Agree. My husband and I are Davidson alums and our child currently attends Rhodes. Their experience at Rhodes mirrors so many of the positive aspects of Davidson: intellectually curious and collaborative students, extensive interaction with professors, research opportunities, beautiful campus, a friendly, supportive feel to the school, easy-going social scene. For us it was a great bonus that Rhodes offers generous merit aid. Internships and research are encouraged; our child has interned at St Jude and will soon begin a sports marketing internship working closely with the professional basketball team. D3 sports (though our child is not involved so can't comment on that aspect). It reminds us a lot of Davidson
How southern does Rhodes feel?
Seems like Rhodes, like Davidson, has made a concerted effort to attract progressive students from a wide variety of backgrounds (economic/geographic/racial/cultural) and my student doesn't feel like there's a particularly "southern" feel. With that said, the college is deeply involved with its Memphis community, with all the reward and challenge that city offers. During the college search process got a much more southern vibe from Furman and Wofford.
My DC athlete was being recruited by Davidson but looks like academic record will keep them out. I had always had my eye on Rhodes for them, but my husband is a hard no on it because he is worried about their safety there. He grew up in DC and we are raising our family here, so it's not like he's a sheltered suburbanite. How have you felt about the safety of the Rhodes campus? I don't think he's wrong about crime in Memphis. Thanks!
The Rhodes campus is very safe. The school focuses a lot of resources on student safety. The wider city of Memphis has appalling crime statistics, and a large percentage of residents who are economically depressed. We do worry, but DC has never had a problem there, spends a lot of time going out in Memphis, including downtown and mid-town, and reports they feel safe as long as they are taking the precautions you would take in any large city, such as only going out after dark in groups. It comes down to individual risk assessment you'd make with any school in such a setting (like JHU, UChicago, Trinity, USC, etc.) I will say that we've been surprised how much we love visiting Memphis -- it's is a really fun, accessible city with great art, great food, music, professional basketball and a really fun minor league baseball team. It's an advantage the school has over similar SLACs in more rural settings (or a disadvantage, depending on your perspective!).
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