College of the Atlantic

I had the opportunity last week to participate in a counselor visit program at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine. I love the chance to visit schools like COA because they help give me examples of colleges that are very much unique in their identity and illustrate the point that all colleges are not 'the same.'

Let me open with some real talk: COA is not for everyone and it shouldn't be. If you are considering it, let me be frank in sharing that the on-campus dorms (where I stayed last week) have composting toilets. This speaks to COA's commitment to sustainability and emphasis on environmental responsibility, but if that sort of thing doesn't ring your bell it should be your first clue that you should explore other schools. (Full disclosure, the toilets actually weren't so bad, just a relevant detail I think prospective students might care about.)

Toilets didn't scare you away? You kept reading! Great, let me share more about this fascinating little gem. COA is a tiny school (under 400 students!) where only one degree is awarded -- a Bachelor's in Human Ecology. Human Ecology, here, is left open to interpretation but the loose idea is that students are tasked with exploring how humans interact with their environment through interdisciplinary courses. Some students concentrate their studies on food systems and sustainable agriculture, others connect music and philosophy, another might eventually pursue Veterinary school after exploring literature and chemistry. Like any liberal arts curriculum, the idea here is that asking deep questions and learning across academic subjects produces intellectually nimble young adults ready to work in a variety of fields. While there are not rigid guideposts providing students ready-made pathways to a degree, there is an expectation that students will have a passion for learning and that passion will grow during their time as a student at COA.

We had the opportunity to visit the college's two working farms (one for animals and one for produce), both of which provide food served in the dining halls. We met with students and professors, all of whom I experienced to be grounded and earnest in their love of learning.

Most impressive, from a college counseling prospective, has to do with COA's age and size in comparison to their endowment. They graduated their first class in the early 1970s and have managed to amass an endowment that lands them in the top 100 in the nation (per student). (Note - this is not to imply that this school is pretentious, snobby, or elite by any stretch. If anything, their frugality and practicality is what keeps their finances as strong as they are).  This translates into the ability to meet about 98% of demonstrated need for incoming students, a rarity at a school that is not hyper selective in terms of acceptance rate. Of note, they do not require the CSS Profile (using a home grown institutional form instead) and do offer merit aid up to 50% of the cost of attendance.

Plumbing quirks aside, this school is not the right fit for all students. Bar Harbor is gorgeous in the summer, but know that winters in vacation towns in Maine can be challenging to deal with (due to both the shortened daylight and reduced number of residents). COA copes with that partially by running a trimester system with no classes held between Thanksgiving and New Year's. Be aware that this is also not a party school. When asked about the social scene on campus, the most popular activity was reported to not be parties but potlucks (driven by the fact that the dining hall is not open on weekends and all dorms have full kitchens). With Acadia National Park located nearby, there is also a thriving outdoor adventure scene to be had all year round - with access to great hiking, cross country skiing, and camping. The best candidates are curious thinkers who are ambitious active learners. They do not have any sports teams, but are certainly far from being categorized as a sedentary campus.

One of the other counselors here made note of the intentional nature of this school. Every campus decision occurs through community wide discussion and input. They intuitively care about every detail and are careful not to waste resources. Thank you so much to the College of the Atlantic for their generosity in sharing their campus with me. What a wonderful school to be able to add to the right student's list!

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NYSACAC 2019 + Syracuse University Visit

 

The annual NYSACAC Conference is going on right now at Le Moyne College, a small Jesuit college in Syracuse, New York. Founded in 1946, Le Moyne was the first Jesuit school to be founded as a co-ed school and unsurprisingly they are also the first to appoint a female lay-person as President (she spoke to us today and she her energy is certainly contagious). I'm here at the conference this year in a few different capacities, including both High School Delegate on the Executive Board and session presenter. My session earlier today focused on the Financial Aid Quadrant Approach that I shared with families and students in the Fall. The goal is helping young people minimize their out of pocket cost by identifying schools with the highest chance of having the lowest price.

