Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I toured Hamilton, everyone there seemed unfriendly. I much preferred Colgate.

Colgate gets more than half their students from private schools. No thanks.

Really Hamilton always had more of that rep when I was in school. Colgate is bigger and seemed more diverse. I think they are similar than different.

To the OP, these are some of the organizations that associate themselves with W&L. The first 2 are alumni groups and the last students. All proud alums or current students. To the school's credit, they don't recognize them.

https://www.thegeneralsredoubt.us/

https://www.facebook.com/WandLPRE1985

www.wluspectator.com

Aims of the General's Redoubt include:

Restore public prayer at ceremonial functions and underscore that prayer for participants is optional.

Western Civilization is at the core of the Washington and Lee student journey, particularly as relates to the humanities

I ended up on the General's Redoubt list somehow (definitely didn't subscribe) as did a bunch of my friends.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All these are tiny schools and incredibly desolate towns. They’re very different politically and socially, but they still need a student that can get lost in their own college world for four years to survive there.

Which SLACs are not in incredibly desolate towns?

Macalester,Trinity, Davidson, Reed, Claremont Consortium, for example

Occidental, Wellesley

Not in a good area.

I grew up in Pasadena, quite nearby, and go back pretty often -- most recently las March for a meeting at Occidental. It's a totally safe area -- just not fancy at all.

[b]

I grew up there too. And went to school there. It’s not safe at night. Would you live in Eagle Rock?. Which is 48% renters BTW

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to W&L on a full academic schorlarship. I was literally the "son of a CEO" (as a PP so grossly phrased it) and from the south, and I hated it. I pledged a fraternity, went through initiation and never set foot in the place again after being initiated.

Too much drinking, too much racism, too little critical thinking. Just all around gross.

For kids who need college paid for, it might make sense, but it's an uphill slog for any thinking kid.

Someone should let the brilliant kids there know that you don’t approve. Sorry you weren’t capable of taking advantage. Sounds like a you problem. My 2014 grad is in a fully-funded PhD program and her entire friend group is bright and absurdly accomplished.

OP, dopes like this won’t help you. Visit the three schools and see what you think. The student profiles are very similar and there are very few kids at any school in this category who aren’t smart and capable and ambitious. See where they send graduates. Look at outcomes.

The Good Old Boys Club drives much of the "outcomes" and those "outcomes" are reserved for the right type of person. I will leave it to the OP to decide if they would be a beneficiary or even want to be a beneficiary of that arrangement. For most, it is a bait and switch.

All 3 schools are fine institutions but only 1 has the pictures of 2 slaveholders (Washington and Lee) on the diploma. And as recently as earlier this year, doubled down on keeping them there.

https://www.wlu.edu/the-w-l-story/leadership/office-of-the-president/messages-to-the-community/2019-20-academic-year/response-to-diploma-petition/

I think issues like pictures on a diploma are beside the point. If you go to a school named after Lee, you know what you're getting into. It's also going to be tough to find a historical figure that's pure as the driven snow.

My concern when I was at W&L was what I perceived as very thinly veiled racism and the lack of diversity. The diversity of my freshman dorm hall consisted of one white catholic kid and a Jewish kid from Charleston SC. Everybody else was a WASP. I didn't know any Black kids at all.

My first week on campus, I went to a KA rush event (I didn't know anything about KA -- whose foundng documents celebrate the confederacy --- or I would not have gone). The event involved guns, binge drinking, causal, overt homophobia and a LOT of implied dislike for Black and Jewish people (phrased as celebration of W&L, the confederacy and the south generally in contrast to northern, urban environments and the kind of people who live in those places, or annecdoes in which every Black or Jewish person is identified by race/ethnicity, no matter how irrelevant to the story --- e.g "that Black security guard"). During my freshman year, I also saw a flier for a "discrete Klan rally", which I remember thinking had to be a joke or something posted to make the school look bad because it seemed so absurd. I ended up pledging the second most liberal fraternity on campus, but the misogyny even at my fraternity was mind boggling and not something I was not at all prepared for based on my older brother's fraternity experience at a large, southern state flagship.

I was at W&L quite a while ago, and I think the university has been making an enormous effort to change which I welcome since my family still has deep ties to the area. But W&L is not somewhere I'd ever in a million years consider for my kids.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the W&L critic upthread, many of those criticisms are valid. But you’re mistaken that the school doesn’t care. They are devoting a lot of energy and dollars to improving on their tragic diversity record. This president cares. The new Dean of Diversity, Inclusion, and Student Engagement is but one of many promising initiatives. I suspect it is a real challenge recruiting people of color to a small, isolated town in the south bearing a confederate name, but they are managing to grow the population of minority students, if too slowly.

