Anonymous wrote:I'm wondering how and if this is measurable, beyond the "vibe" one gets from visiting a school. I feel like college has become such an industry (this board alone underscores the intensity of admissions!). I want my kid to get a good education, but more than anything, I want my child to take away invaluable lessons about happiness, balance, and values during those four years instead of getting caught up in the noise of the competitive rat-race. Which schools have happy graduates? Which schools have a healthy balance between work and life? How is this measured, and can it be?
I know way too many kids who worked so hard for some kind of elite school, thinking it would solve their problems or magically open doors, and it did none of those things. I know one teenager who took his life after being denied admission to a top college. I know others who have been admitted to psychiatric hospitals due to intense academic pressure. It all feels like too much, and I'm wondering how and where to look for communities that put these four years into healthy perspectives.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:JMU
Anecdotally: Sadly, I know several students that left JMU with mental health issues. They did not have them prior. It could be timing, onset of some issues are early adulthood/late adolescence. It just stood out to me that I know 5-6 kids that left for a year or completely due to this and none of the other many, many college kids I know from other schools had this issue.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:It’s so strange to me that people expect actual lists of schools that produce happy young people. That’s just not the way college, or anything else in life, works. It’s a lot more complex than that, but ultimately, it helps to raise your kids to value human connection, to be content with less, and not to have overblown expectations of what college is about.
I'm the OP. I'm not looking for colleges that "produce" happy young people on an assembly line; I'm looking for schools that foster a sense of collaboration and that offer exceptional mental health resources (which I should have said in my original post). Totally concur that how kids are raised matters. But some schools are pressure cookers. (I see Swarthmore and U Chicago come up often in this regard.)
Anonymous wrote:My kids play club sports, workout and don’t go to a drinking culture school. They are both health nuts. They don’t stay up all hours and have good control with SM/iPhone use.
They don’t stay in their dorm rooms- study at the library, go to the fitness center, get outside, involved.
All of that has kept them mentally and physically healthy.
It’s a far cry from my college days of binge drinking several nights a week, day parties, football tailgates, etc.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Princeton Review has lists and rankings for this:
https://www.princetonreview.com/college-rankings/?rankings=happiest-students
Interestingly, many of the well-ranked schools on this list are almost never brought up on this board.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:William and Mary
Midwestern SLAC’s
SEC schools
This X 1000.
Anonymous wrote:William and Mary
Midwestern SLAC’s
SEC schools