OT: Eeep! Rutgers!

[CTyankee]

Not the oldest boy. He's going to be a mechanical engineer, probably with an electrical engineering minor. He wants to stay in the Northeast and happily for him, there are many good schools that fit the bill up here. We'll keep you in mind for the younger kid, though, especially for Duke Law. That boy can argue circles around people and make you believe up is down. He'd make a great lawyer.

True, true. But my boy still isn't going there If it makes you feel any better, he's also unmoved by the absolute avalanche of literature from Pitt, too. I don't know if Pitt is after my son in particular or if it's just desperate for students. My son also got a laugh out of the contact from Kentucky ("An SEC school, Mom! Ha ha ha"")

Mechanical engineer??? Send him to see Clarkson. (Good thought Nan??) My son went there and loved all 4 years. He'll like it if he's the outdoors type; small town type; small college type. Coed and girls next door at SUNY. Lots of job possibilities from well known corporations who interview on campus at the end. Downside: Expensive..

 

[HuskyNan]

Mechanical engineer??? Send him to see Clarkson. (Good thought Nan??) My son went there and loved all 4 years. He'll like it if he's the outdoors type; small town type; small college type. Coed and girls next door at SUNY. Lots of job possibilities from well known corporations who interview on campus at the end. Downside: Expensive..

I'm a Clarkson grad myself but I won't recommend the school to my son. My son's guidance counselor gave him a list of colleges and ranked them as Most Competitive (Ivies, Duke, Stanford, MIT, RPI, etc), Highly Competitive (WPI, Northeastern, UConn, etc), Competitive (UMass, etc), Less Competitive and Open Enrollment. My son has the grades & SAT scores to apply to MIT, RPI, WPI and UConn so he will. Clarkson is considered Competitive - in other words, a safety school.

As for cost, MIT is actually less expensive than RPI although all of the schools getting serious consideration except for UConn are $52,000+.

 

[VAUConnFan]

Rutgers was good enuff for CD. So, that could count for something.




But then they did choose CViv over her.

1. I was not aware Coach Dailey ever applied for the Rutgers job, much less any other head coachimg position. Considering that Coach Dailey graduated from Rutgers, she played at Rutgers for and was an assistant coach to Theresa Grentz, one would thing that the inside track would have been all Coach Dailey's to navigate.
2. It has been my belief that Rutgers never looked anywhere else but at Coach Stringer to take over the women's program when Rutgers joined the Big East. The contract and salary Rutgers gave Coach Stringer made it possible for Coach Auriemma to eventually get paid.

 

[VAUConnFan]

Yes, but she atoned for her sin by coaching first at Cornell.

But, then Coach Dailey returned to Rutgers for two years before Coach Auriemma snatched her up.

 

[HuskyNan]

1. I was not aware Coach Dailey ever applied for the Rutgers job, much less any other head coachimg position. Considering that Coach Dailey graduated from Rutgers, she played at Rutgers for and was an assistant coach to Theresa Grentz, one would thing that the inside track would have been all Coach Dailey's to navigate.
2. It has been my belief that Rutgers never looked anywhere else but at Coach Stringer to take over the women's program when Rutgers joined the Big East. The contract and salary Rutgers gave Coach Stringer made it possible for Coach Auriemma to eventually get paid.

Dailey, who oversees the UConn post players, went after the Rutgers head coaching job in 1995. She didn't get it. She thought the Boston College head coaching job would be the perfect fit for her. She interviewed. She found out it wasn't.

From this Jeff Jacobs article, via the LA Time - http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion...s-dailey-0331-20120330,0,484999.column?page=1

 

[KnightBridgeAZ]

Things were a bit murky when Grentz left. She was not getting along with the then AD, Fred Gruninger, and while Fred was not in the mold of the modern progressive AD, and his time may have been past, so was TG's at Rutgers. She was really looking for an administrative job and was pretty well known to the insiders for letting her assistants do all the work, including, from what I heard, most practices.

At the time, I thought (but I could be wrong) that Vivian called / was directed to RU through her network. She wanted to leave Iowa and was looking for an east coast, possibly Philidelphia area job.

By the way, one thing I know she said early on - the reason she came to the Big East was because Connecticut was there. If there was no Connecticut, she wouldn't have felt that she could build something in a conference that lacked relevant distinguished programs in the mid '90s.

 

[VAUConnFan]

Dailey, who oversees the UConn post players, went after the Rutgers head coaching job in 1995. She didn't get it. She thought the Boston College head coaching job would be the perfect fit for her. She interviewed. She found out it wasn't.

From this Jeff Jacobs article, via the LA Time - http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion...s-dailey-0331-20120330,0,484999.column?page=1

Thank you. Great article.

 

[cabbie191]

My daughter last month married a guy who graduated from Clarkson. She went to a small school in Minnesota. They are in their late 20's and their connections to both schools remains very strong. I agree with what was said earlier - quality education in the field you want to pursue and the ability to make life long connections that will help you in your career and for the sheer joy of friendship are the top two qualities. If it is an attractive campus, that's a bonus.