This morning, I had the opportunity to tour Syracuse University. With 14,000 students, Syracuse is a medium sized Research I school comprised of nine different undergraduate colleges. Students must indicate the college where they are applying on the Common App, but can keep the specific major undecided if they are not sure about their exact pathway. Syracuse values interdisciplinary study and many students take courses or add minors in other divisions besides the one through which they were admitted. Over 70% of students live on campus all four years (and all students are required to live on campus for the first two years) so there is very much a cohesive campus community surrounded by the urban backdrop of the city of Syracuse. New campus initiatives include: a first year reading assignment for all freshman students to read a book centered on the theme of diversity and a renovated wellness center that combines mental, physical, and emotional health into one building. One of the nicest features about Syracuse is the fact that they both meet 100% of demonstrated financial need of admitted students AND have merit aid to offer the top 25% or so of the admitted class so it can also be a good fit in terms of affordability. Thank you to the Syracuse team for welcoming us today!

I'll be at the conference one more day before returning back to school on Friday. As always, it is a pleasure and a privilege to serve the organization and connect with colleagues, new and old.

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Pacific Northwest Tour - Lewis & Clark College

Original estate manorhouse, now the Lewis & Clark Admission Office

Students personalize their mailboxes with stickers.

Today was the final day of the tour and we spent it visiting Lewis & Clark College. A liberal arts college with about 2,400 students located in the suburbs of Portland, this school has a gorgeous campus (formerly a private estate and country club built by a Jewish family unwelcome to join existing clubs in the 1920s). There are towering trees and a lovely wooded landscape that can't help but make you feel transported to a peaceful forest retreat away from the urban grid of Portland just a few miles away.

Location is one of the major features that Lewis & Clark prides itself on, being both in a major city and in the Pacific Northwest situated right between the Oregon coast, a state park, and nearby mountains for skiing. There is a focus on sustainability and environmental stewardship and students are very much drawn toward global experiences and applying their learning to the real world.


As a counselor, something I found appealing was the fact that Lewis & Clark can offer high quality of education while simultaneously having a generous rate of admission. For the vast majority of Eleanor Roosevelt students, this could be a target or likely school but it wouldn't result in sacrificing on key factors like proximity to a city/airport, strong faculty, and happy students. The school has been testing optional since 1991, a sign that they genuinely are able to serve and welcome students with all sorts of strengths. About 8-9% of the pool applies without testing, but those students end up being 20% of the enrolled class.

From my observation, Lewis & Clark is a good fit for a student who is outdoorsy, artsy, and self identifies as someone a little off the beaten path. They do not have any Greek life and the student I had lunch with made a point to say it was not a party school. Instead, most students prefer to go hiking or camping on the weekend, socializing in the great outdoors as opposed to a bar, club, or big party. One of the highlights of the visit was getting to hear anecdotes from professors at breakfast about their interactions with students. It was clear that teaching is a priority and personal attention from faculty is the norm. A few spaces on campus could potentially use some renovation, but I respect their approach to fund other institutional priorities above interior decorating (especially given the precarious state of liberal arts colleges that don't have giant endowments). It also goes with their mission of environmental sustainability to not replace or redecorate functional spaces.

I want to sincerely thank all five campuses for their hospitality over the past week. I also very much thank the ElRo PTA for their funding support of the college office and Mr. Saliani for his commitment to professional development in granting me permission to attend amazing opportunities such as this. I feel so much more well versed in these schools and am ready to recommend them to the right students.

Pacific Northwest Tour - Reed College and Willamette University

Our next school was probably the one I felt most knowledgeable about prior to the tour. Reed College's reputation precedes it. It is known as an ultra-rigorous intellectual liberal arts college and indeed that is the place I got to see in person yesterday evening and this morning.

Reed is a school full of bright students that aren't so much after grades as they are after knowledge. They are smart without needing to brag about it or be rewarded for it through gold stars or pats on the back. That isn't to say they are completely cynical or jaded all the time (of all our student panels so far, when the Reed students got jazzed about a topic they smiled the biggest, giggled the loudest, and showed great amounts of enthusiasm) but they are seemingly not here just to go through the motions. They value process as much as they value product.

Thesis Tower

Sample Thesis about the Physics of Skipping Stones

All students at Reed write a thesis and we got to visit the tower in the library where all of them are bound and kept.  Submission of the thesis is turned into a three day campus wide celebration, complete with ceremonial burning of past drafts, food, pomp and circumstance.

Learning is taken very seriously at Reed. There is an 'Honor Principle" that is intentionally not written down in order to emphasize the nature of being part of the Reed community. Students are to treat others as they would want to be treated (NOT 'they' as in themselves 'they as in the other person). This urges students to be good community members, taking the perspective of their peers and professors and acting in their best interests. This includes a universal academic honesty policy, where all exams are self-proctored and students don't cheat. I suspect this is both because they don't need to and because it doesn't benefit them. Most Reed students don't even know their grades or GPAs. That sort of quantification of intelligence are overshadowed by the pursuit of inquiry, creativity of thought, and exploration of knowledge.

