Kool Kristine: Choosing Universities

I have invited a regular guest blogger- a college student- an avid writer- a very sharp intellectual and an all around great kid to contribute to the blog. This is the first of several installments from Kool Kristine- life as seen from her quick snap shots of the college journey.

When the spring of my junior year of high school rolled around, picking what colleges I wanted to apply to felt a little bit like playing Jeopardy. Each school was a different flashy price tag, almost as equally appealing as the next.

“University of Denver—yeah, I can see myself going to school in Colorado. University of Portland looks like it has a super great dining hall! Oh, but I might be able to learn how to sail and do the rowing team if I go to Western. But Lewis and Clark has such an awesome campus and they serve ice cream at every meal…I guess I’ll apply to the University of Montana and University of Idaho too. Reasonably priced, and all that.”

The summer before senior I visited the schools that were the easiest to get to, and was finally able to list them from where I most wanted to go, to where I thought I’d be the most miserable. This was roughly my thought process for my top three choices:

• Lewis and Clark: A liberal arts school with a beautiful campus in wonderful Portland, Oregon near my family. The English Department looked pretty good, I liked the tour guide, and my interview with someone involved in admissions—I wasn’t sure exactly who—seemed to like me, and knew about my high school. This was a university that my college counselors wanted me to go to, and even though the tuition sticker price was way above anything my family and I could reasonably pay for I wanted to go there no matter what it would cost me.
• Western Washington University: A larger public school was appealing to me because I went to a small private high school, and Western was a good size. Not too big, not too small. I loved the campus and I have a lot of family within a few hours of Bellingham. I was very interested in the English department, and being a resident of Idaho I was eligible for the Western Undergraduate Exchange (WUE) scholarship, which would make attending a public university out of state much more affordable. (More on that later.)
• University of Montana: This was one of those schools I tossed up to the third of my list because so many people had recommended it to me. The English Department at UM is particularly well known for their Creative Writing program, which is what I wanted to major in. Along with this, I was also eligible for the WUE and it was close enough to home to make moving and living there easier than being any further away. The first time I visited I didn’t have any strong feelings for the campus, especially since I already had my sights set WWU or Lewis and Clark. I liked Missoula, but would rather have been in Bellingham or Portland.

What ended up making my decision about where to go to school was not what campus had the nicest buildings, what it cost, what type of food was served, or whether anyone thought I’d fit in better somewhere else. I chose to go to the University of Montana for no one but myself due to the stellar reputation of the faculty and the Creative Writing program. On top of this, UM has all of the benefits of both large and small schools, it’s close enough yet just far enough away from home, and affordable, even for out of state students like me. Once I visited campus again I was able to see how much I liked the atmosphere of Missoula and UM itself, and visiting with the advisor of the English Department only made me more ecstatic about where I was going to go to school.

Choosing a university is a very personal process; you have to earn a degree and consider where you want it to take you, what opportunities might arise, who you might meet, what city you want to live in, and what you want to do while you’re not actively pursuing your education. Out of all of the universities in the world, picking one you want to attend might feel a little bit like spinning the Jeopardy wheel and letting the ticker land where it may. As a veteran of the process, all I can say is that it’s best to think long term and below the superficial surface of what appeals to you in a university. Apply to some schools even if you don’t think you’re bananas over them, because a month or two down the road you might change your mind. When the deadlines stare you in the face and demand a decision, chose a university where you think you’ll be the happiest and receive the best education and degree for you and your dreams, and you’ll be on the right track.

Rank Your Brain Function by Using Rankings Right

I find that people are fascinated and incredibly attached to reading all they can about college rankings. Rarely do I sit down with a student without hearing that their college list was closely modeled around the latest from US News or another "reliable" source.

We don't buy clothes without trying them on or go on vacations based on rankings- we choose these by process of adding our own opinions and needs. Why is it that we do not do the same with universities? The Internet is FULL of virtual tours, videos and comments to peruse. Aside from visiting campuses and representatives, I would, as an practice to strengthen the brain, hop right on the Internet and do some research online. It is the biggest resource one can reach out to and the hardest to manage if one doesn't know how. Consider using the same technique I tell my students to do when reading Wikipedia (which I used to detest- but heck- if I can't fight it or flee from it- might as well go with the flow)- use the resources and comments at the bottom of the article to check its veracity. Do it once and you'll know why. For me, studying reader comments on "a first draft" of 2012 admissions " from a source like the New York Time's "The Choice" education blog, is mind-blowing, peace of mind and mindful all wrapped into one.


Students are in a "real-world" learning phase by the end of high school and the college process is a perfect platform for teaching skills. When asked what they think goes into college rankings, my 10th and 11th graders have said things such as: admissions percentages, graduation rates, endowments received, reputation, "whatever the college wanted to say" (small skeptic) and "whatever the school paid for the spot" (big skeptic and not true as I far as I know). My questions back to them were: How do you know these are the variables and how is the math done? The response was silence. One of my mentors, a dean of admissions at a highly competitive liberal arts school in California broke it down for us college counselors in a discussion last year- an eye opener that I have used 100s of times over. Knowing the breakdown made me consider the most basic of questions to add to my teachings about rankings: Since admissions percentages seem to be the area that families get caught up on most often when scouring rankings-here's a smart question to feed a ready brain: How many of the applications College X received were from applicants that met all of College X's admissions requirements? Get the truer percentage by taking only the "fitting" applications and do the math using the number of those students who were accepted from this newly reduced "good" pool. Are the numbers the same as what is published in US News? Critical thinking opens minds.


It isn't that institutions should be wholly blamed for omitting information or that all media outlets are faulty at reporting what info they are given- although it would be nice to require more transparency and synthesis of information as good practice. I also don't think staying away from ranking articles sows rational thinking. Too much doubt leaves little room for finding the truth and not enough makes us easy targets. However, I DO think a little investigative work on part of the reader is not too much to ask for. Take the rankings with a grain of salt, and just like the US admissions process, be holistic in your judgment because there are more parts to a ranking than what someone says. YOUR ranking is more important than anything- so make sure you consider what is valuable to you- such as campus atmosphere, price, courses offered, internships provided, international student body, or any other assortment of criteria that would make a post-secondary choice YOUR choice. In fact, when a university asks that tricky question- Why do you want to attend University X on the application, this is the thinking that they would prefer to hear as opposed to telling them they are #1 in so and so (They don't need to hear something they already know. Heck, they aimed for that spot!!). Researching, evaluating sources, making connections and synthesizing will not only give you those supplemental answers for applications, but you will have confirmed that brain of yours WORKS and WORKS WELL before it gets on campus!