Tell me everything about Fairfield University

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread definitely went off the rails.

My youngest child attends Loyola MD. Up until the 11th hour she was set on Fairfield University.

Most of the schools that my youngest looked at were mid size mid tier Catholic Universities. I am not sure why she was attracted to these schools as while we are Catholic we are what I would call non-practicing.

As she is my third I have visited a lot of schools and have had two older children attend other schools.

We live in Fairfield County. My wife has always liked Fairfield University and has spoken highly of their graduates as she is a Nurse at a local hospital that has hired a lot of Fairfield University nursing graduates.

So we are from the area and had an understanding of the reputation of the school and are obviously familiar with the town.

Comparable schools were Marist, St. Joe’s in Philly, Providence, Loyola MD, and I’d say Fordham.

My DD applied during the Covid cycle and it is my opinion that cohort had an easier admissions cycle with strong financial aid offers.

Fairfield gave us a strong financial aid package.

Here is what I didn’t like:

The new management building was a hike from the freshman dorms and given the topography and the LI Sound I thought it was going to be an unpleasant walk during the winter months.

I was not a fan of the cohort of students. Too homogenous.

I like the idea of my kids getting out of the bubble (we live in an UMC Fairfield County Town - it’s not indicative of lives most people live). Fairfield was too close to home and worried it would turn into a suitcase school for my DD.

For the price of Fairfield I thought there were better values.

I thought my DD was decided on Fairfield until her and I were driving to school one morning and she told me to send the deposit to Loyola MD.

My daughter’s reasoning - she had gone to a second on campus accepted student event and felt that the kids were not very friendly or welcoming.

Unbeknownst to DD my DW and I shared a reservation that socially Fairfield University might be tough for our DD.

Loyola would not have been first choice for my DD. I liked Muhlenberg.

But I will say my DD and I visited Loyola during Covid and in what appears to have been some serendipity met one of the administrators that is now the president. He was down to earth, we talked about the risk Covid put on higher Ed - he made me feel very comfortable with the staff at Loyola and I had the sense that my DD would be in “good hands”.

Loyola has been a success for my DD. She has found her friend group - she is definitely out of the bubble - she can take Amtrak if we cannot drive her and she has met a mix of other kids from a variety of locales and SES backgrounds.

She is working on her academics, achieving success, and I hope feels good about herself and her choice.

As Loyola is D1 they seem to have good school spirit and attend and support their teams.

Loyola MD was cheaper then Fairfield. I was prepared to pay for Fairfield but will admit financially I was happy about the Loyola decision. Obviously our family spends money going down to Baltimore but we like the trips.

I did not mean to hijack this thread and have my post be a booster to Loyola. Rather I thought to share our experiences.

Of the schools with a similar vibe I found Marist to be the most expensive and not willing to work with you. Providence was surprisingly generous as my DD was initially wait-listed. Fairfield also was willing to work with us.

I hope you found this helpful and wish you and your family good luck on your college search.

Niece is a freshman at Fairfield and having a similar experience with how your daughter felt during her second time touring. Compared to similar schools like Loyola, Fordham, Providence Fairfield in particular always seems to get a cliquey rep.

[Anonymous]

I’m not buying that people who live nearby never heard of it. Next they will claim their nose was so far up Yale’s gargoyle that they never heard of Quinnipiac, either. 😏

It would be worth $40k just to be able to reply “FU” whenever somebody asks you where you went to college.

[Anonymous]

22:47, that's a great, helpful post. I like Loyola a lot ... glad your DD is happy!

[Anonymous]

It was all male when my dad attended in the 60s. Jesuit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not buying that people who live nearby never heard of it. Next they will claim their nose was so far up Yale’s gargoyle that they never heard of Quinnipiac, either. 😏

It would be worth $40k just to be able to reply “FU” whenever somebody asks you where you went to college.

Read this during a deadly dull work meeting and desperately trying not to giggle!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not buying that people who live nearby never heard of it. Next they will claim their nose was so far up Yale’s gargoyle that they never heard of Quinnipiac, either. 😏

It would be worth $40k just to be able to reply “FU” whenever somebody asks you where you went to college.

Read this during a deadly dull work meeting and desperately trying not to giggle!

Gosh, you're intellectually challenged.

[Anonymous]

I’m a junior at FU. It is a Jesuit university with about 5,000 undergraduate students. Academically average with about half of applicants being admitted, most recent class has a 33% acceptance rate because of space issues.

In all honesty, I would not go to FU. I only went because my parents are alumni, and I commute from a short distance away. If you intend to go to grad school or be in college for many years, it doesn’t make sense financially. FU is really expensive for no reason, and aid awards are not great.

For those reasons, the students here are mostly white, weathy, and spoiled from New England, mainly New York, MA, CT, RI. The environment is incredibly cliquey, I have no friends or peer connections whatsoever. Now I will say gen z struggles socially which makes sense, but in general the school is just too small with not enough students. The good ones who don’t form cliques, are on their own studying.

The campus is really nice and there are some great professors and class sizes are small, which are some pros. But campus wise, there isn’t much that happens. If you do have free time, there’s nothing to do.

Similar to a private high school. Police presence is common and parties are broken up. Seniors live on the beach, but you have to know people to rent property. In other words, no party scene at all. The school is academically focused.

Food is meh. There’s the Tully, levee, and food trucks next to a parking lot. Nothing really special, just what you would expect.

Due to aforementioned police presence, the school is very safe which is another pro. I haven’t experienced crime or have seen another student put into danger.

Academically, the only stand out degrees are anything business related and nursing. There’s no need to come here otherwise unless you are rich or only care about your grades.

There are clubs but most are pretty boring. You might not even find any that you are interested in, and the available ones may have low attendance.

I’ve never felt so isolated. I’d recommend going to a cheaper and larger school with more going on.

[Anonymous]

It’s a decent school. Like below Fordham and Villanova but probably above providence college

[Anonymous]

My dad was there when it was all male.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It was all male when my dad attended in the 60s. Jesuit.

+1 he probably knew my dad.

[Anonymous]

Not to knock Fairfield but it’s not a peer to Fordham. Surprised someone said that

[Anonymous]

How is law school placement from Fairfield?

[Anonymous]

All my family is from Connecticut, and my cousin went to Fairfield in the 90s and transferred after freshman year, for two reasons: it was incredibly cliquey to her (as described above), and it was too expensive. She transferred to Southern CT State U (NOT a national school) but graduated and then went to UConn Law. She now works for the state in a high-profile legal role.

The person who said they were from CT and had never heard of it must have been living under a rock.

I actually think Georgetown as an undergrad might have a similar vibe. (I went there for grad school.) It is SO expensive without financial aid and there are many rich international students, and you can definitely feel like a fish out of water if you are a random middle class kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All my family is from Connecticut, and my cousin went to Fairfield in the 90s and transferred after freshman year, for two reasons: it was incredibly cliquey to her (as described above), and it was too expensive. She transferred to Southern CT State U (NOT a national school) but graduated and then went to UConn Law. She now works for the state in a high-profile legal role.

The person who said they were from CT and had never heard of it must have been living under a rock.

I actually think Georgetown as an undergrad might have a similar vibe. (I went there for grad school.) It is SO expensive without financial aid and there are many rich international students, and you can definitely feel like a fish out of water if you are a random middle class kid.

The number of rich internationals may greatly reduced at Georgetown in coming cycles.