This is a place that breaks the mold in a lot of ways. Things like not participating in college rankings (and thus not having a giant focus or motivation toward things like yield rates, acceptance rates, or driving up application numbers). They also don't employ adjunct professors, a practice that is widespread across most other institutions of higher education. They don't have NCAA sports, but reminded us, more than once, that high school student athletes can and should still apply and are welcome with open arms.

The only school on the tour to meet full demonstrated financial need of admitted students, Reed can be grouped with its other philosophical peer schools like Amherst, University of Chicago, and Williams. But unlike those schools, their acceptance rate hovers around 35%, meaning they are a much more realistic option for the right fit student. I also observed that the place Reed puts its money is into the people and the classroom experience (read: financial aid and high quality engaging professors) as opposed to facilities. Case in point: I was expecting a gorgeous brochure-worthy 100 year old library for a school this chock full of voracious readers and was instead met with a space last renovated in the (aesthetically painful) timeframe of 1989.

I would classify that 'right fit' student as someone who aims to be a lifelong learner. A person for whom thinking deeply brings joy. I very much value schools like this because they really do have an identity that sets them apart from the rest.

A study hearth at Willamette U.

Our second school of the day was Willamette University, a small college of about 1,700 students located in Oregon's state capitol of Salem. And they are not just in the state capitol, they are literally across the street from it - meaning that students have direct access to not only politics but also virtually every industry and branch of state and local government including sustainability, education, business development, and healthcare.

The overarching themes of this school were clear: community/civic engagement and teaching. Students raved about their professors and we met the most faculty here than of any school so far. The school motto is: "not unto ourselves alone are we born." A message that hearkens back to their past affiliation with the Methodist church, but more so appears to embody the ongoing commitment to teaching students to grow both academically and as human beings, responsible for bettering the world and building bridges of understanding with others.

Willamette is the oldest school in the Western US (founded in 1842) and occupies a unique space within the world of higher ed. With a firm commitment to the liberal arts, Willamette is also a place with graduate programs (including 3-3 and 3-2 combined degree programs in fields like law, business, and engineering) but with a size that is much smaller and more intimate than other universities. No undergraduate class here is over 50 students. They are testing optional and offer merit aid to all applicants, even those who don't submit scores.

Perhaps the more than any of the other three schools we've seen so far, Willamette was transparent about their areas for growth. To be frank, this part of the country is not very racially/ethnically diverse and each of the schools we have seen have a ways to go before their schools accurately represent the makeup of our country (both in terms of Pell eligible students and underrepresented students of color). That said, I was most impressed with the answers Willamette gave on this topic. They were reflective and gave real action items and ways their community is striving to do better. The initiatives appear to genuinely be from the top down and there is an ongoing dialogue between students, faculty, and the administration around areas of diversity, access, and inclusion. Bravo to them for not shying away from these difficult conversations, not skirting these topics with visitors like us, and seeking out ways to move forward together as leaders in the West.

Willamette struck me as a place where, in the true spirit of a CTCL school, a typical student can come to be the best version of themselves. The energy is positive and I found it to be more bubbly than the other schools we've seen so far.

Our final school awaits us tomorrow - excited to finish out this great week!

Pacific Northwest Tour - Whitman College

Stix, students climb on for good luck before exams or big papers.

Whitman College

 So I'm going to start by being honest - no one goes to Whitman College by accident. The reason I say that is it is not a place you stumble upon. We drove 4+ hours to get there (it is located in the south east corner of Washington state) so, as you might imagine, the it is a very intentional place. The students who attend feel a connection to the community and opt to be there on purpose. (*Note: driving from Portland or Seattle is not the only way to reach campus, a student from NYC would likely opt to fly to one of these cities and then take a short regional flight to one of two airports, either 7 minutes or 45 minutes from campus).

Whitman has about 1,500 and is totally focused on the undergraduate experience. There is a challenging curriculum paired with individual support. Virtually all majors have a thesis requirement and a senior comprehensive exam (often with an oral component). Writing is taken seriously. There is Greek life, but I certainly didn't get a party school vibe. These are opportunities to connect with peers, not be exclusionary.

