don't know the stereotypes about the following schools:

Amherst - super smart kids, a bit preppy
Barnard - super smart women who like the advantage of cross-registration with Columbia
Colby - strong but not top tier SLAC
Wellesley - super smart women who like the advantage of cross-registration with MIT
Tulane - strong but not top tier school
Tufts - strong school but is in the shadow of its neighbors - Harvard and MIT
Bates - strong but not top tier SLAC
UVA - smart, preppy kids - good if you are IS
Duke - smart kids - better like basketball!

Thanks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tufts = Ivy League rejects

Please stop. Most smart students will not get into an Ivy League. Most smart kids don't even apply to all the Ivy League schools because they are all different. Some are too Greek, some are too rural. Tufts is a good school as are many, many other schools.

I grew up in the Midwest. Most of us wanted University of Chicago or Washington University or Stanford or Cal Tech or UC Berkeley for a first choice. None of us wanted to go to an Ivy or anything east of St. Louis. It just seemed stuffy and stuck-up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only good one in the lot is UVA. The rest smack of "daddy is paying full freight because I couldn't get into my first choice."

Duke and Amherst? Really? Both are night and day harder to get into than UVA.

Only a fool, scholarship recipient, or rich legacy moron would turn down instate UVa to go to Duke.

You need to get it through your thick skull that not everyone is enamored with UVA and other schools may have a better program for their interests.

It is you who sounds foolish with this continuous pronouncement that UVA is a do or die place to attend. It's just not, and I have no dog in the fight.

Well, both of my kids attend Duke and received more generous financial aid packages than at any of the other schools the were admitted to, including UVA. As a bonus, a Duke education is pretty hard to beat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only good one in the lot is UVA. The rest smack of "daddy is paying full freight because I couldn't get into my first choice."

Duke and Amherst scream that? Try again, bro.[/quote

+1 you've got to be kidding re; Amherst.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only good one in the lot is UVA. The rest smack of "daddy is paying full freight because I couldn't get into my first choice."

Duke and Amherst? Really? Both are night and day harder to get into than UVA.

Only a fool, scholarship recipient, or rich legacy moron would turn down instate UVa to go to Duke.

You seem to be assuming that everyone posting lives in VA. For those of us who don't, UVA costs about the same as private colleges. The challenge for state universities, especially those like UVA and UNC that limit out of state students, is that they can be a little parochial since so many students come from the state. Some people prefer a more geographically diverse student body. So it is perfectly rational to choose Duke over UVA. In fact when you look at the admissions stats the yield for out of state admits is much lower than in state so plenty of accepted students are choosing other schools.

There are many in-state VA students who ultimately choose not to attend uVA. There are many good reasons behind their decision. Last check, Duke was rated higher than UVA?

[Anonymous]

They are all good schools. Some offer a different experience (Amherst, Bates, Colby are all NSCAC schools), but, having just gone through the college application process with my child, none of those schools are easy to get into anymore.

[Anonymous]

I went to Duke on a full athletic scholarship. I'm grateful for the education but if I could go back in time I'd choose a different school. I didn't like the social scene (Greek life wasn't for me) and there's no small dose of southern culture. I'd have done better in the northeast or at Stanford. My two cents. If a kid grows up middle class in the DC area, Duke might not be the easiest fit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only good one in the lot is UVA. The rest smack of "daddy is paying full freight because I couldn't get into my first choice."

Duke and Amherst scream that? Try again, bro.

Really? Well it turns out that if you applied right, you probably shouldn't have gotten into your "reach" school -- if you got in everywhere you probably undersold yourself.

I'm too old to know what the reputations of these schools are (other than VA residents often think UVA is better than anywhere else in the entire universe). I can tell you that this is a nice list.

I can't imagine someone choosing between Amherst and Barnard, so I think it is time for a college trip.

[Anonymous]

My daughter received a much better FA package at Barnard as compared to Duke, UVA and Vanderbuilt.