What is so special about UVA, W&M, VT!?!??
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
Michiganders pay $40k for Michigan; Vermonters pay $40k for UVM; Virginians pay $46k for W&M. |
Anonymous
|
I'm the poster who originally said W&M was pricey for in-state tuition. I still think that. I also didn't say that it was the most expensive school out there or that it wasn't worth it. If one of my kids wanted to go there, I'd happily pay.
Out of curiosity, I looked up Michigan's tuition and fees, which are $18,346. W&M's tuition and fees are $26,456. UVM's tuition and fees are $19,996. All exclusive of housing, of course. |
Anonymous
For advising, at W&M the students have a "pre-major" advisor, and then once they declare, they have a departmental advisor. In both cases, the advisor is a professor. They understand the system, are available/accessible (both for office hours, or for one-off appointments), and see connecting with and guiding the student as part of their role at the school. At Berkeley, the department advisor is a junior administrator, with (possibly) a masters or (possibly just) a certificate in higher ed administration. Appointments are harder to come by, and rather limited, in frequency, in duration, in depth. These advisors are working within a larger, more complex system, and while I'm sure they handle most cases well, the edge cases are where a good advisor is most helpful, and … that's just going to be harder in a system/scale like Berkeley's. Similarly, for teaching, I don't have direct insights into how things are in the classroom, but will say that the kids at W&M have been very enthusiastic about their professors/classes, even going so far as to talk about changing majors, or adding a double major, or adding a minor, because of how much they enjoyed them. Even when the one at Berkeley has been in a class with a prof with high marks on Rate My Professor, there's been little enthusiasm about the classroom experience. My gut is that that has a lot to do with the classroom size. The one at Berkeley has been able to get instructor permission to get access to a few grad-level classes and has enjoyed those a lot more than the undergrad classes, and I think that maps to the classroom size theory, that when given a chance to have more direct contact with the professor, it's a more rewarding experience for the student. There have been some good regular (undergrad) classes, and one professor (who she never actually had for a class) who regularly hosts groups of students at his office hours that has been one of the highlights of her time there, but I would have a hard time giving a list of professors she loved. On the other hand, both of the W&M kids — after one semester there — have professors who have offered to write recommendation letters for summer programs / internships. Regarding majors, another issue the oldest had was that she had to declare her major when applying. The W&M students won't have to declare until the end of sophomore year (per the liberal arts tradition of trying a bunch of things out before committing to one). That meant that the oldest (at Berkeley) had to take a lot of required courses for Major 1 that then didn't translate to Major 2 when she transferred departments after sophomore year, and now had to take new required courses. So her exposure to the breadth of classes that normally would be available to her was curtailed. I think the clearest and most obvious summation is that W&M is, in all ways, a medium-size school, and Berkeley is, in all ways, a large school, and that overlays all of the main touchpoints the students have with the school. Even though the oldest started in the smallest college within Berkeley (in fact, their tagline at the time was something like "the small college in the great, big university"), we saw that there was no real way for it to compare to the relational experience a student would have at an actual medium-size university. (Side note: I had harbored a small (naive) hope when Mills College was on the rocks that the UC system would acquire it and turn it into a public LAC, like a west-coast W&M (if smaller). But the UC system is all about scale, by both necessity and design, so that wasn't ever a realistic idea.) I'm not saying that W&M is going to be better for all students than Berkeley. (I mean, clearly not for engineering, obviously, and not for many majors. Or for students looking for a big school experience.) Nor do I mean to complain about Berkeley. I'm grateful for the many great experiences my oldest has had! But I think it's easy for people to be blinded by prestige, or US News lists, or Nobel counts, or whatever metric they're using (often based on grad-level data that doesn't impact undergrads very much at all), and to minimize the importance of the undergrad experience / teaching, or of building a strong relationship with professors, or of having the kind of flourishing dynamics that exist in more intimate environments. And I'm grateful that W&M exists as a public option, both for Virginians and non-Virginians, and for the great experience my kids have had there. |
Anonymous
+1 "I go to an Ivy plus school" said no normal secure person ever. |
Anonymous
But anyone who cares about these designations could. Including you, I presume since you seem hung up on it. |
Anonymous
Actually that wasn't me at all at all who brought up the notion of Ivies - big or little or otherwise. Merely pointing out that a lot of people wouldn't know what an Ivy league school was - even if you walked straight into the ivy covered brick wall of one of them |
Anonymous
How about public-lite  ?
|
Anonymous
|
Nothing “special” - but kids can get a solid education at a reasonable price, while spending 4 years in a fun environment
Nothing unique. |
Anonymous
What is peculiar about W&M fees compared to the other VA publics is a $1 284 a semester “auxiliary fee” charge and a $1,204 a semester fee for “intercollegiate athletics” which adds up to $4,084, hence the surcharge over, say, UVA. I asked about that because DD has no interest in “intercollegiate athletics” but they were firm it had to be paid. |
Anonymous
|
Anonymous
Excellent post, very informative, it is indeed unfortunate that UC didn’t see the opportunity presented by a purchase of Mills. So many positive things UC could have done with it, including creating a SLAC (which UC Davis was close to being in the 1960s). |
Anonymous
The intercollegiate athletics fee is not unique to W&M. All Virginia public 4 year colleges have it, unfortunately. They range from $732 a year at VT (although the board has voted to raise it substantially) to $4,186 per year at VMI. |
Anonymous
|
Anonymous
Yeah; OK. Tell yourself whatever you need to in order to cope. |
Anonymous
JMU’s mandatory student fees for athletics are more than four times higher than all the other College Football Playoff schools combined. |