Students are earnest and seek out connections, both with one another and with the local community. Lifting one another up is considered part of the fabric of the school culture. My tour guide chose to come to Whitman after getting into schools like Yale. Her reason? She said that she valued the "humble intelligence" of Whitman students.

Whitman is test-optional and about 25% of the students opt to go this route. They are admitted to the school at the same rate as those that submit test scores (about 50% acceptance rate, for those wondering). They still utilize an old school holistic reading process, with at least two readers per file. There is not currently a supplement for the application and anyone who applies before December 1 doesn't have an application fee either. Barriers aren't really Whitman's thing. They are much more interested in identifying the students who will be the best fit and helping them grow and develop.

Like many small liberal arts colleges, Whitman is a place with room to grow in terms of diversity. But unlike many schools, they seem to be making efforts across all parts of the school (not just the Admission Office) to make their campus a safe place for difficult conversations. Pretty much every presenter/person we heard from mentioned the annual Privilege and Power Symposium, a day each spring when classes are cancelled and the campus engages in a day full of panels and discussions around topics of access, privilege, identity, and social justice. There is also a term that I (and other counselors) noticed being used here which is 'first generation working class' - something that Whitman has a clear focus on and a population they appear to both seek out and subsequently empower. In addition, like our other visits, LGBTQ+ students are embraced and celebrated, it seems we have found a common theme for this grouping of schools.

Whitman is not yet in a place where they can meet full demonstrated financial need for admitted students, but they said their average gap is currently only about $4,000 a year. In the scheme of things, this is still pretty darn great and makes this an attractive option for students looking to minimize debt. About three quarters of students receive financial aid, a stat that speaks some of the difference one might feel from the highly selective East Coast small liberal arts colleges that have a stereotype of being full of only majority full pay students.

Appealing for their ability to push students to grow without an environment of pressure and anxiety, Whitman strikes me as a happy place with a thoughtful and reflective student body. The surrounding area is small compared to New York City, but is far larger and more developed than the neighborhoods of placed like Wesleyan or Beloit.

While we technically had a tour of Reed late this afternoon, I'm saving my blog post about them until tomorrow.

Pacific Northwest Tour - University of Puget Sound

On a day when my colleagues and students at Eleanor Roosevelt managed to have, what turned out to be, a false alarm snow day, I was out of the office participating in day one of the Pacific Northwest Five Consortium Tour. We got the chance to see the University of Puget Sound, located near Seattle in Tacoma, Washington.

Gorgeous atrium by UPS alum Dale Chihuly.

UPS is one of the schools added to the more recent edition of Colleges That Change Lives list. These are schools that consider themselves to be places of transformation and where students can bank on lots of personal attention. With stunning views of Puget Sound, Mt. Rainer, and Craftsman style homes in a residential section of Tacoma, this is a lovely school with 2,400 undergraduates. Their identity is rather sporty/outdoorsy (not a huge shock given the geographic location) and there is access to pre-professional majors like Business that are deeply rooted in the liberal arts. There is a core curriculum that is writing heavy and lets students delve deeply into seminars that span from topics like The Third Wave: Rock After The Beatles, to Imagining Blackness, and Exploring Bioethics Today. They are testing optional

My largest takeaways, from a college counseling perspective, have to do mainly with ways that UPS doesn't always follow the herd. For example, they have a practice of not maintaining a significant waitlist. This means they don't string students along or keep a cushion of 'courtesy waitlists' of students the have no intention of later admitted. Instead, their waitlist might contain 20 students, those that they truly might end up reaching out to if a space arises. They also have a relatively tiny international population (though they admittedly are looking to grow it). They have approximately 2% of their students identifying as international, something that I find refreshing at a time when so many schools seek out up to 20% of their class from full pay international students as a way to increase their operating budgets. Also, while they have Early Decision, it is not a huge enrollment stream, so Early Action and Regular Decision students still get a very fair shake.

I was thrilled to be able to have breakfast with Audrey P., ElRo Class of 2016 and current UPS senior. To me, it seems she is thriving. I was most impressed by her senior Capstone project where she is looking at the influence of pregnancy on incarcerated women as it intersects with race/ethnicity. It sounded like a fascinating topic and I'm so glad to see her doing well and representing our school on this campus!