The Lee legacy will be harder to grapple with as it’s very much part of their identity. Lots of stubborn old coots who don’t get it, and lots of donors threatening to cut ties if they dare touch the name. Many have already written them off for the (overdue) changes they’ve made, such as removing slaveholder names from buildings, isolating the recumbent Lee statue from view within the chapel, removing all images of him in uniform, etc. But the name is a tough nut to crack. He saved the place. I’m an alum and I hope they remove it. I said as much in the gigantic survey that was sent to alums. But I’d be surprised if it happens. Ask yourself why Yale keeps its name despite the horrorshow of that namesake. I was hesitant about my daughter applying there so she wouldn’t have to deal with the mess.

I do think that the W&L administration is trying. My child attended a "diversity weekend" recruitment event within the last couple of years. My child loved meeting all of the bright, eager recruits who came to visit, including many Questbridge scholars. Many of them preferred to attend anywhere besides W&L. One current student of color actually warned the recruits not to enroll.

I should add, though, that DC was absolutely charmed by her W&L alumni interviewer. I was afraid that it wouldn't go well, as he was a much older alum, but they had a fantastic conversation and he represented the school very well.

I will also add that DC was accepted and received a very generous financial aid package from W&L. DC chose to take the full ride Banneker Key scholarship at UMD instead.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the W&L critic upthread, many of those criticisms are valid. But you’re mistaken that the school doesn’t care. They are devoting a lot of energy and dollars to improving on their tragic diversity record. This president cares. The new Dean of Diversity, Inclusion, and Student Engagement is but one of many promising initiatives. I suspect it is a real challenge recruiting people of color to a small, isolated town in the south bearing a confederate name, but they are managing to grow the population of minority students, if too slowly.

The Lee legacy will be harder to grapple with as it’s very much part of their identity. Lots of stubborn old coots who don’t get it, and lots of donors threatening to cut ties if they dare touch the name. Many have already written them off for the (overdue) changes they’ve made, such as removing slaveholder names from buildings, isolating the recumbent Lee statue from view within the chapel, removing all images of him in uniform, etc. But the name is a tough nut to crack. He saved the place. I’m an alum and I hope they remove it. I said as much in the gigantic survey that was sent to alums. But I’d be surprised if it happens. Ask yourself why Yale keeps its name despite the horrorshow of that namesake. I was hesitant about my daughter applying there so she wouldn’t have to deal with the mess.

I do think that the W&L administration is trying. My child attended a "diversity weekend" recruitment event within the last couple of years. My child loved meeting all of the bright, eager recruits who came to visit, including many Questbridge scholars. Many of them preferred to attend anywhere besides W&L. One current student of color actually warned the recruits not to enroll.

I should add, though, that DC was absolutely charmed by her W&L alumni interviewer. I was afraid that it wouldn't go well, as he was a much older alum, but they had a fantastic conversation and he represented the school very well.

Anonymous wrote:To the W&L critic upthread, many of those criticisms are valid. But you’re mistaken that the school doesn’t care. They are devoting a lot of energy and dollars to improving on their tragic diversity record. This president cares. The new Dean of Diversity, Inclusion, and Student Engagement is but one of many promising initiatives. I suspect it is a real challenge recruiting people of color to a small, isolated town in the south bearing a confederate name, but they are managing to grow the population of minority students, if too slowly.

The Lee legacy will be harder to grapple with as it’s very much part of their identity. Lots of stubborn old coots who don’t get it, and lots of donors threatening to cut ties if they dare touch the name. Many have already written them off for the (overdue) changes they’ve made, such as removing slaveholder names from buildings, isolating the recumbent Lee statue from view within the chapel, removing all images of him in uniform, etc. But the name is a tough nut to crack. He saved the place. I’m an alum and I hope they remove it. I said as much in the gigantic survey that was sent to alums. But I’d be surprised if it happens. Ask yourself why Yale keeps its name despite the horrorshow of that namesake. I was hesitant about my daughter applying there so she wouldn’t have to deal with the mess.

I do think that the W&L administration is trying. My child attended a "diversity weekend" recruitment event within the last couple of years. My child loved meeting all of the bright, eager recruits who came to visit, including many Questbridge scholars. Many of them preferred to attend anywhere besides W&L. One current student of color actually warned the recruits not to enroll.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to W&L on a full academic schorlarship. I was literally the "son of a CEO" (as a PP so grossly phrased it) and from the south, and I hated it. I pledged a fraternity, went through initiation and never set foot in the place again after being initiated.

Too much drinking, too much racism, too little critical thinking. Just all around gross.

For kids who need college paid for, it might make sense, but it's an uphill slog for any thinking kid.

Someone should let the brilliant kids there know that you don’t approve. Sorry you weren’t capable of taking advantage. Sounds like a you problem. My 2014 grad is in a fully-funded PhD program and her entire friend group is bright and absurdly accomplished.

OP, dopes like this won’t help you. Visit the three schools and see what you think. The student profiles are very similar and there are very few kids at any school in this category who aren’t smart and capable and ambitious. See where they send graduates. Look at outcomes.

