Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 16:30     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Stanford. We should’ve done research before, because it was so sprawly and felt like our tour was never going to end. It’s more Disneyland than a college.


Imagine me as a high school senior who had never visited Stanford, got accepted, and had a month and a budget of $500 for my college visits. Stanford was my second visit after an Ivy that underwhelmed me, and after the Stanford visit I decided the Ivy wasn’t so bad after all. We rode a golf cart on part of our tour and I remember thinking that it was going to be really tedious to get from point A to point B without the admissions golf cart. My mom didn’t help by saying that I could have plane tickets to CA or a bike for campus, but not both.


I remember visiting around 1980 and just hated how the part I saw looked like a Star Trek universe shopping center. Just couldn’t imagine spending time on that campus.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 16:10     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Cornell, I actually adored the campus and hill itself, but the students…not so much. Tour guide joked about suicide on the campus, and anti social doesn’t begin to describe the type of student we saw and talked to. It felt like a campus where rigor was thrown on the students and not in a positive way.


Wow. We have this on DS’ list because the frats and social life seem a bit more fun than many of the other top 20s.


DS has it on his list not yours.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 16:09     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:Cornell, I actually adored the campus and hill itself, but the students…not so much. Tour guide joked about suicide on the campus, and anti social doesn’t begin to describe the type of student we saw and talked to. It felt like a campus where rigor was thrown on the students and not in a positive way.


Wow. We have this on DS’ list because the frats and social life seem a bit more fun than many of the other top 20s.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 16:03     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Cornell, I actually adored the campus and hill itself, but the students…not so much. Tour guide joked about suicide on the campus, and anti social doesn’t begin to describe the type of student we saw and talked to. It felt like a campus where rigor was thrown on the students and not in a positive way.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:57     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Carnegie Mellon. Just blah and the students didn’t look happy. Pitt was more interesting and closer to the student-oriented areas in Oakland.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:47     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Yale. I just don’t see the big fuss, and I love gothic architecture; it just looked artificial and ugly to me. Uchicago, Sewanee, and washu are preferred faves
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:42     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Muhlenberg. DS isn't too picky about being in a cute college town but even for him, Allentown was not going to work. Billy Joel got it right sadly.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:41     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Union was a total turn off. The actual campus wasn't bad, but the tour guide kept telling us not to walk x blocks in this or that direction because of the crime.

Hard no.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:40     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:Princeton felt just too precious. It did not feel welcoming.


It feels like a stuffy country club to me. And I went to another school of the same caliber that feels more down to earth.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:38     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:We thought Bucknell had potential, but there was this God-awful big ugly cylinder that started on campus and appeared to lead in the direction of Manhattan. I think I heard it referred to as some sort of "pipeline." Not really sure, but it ruined the campus aesthetic.


I heart you


+1
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 15:36     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:We thought Bucknell had potential, but there was this God-awful big ugly cylinder that started on campus and appeared to lead in the direction of Manhattan. I think I heard it referred to as some sort of "pipeline." Not really sure, but it ruined the campus aesthetic.


I heart you
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 14:02     Subject: Re:Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:Tufts was the most depressing place we had ever been, and the tour was downright strange, and took us almost no where of importance.


YES! I can't tell you how bummed I was. Tufts was seemingly everything my kid wanted - mid size, semi-urban, strong in humanities and econ, easily reachable from NY. I went in thinking Early Decision. After the tour DC refused to apply RD, never mind ED. (DC will be going to U Chicago next year)
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 11:53     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:We thought Bucknell had potential, but there was this God-awful big ugly cylinder that started on campus and appeared to lead in the direction of Manhattan. I think I heard it referred to as some sort of "pipeline." Not really sure, but it ruined the campus aesthetic.


Thanks for the laugh! :D
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 11:48     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Tufts was so dreary. Everything about it was depressing. Which was a BUMMER because on paper it seemed like the perfect school for DS.


Agree. So much 70s brutalism that had never been updated.


Where?

The PP was responding to a post about Tufts.
Anonymous
Post 01/01/2025 11:44     Subject: Underwhelming campus experience
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Tufts was so dreary. Everything about it was depressing. Which was a BUMMER because on paper it seemed like the perfect school for DS.


Agree. So much 70s brutalism that had never been updated.


Where?