In closing, I want to share how struck I was by the inclusive and welcoming climate for LGBTQ+ staff and students. It seems that the entire community was committed to helping all incoming and continuing students feel welcome and comfortable enough to be themselves. Not to say their work is done or that any campus is perfect, but the conversation appeared to be ongoing and at the forefront of the campus consciousness.

Tomorrow: Whitman College!

Decision Day 2018

Congrats to the Class of 2018 for their participation in Decision Day 2018! We continued our tradition of allowing interested students to post their plans for the Fall of 2018 on our lobby bulletin board. It is always so fun and exciting to see where students will be after high school. Below, you will see the current list of college acceptances and enrollments (indicated in bold) based on the information entered in Naviance.

The college with the highest number of acceptances was Binghamton University, with at least 60 members of the class being admitted. The four colleges tied with the highest number of students planning to enroll (at five per school) are: Tulane University, Binghamton University, New York University, and University of Michigan.

College

American University

Amherst College

Ashoka University

Auburn University

Babson College

Bard College

Baruch College of the CUNY

Binghamton University

Borough of Manhattan Community College

Boston College

Boston University

Bowdoin College

Brandeis University

Bronx Community College of the CUNY

Brooklyn College of the CUNY

Brown University

Bryn Mawr College

Bucknell University

Butler University

Carnegie Mellon University

Case Western Reserve University

City College of New York CUNY

Clark University

Clemson University

Colgate University

College of Charleston

College of Staten Island - CUNY

Columbia University

Connecticut College

Cornell University

CUNY New York City College of Technology

CUNY-Macaulay Honors College

Dartmouth College

Davidson College

Denison University

DePaul University

Dickinson College

Drexel University

Duke University

Earlham College

East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania

Elon University

Emory University

Fiorello H. LaGuardia Community College

Flagler College

Florida Atlantic University

Fordham University

Franklin & Marshall College

Goucher College

Grinnell College

Hamilton College - NY

Hampshire College

Herkimer County Community College

Hofstra University

Hostos Community College of the CUNY

Howard University

Hunter College

IDC Herzliya- Raphael Recanati International School

Indiana University at Bloomington

Iona College

Ithaca College

John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the CUNY

Kenyon College

King's College London

Kingsborough Community College of the CUNY

Lehigh University

Lehman College of the CUNY

Lewis & Clark College

Loyola University Maryland

Loyola University New Orleans

Manhattan College

Marymount Manhattan College

McGill University

Medgar Evers College of the CUNY

Miami University, Oxford

Mount Holyoke College

New York University

North Carolina State University

Northeastern University

Northwestern University

Oberlin College of Arts and Sciences

Ohio Wesleyan University

Pace University, New York City

Pennsylvania State University

Pennsylvania State University - Altoona

Pomona College

Providence College

Purchase College State University of New York

Purdue University

Queens College of the CUNY

Queensborough Community College of the CUNY

Quinnipiac University

Reed College

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Rhode Island School of Design

Rochester Institute of Technology

Rockland Community College

Rutgers University - Camden

Rutgers University-New Brunswick

Rutgers University-Newark

Saint Joseph's University

Sarah Lawrence College

Seton Hall University

Skidmore College

St. John's University - Queens Campus

St. John's University - Staten Island Campus

State University of New York at Albany

State University of New York at New Paltz

Stella and Charles Guttman Community College

Stony Brook University

SUNY Buffalo State College

SUNY College at Cobleskill

SUNY College at Cortland

SUNY College at Geneseo

SUNY College at Old Westbury

SUNY Oswego

Syracuse University

Temple University

The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art

The George Washington University

The Ohio State University

The University of Alabama

The University of Arizona

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

The University of Tampa

The University of Texas, Austin

Tufts University

Tulane University

University at Buffalo - SUNY

University of California, Irvine

University of California, San Diego

University of California, Santa Barbara

University of California, Santa Cruz

University of Colorado at Boulder

University of Connecticut

University of Delaware

University of Florida

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

University of Kansas

University of Kentucky

University of Maryland, College Park

University of Massachusetts, Amherst

University of Miami

University of Michigan

University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

University of New Hampshire at Durham

University of Pennsylvania

University of Pittsburgh

University of Richmond

University of Rochester

University of Southern California

University of St Andrews

University of Toronto

University of Vermont

University of Virginia

University of Wisconsin, Madison

Vassar College

Villanova University

Washington University in St. Louis

Wellesley College

Wesleyan University

Wheaton College MA

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

York College of the CUNY