First…pretend there’s a pic of my daughter right HERE. 5’5",cute,light brown wavy hair.
(thanks. I’m hopeless at online photo manipulation)
well…here’s a link: http://home.earthlink.net/~emmline/id4.html
You guys all seem bright enough. You can help this waffling teen Libra choose her college for next year.
Here are the choices:
Swarthmore
Vassar
St. Mary’s of Maryland
Kenyon
Wooster
Allegheny ¶
Anyone have insights or input relative to any of these options?
(she actually plays clarinet, not whistle, but at least it’s a wind instrument with holes.)
thanks!
Is she planning on majoring in music or is there some other field that interests her? And have you though UMBC? Its closer to J. Patricks for the Sessions on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday nights (Though the Calrinet has to go ).
Make sure your daughter actually visits all of them. I didn’t find out until I saw the place and actually took their tour. One place I had high expectations of turned out to look really bad, and I ended up extremely impressed with my original 5th choice out of 6 possible, and I am in my second year there now (UCI).
I wish her the best of luck. Also, make sure she knows that the whole “more-spare-time-than-in-high-school” thing is an elaborate myth.
Best of luck whichever she chooses. We’ll be facing this decision-making process soon; my daughter is a high school sophomore who also plays clarinet in the school band.
Of those schools, the only one I can tell you anything about is Wooster. I visited there three years ago while looking for schools, and I have to say that I was not impressed. The school was sort of dreary, and didn’t seem stimulating in the way that others did. So far as I know, its academics aren’t anything special, and the setting is pretty dreadful – hundreds of square miles of corn and soybean fields. Just a depressing place.
I go to Reed College (of Portland), and I naturally have to recommend it. Well, if you’re kind of weird, are into academics (at least that’s what everyone says. Some people could use less partying and more work, though it seems to be considerably better here than elsewhere. Here people get drunk, but do it safely. And then go back to reading) As the admissions department would say, LOVE REED
More seriously, what kind of things are your daughter interested in? Are you looking at smaller schools, large places, liberal arts, more focused? Where do you want to be geographically (I, for example, couldn’t stand being anywhere that could be called the South. Here I am in Oregon happily]) You should really make sure you think about things like that when choosing schools, because it might matter more than you think; and being happy has a lot to do with how well you learn – and remember that you can go to an excellent school. but unless you want to learn, you won’t. Or you can go to a less well known one and come out very well off.
I don’t have personal experience with any of those colleges, but with a quick search of the music department webpages, the only clarinet professor I recognize is Larry Guy at Vassar. I have no idea if your daughter intends to continue clarinet, but I’ve heard a lot about him and understand he is pretty good.
Really? Sounds like heaven to me… but then, I’m surrounded by thousands of square miles of tundra and snow and love it.
I’ve got hundreds of miles of forest east, north and south, Mt Hood a short ways east, and the ever so wonderful northwest rocky beaches west, all of which I like more than fields
You can’t go play in a corn field, all the roads are straight lines, there aren’t even many hills. Much too bland for my tastes, though I might like tundra (it’d be interesting at least for a while, I might want to see green before too long though)
I just sent in applications to Swarthmore and St. Mary’s both, haven’t made a choice yet but I’m leaning towards St. Mary’s. Gotta love the river view, and the people I met there were great. Plus Swarthmore seems like toooooooooooooooooooo much work.
She needs to get her apps out now! If she picks St. M’s, Penguin, I’ll try to get her in touch with you.
She’s planning to major in bio/environment, not music.
As for the corn & soybeans…not a turn-off to this particular kid, but Reed was ruled out due to distance, which is one reason I’m pulling for Swarthmore or St. Mary’s!
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