The Good Old Boys Club drives much of the "outcomes" and those "outcomes" are reserved for the right type of person. I will leave it to the OP to decide if they would be a beneficiary or even want to be a beneficiary of that arrangement. For most, it is a bait and switch.

All 3 schools are fine institutions but only 1 has the pictures of 2 slaveholders (Washington and Lee) on the diploma. And as recently as earlier this year, doubled down on keeping them there.

https://www.wlu.edu/the-w-l-story/leadership/office-of-the-president/messages-to-the-community/2019-20-academic-year/response-to-diploma-petition/

Who’s going to tell genius that Hamilton owned slaves?

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/confederate-gen-robert-e-lee-statue-has-been-removed-from-the-u-s-capitol

And this just happened....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to W&L on a full academic schorlarship. I was literally the "son of a CEO" (as a PP so grossly phrased it) and from the south, and I hated it. I pledged a fraternity, went through initiation and never set foot in the place again after being initiated.

Too much drinking, too much racism, too little critical thinking. Just all around gross.

For kids who need college paid for, it might make sense, but it's an uphill slog for any thinking kid.

Someone should let the brilliant kids there know that you don’t approve. Sorry you weren’t capable of taking advantage. Sounds like a you problem. My 2014 grad is in a fully-funded PhD program and her entire friend group is bright and absurdly accomplished.

OP, dopes like this won’t help you. Visit the three schools and see what you think. The student profiles are very similar and there are very few kids at any school in this category who aren’t smart and capable and ambitious. See where they send graduates. Look at outcomes.

The Good Old Boys Club drives much of the "outcomes" and those "outcomes" are reserved for the right type of person. I will leave it to the OP to decide if they would be a beneficiary or even want to be a beneficiary of that arrangement. For most, it is a bait and switch.

All 3 schools are fine institutions but only 1 has the pictures of 2 slaveholders (Washington and Lee) on the diploma. And as recently as earlier this year, doubled down on keeping them there.

https://www.wlu.edu/the-w-l-story/leadership/office-of-the-president/messages-to-the-community/2019-20-academic-year/response-to-diploma-petition/

To the W&L critic upthread, many of those criticisms are valid. But you’re mistaken that the school doesn’t care. They are devoting a lot of energy and dollars to improving on their tragic diversity record. This president cares. The new Dean of Diversity, Inclusion, and Student Engagement is but one of many promising initiatives. I suspect it is a real challenge recruiting people of color to a small, isolated town in the south bearing a confederate name, but they are managing to grow the population of minority students, if too slowly.

The Lee legacy will be harder to grapple with as it’s very much part of their identity. Lots of stubborn old coots who don’t get it, and lots of donors threatening to cut ties if they dare touch the name. Many have already written them off for the (overdue) changes they’ve made, such as removing slaveholder names from buildings, isolating the recumbent Lee statue from view within the chapel, removing all images of him in uniform, etc. But the name is a tough nut to crack. He saved the place. I’m an alum and I hope they remove it. I said as much in the gigantic survey that was sent to alums. But I’d be surprised if it happens. Ask yourself why Yale keeps its name despite the horrorshow of that namesake. I was hesitant about my daughter applying there so she wouldn’t have to deal with the mess.

Anonymous wrote:I went to W&L on a full academic schorlarship. I was literally the "son of a CEO" (as a PP so grossly phrased it) and from the south, and I hated it. I pledged a fraternity, went through initiation and never set foot in the place again after being initiated.

Too much drinking, too much racism, too little critical thinking. Just all around gross.

For kids who need college paid for, it might make sense, but it's an uphill slog for any thinking kid.

Someone should let the brilliant kids there know that you don’t approve. Sorry you weren’t capable of taking advantage. Sounds like a you problem. My 2014 grad is in a fully-funded PhD program and her entire friend group is bright and absurdly accomplished.

OP, dopes like this won’t help you. Visit the three schools and see what you think. The student profiles are very similar and there are very few kids at any school in this category who aren’t smart and capable and ambitious. See where they send graduates. Look at outcomes.

I went to W&L on a full academic schorlarship. I was literally the "son of a CEO" (as a PP so grossly phrased it) and from the south, and I hated it. I pledged a fraternity, went through initiation and never set foot in the place again after being initiated.

Too much drinking, too much racism, too little critical thinking. Just all around gross.

For kids who need college paid for, it might make sense, but it's an uphill slog for any thinking kid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All these are tiny schools and incredibly desolate towns. They’re very different politically and socially, but they still need a student that can get lost in their own college world for four years to survive there.

Which SLACs are not in incredibly desolate towns?

Macalester,Trinity, Davidson, Reed, Claremont Consortium, for example

Occidental, Wellesley

Not in a good area.

I grew up in Pasadena, quite nearby, and go back pretty often -- most recently las March for a meeting at Occidental. It's a totally safe area -- just not fancy at all.

Anonymous wrote:When I toured Hamilton, everyone there seemed unfriendly. I much preferred Colgate.

Colgate gets more than half their students from private schools. No thanks.