Comparing other colleges (non SA's)
- Thread starter Basketcase
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Not to hijack the thread, but I had to add my 2 bits: Back in the 80's in Georgia, at a small college, I had a professor for a core required US History class who was Asian. His heavy accent was VERY hard to understand. A week or so into the course, he had some sort of issue with his throat and brought a small speaker hooked to a microphone for his lectures. (This was a class of less than 20 students in a small room) That only made it harder for me to understand him! Looking back on that, I feel like I certainly wasn't getting my money's worth out of my parent's tuition dollars for that class, but being 18, I made it through with a B using the textbook......
5Day
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At my son's school, students put together a website that not only rates the professors, but it provides the past grade distribution for a professor. Somehow they have permission to mine the grades, so it is not self reporting of grades. As you would expect the way professors grade is all over the place.
running615
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My one son was so torn on picking between 3 schools last spring (he applied to about 10 places, was too many but he got down to the final 3) I think what was so hard was he was trying to please us (his parents whose interest in cost was very high on our list) and he was feeling pressure to pick the school that offered a free ride that he had no interest in attending. Finally, he devised his own survey and gave a weighted score of 1-5 for each answer (he came up with over 50+ points that were to be considered for a college, from costs to housing, academic reputation, to major opportunities, honors opportunities, extracurricular activities, town location, and everything else you could think of when picking a school). My husband and I both took this survey too. In the end, the school that was middle of the road for costs, that I think he really deep down wanted to attend, came out the highest on just about every category. (The "free" school scored the lowest in all but one category) I think it just gave him confidence to make his decision without doubts.
^^ Part of the reason your 'criteria' for selecting a college shouldn't rely so heavily on arbitrary rankings published by the media. What matters to you may be factors they don't even consider in their formula. For most families, cost is a key factor, regardless of how some media outlet happens to rank that college.
Having gone through back-to-back college searches and inhe process with a third, I think much of the above advice is excellent! If your child is sure of a major or at least department, we found it helpful to delve into the actual curriculum in the course catalog. We also spoke with an assistant dean (always go below the top dog- the assistants have more time) in the department he was interested in and got a ton of great info we never would have found elsewhere. I think ultimately though, it does come down to "feel" once whittles down to colleges that fit your criteria (financial, academic, social) so make a trip to the admitted student days of the top couple of choices. And from my experience- food is actually MUCH higher on the list of priorities!!!