Posted on 09/22/2009 5:09:21 PM PDT by jazusamo
There is so much for high school seniors and their parents to know about colleges that they not only need to get a lot of information but also need to make sure it is the right kind of information.
A number of college guides have useful information but, unfortunately, the best-known and most pretentious of these guides — "America's Best Colleges"— is grossly misleading.
There is no such thing as a "best" college, any more than there is any such thing as a "best" wife or a "best" husband. Who would be best for a particular person depends on that person.
Would we not consider it absurd if someone collected statistics on people and then used those statistics to rank individuals according to who would make the "best" wife or husband? Yet that is the approach "America's Best Colleges" is based on.
A college that would be best for a particular student could be a terrible place for that student's brother or sister. One of them might find West Point a great experience, while the other would fit in perfectly at Reed College— and each might be miserable at the other institution.
Choosing the college that is right for a particular person is not about the rankings of institutions. It is about matching a student with an institution that can enable that person to flourish while there, and to graduate with an education that is a foundation for a fulfilling life in the years ahead.
Among the things you need to know about a particular college is whether it has a real curriculum or just a smorgasbord of courses, so that it is possible to graduate knowing nothing about history, economics or science, for example. Some of the most prestigious colleges in the country are places where you can graduate completely ignorant of such fundamental subjects.
What also matters is whether the intellectual atmosphere is one in which competing ideas are explored and debated, or one in which there is a prevailing orthodoxy of political correctness that a student can challenge only at the risk of being ridiculed by the professor, given a low grade or— in some places— suspended or expelled for violating a campus speech code by giving an honest opinion about things where an orthodoxy is imposed, such as issues involving "race, class and gender."
In short, what is important is not choosing the "best" college, according to some statistics that conceal the arbitrary choices behind the objective-looking numbers. What is important is choosing the right college for you.
The best of the college guides reflects that difference in its title— "Choosing the Right College." Its latest edition has just been published. Like people, it has put on some weight over the years and its seventh edition is now 1,140 pages long. Unlike some of us, however, its additional weight is muscle rather than fat.
"Choosing the Right College" tells you whether there is or is not a curriculum at each of the colleges it covers and whether classes are taught by professors or by graduate students.
It also tells you whether the intellectual atmosphere is free or is hidebound with political correctness, and plagued by professors who think their job is to use the classroom as a place to sound off about their political ideology to a captive audience, even when the course is about chemistry or accounting.
"Choosing the Right College" also presents information on such things as black separatist organizations at Lafayette College, for example. Whether you are for or against such things, you need to know about them, in order to choose what you think is right for you.
Co-ed living arrangements are also discussed, including just how co-ed they are— that is, whether males and females simply live in the same dormitory and/or share the same room and/or use the same bathrooms and showers. It also mentions some colleges where you don't have to live co-ed at all, if you don't want to.
If you want to get more than one college guide, there is also "Barron's Profiles of American Colleges" which has much more statistical detail and can be a useful supplment. But "Choosing the Right College" is a must— even if it is not carried in your local bookstore, and you have to order it on-line or from its publisher, ISI Books in Wilmington, Delaware.
thanks for this post! my oldest son is 13—eighth grade... been looking into colleges for him... i am going to get the book Thomas Sowell recommends...
ping
yes--i just wish it weren't in Michigan! isn't it in Michigan? Patrick Henry in Virginia is also a college that takes no federal money...
Hillsdale graduates do very well in life too.
I did a quick check earlier at Barnes & Noble and they list it at $25.00, well worth it, IMO.
Thanks, it’s shame there aren’t many more like it.
There are federally supported colleges I would be pleased to have my sons attend: any of the military academies.
and Amazon has it for $18.50...
Absolutely! Any of them!
I knew I should have checked Amazon. :-)
A school I’ve heard of that has an interesting approach (at least it seemed to me) is St John’s College. It teaches via classic books and discussion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._John’s_College_(United_States)
Not a recommendation, it just seemed interesting.
Yes, Michigan. BRRRRRR.
My 18-year-old is attending the United States Coast Guard.
I would recommend getting several books, not just one, and also making use of the high school college counselors. Assuming that they are doing the job with enthusiasm, they are very well connected and have a good idea of which of their students will do well at a particular school. I also found collegeboard.com helpful. Your college counselor can give your son a password to access the restricted portions of that site. It has a good search program to narrow down the list of colleges you're interested in by location (urban/suburban/small town/rural), class size, selectivity, courses offered, etc.)
If you use ALL these aids you will generally wind up with a RANGE of recommendations. But you will start to see the same names turning up over and over again.
Our game plan was to narrow down our list to five: one "safe" school (i.e. one she would be happy attending but which we were pretty sure she would get in and get some scholarship money), one "reach" school (one that her chances of getting in were not good but, hey, she might), and three schools that she wanted to attend and most likely would be admitted. We visited those five schools (except the "reach" school which she really wasn't all that keen on), several more than once, and she decided on her favorite.
Fortunately she was admitted to all four, got money offers from three, and got wait listed at the 'reach' school. Since she wasn't really all that keen on it, we struck it from the list and visited the three middle schools again before she made her final decision.
She loves the school, has made decent grades and a lot of friends, and has decided to pursue a career in field biology. (Me, I like air conditioning and dry feet!)
We looked at St. John’s, my daughter decided it was (a) too liberal for her (in the political sense) and (b) just too weird. She’s a pretty conventional kid.
My daughter vetoed Michigan right out of the box. She HATES the cold! (that’s probably why she’s done biology field work in Costa Rica and coastal North Carolina!)
Finally got my son to send me his new mailing address at the USMC SOI (I told him I needed to send him a check. That's how we used to catch people we wanted to serve process on -- "I need to talk to him. I owe him some money.")
BTW, 'never say never'. He was SO over school he didn't want to go to college. But I got a text message from him saying that he's taking advantage of the USMC study program to go ahead and get started on a bachelor's degree in Sports Medicine. Which pleases me no end.
My son is an Engineering Major at Grove City College.
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