 

[VAUConnFan]

Things were a bit murky when Grentz left. She was not getting along with the then AD, Fred Gruninger, and while Fred was not in the mold of the modern progressive AD, and his time may have been past, so was TG's at Rutgers. She was really looking for an administrative job and was pretty well known to the insiders for letting her assistants do all the work, including, from what I heard, most practices.

At the time, I thought (but I could be wrong) that Vivian called / was directed to RU through her network. She wanted to leave Iowa and was looking for an east coast, possibly Philidelphia area job.

By the way, one thing I know she said early on - the reason she came to the Big East was because Connecticut was there. If there was no Connecticut, she wouldn't have felt that she could build something in a conference that lacked relevant distinguished programs in the mid '90s.

This is consistent with what was written in Coach Stringer's book Standing Tall.

 

[boontonbomber]

A) It's a state university in a region of the country that diverts significant state monies from universities to private schools. It's not a very good university; it's decent at best.

B) Go to a good college town sometime. You'll notice that the people there don't say, "Oh we're so close to X". Folks in Athens love Athens; the proximity to Atlanta, though convenient for some things and great post-graduation from a professional standpoint, is not a primary focus. There are a number of great college towns around the country: Austin, Athens, Chapel Hill, Eugene, Ann Arbor, and the Amherst/Northampton/Holyoke area to name a few. There are also some great cities that happen to have colleges, such as NYC, DC, Chicago, and Seattle. And then there is Boston, which is both a great city and a great college town. New Brunswick, NJ doesn't fit into any of those categories. If you want to go to college in NYC, you go to NYU, Columbia, CUNY, or any number of colleges. If you want to go to school in Philly, Penn, Temple, Drexel, and a few other schools are options. If you like rural locations, there are any number of colleges in rural areas, and if you like the beach, there are some fine schools where the beach is just a stone's throw away (and MUCH nicer beaches than Jersey Shore, if it comes to that). Suffice it to say that if you want to go to college in NYC, Philly, Eastern PA, a rural area, or a beach town, you don't go to school in New Brunswick. What's within a three-hour radius is pretty irrelevant.

been to few college towns, as my children went to schools in austin , houston, boston, louisville, and d.c. , one son is a prof. at ohio st. in columbus, and my better half went to smith college in northampton. all nice college towns. but i was not comparing new brunswick to towns of that ilk, rather i was referring to the area, which i think is incomparable. nor was i comparing rutgers to some of the schools you mention, but "decent at best" is laughable. it's ranked #25 among national universities in the latest u.s. news ratings, ahead of such schools as minnesota, iowa, and vermont. btw, uconn was ranked #19. you think proximity( once again, within 2 hours, not 3) is not important, i think it is.
re beaches, which beaches on the jersey shore have you run your toes though the sand on? the jersey beaches have long been considered among the best on the east coast. of course, the beaches were mentioned as just one of the many opportunities in the area.

 

[DobbsRover2]

been to few college towns, as my children went to schools in austin , houston, boston, louisville, and d.c. , one son is a prof. at ohio st. in columbus, and my better half went to smith college in northampton. all nice college towns. but i was not comparing new brunswick to towns of that ilk, rather i was referring to the area, which i think is incomparable. nor was i comparing rutgers to some of the schools you mention, but "decent at best" is laughable. it's ranked #25 among national universities in the latest u.s. news ratings, ahead of such schools as minnesota, iowa, and vermont. btw, uconn was ranked #19. you think proximity( once again, within 2 hours, not 3) is not important, i think it is.
re beaches, which beaches on the jersey shore have you run your toes though the sand on? the jersey beaches have long been considered among the best on the east coast. of course, the beaches were mentioned as just one of the many opportunities in the area.

If Rutgers did jump to #25 in the US News rankings, that's quite a jump, because the current online rankings shows it at #68, a ways behind UConn. On the first site that comes up when you google "college rankings," something called the stateuniversity.com list, Rutgers is way back at #177, and is a hard find. I don't know if Princeton Review has an overall ranking but the three cited category rankings for Rutgers (New Brunswick) are:

• Professors Get Low Marks - #1
• Least Beautiful Campus - #8
• Election? What Election? - #17

That doesn't sound like a place that will very high up on many prospective student lists. I work and went to school in NJ, and I would not be quite so glowing of the area, which along with all the complimentary things you describe also includes quite a few areas of plain grossness and dullness. It's a mix, but having just got back from leaving my daughter off for her freshman year, I wouldn't be feeling good if I knew she was going to the place with the worst rated professors and that was canker-sore ugly to boot.

 

[boontonbomber]

If Rutgers did jump to #25 in the US News rankings, that's quite a jump, because the current online rankings shows it at #68, a ways behind UConn. On the first site that comes up when you google "college rankings," something called the stateuniversity.com list, Rutgers is way back at #177, and is a hard find. I don't know if Princeton Review has an overall ranking but the three cited category rankings for Rutgers (New Brunswick) are:

• Professors Get Low Marks - #1
• Least Beautiful Campus - #8
• Election? What Election? - #17

That doesn't sound like a place that will very high up on many prospective student lists. I work and went to school in NJ, and I would not be quite so glowing of the area, which along with all the complimentary things you describe also includes quite a few areas of plain grossness and dullness. It's a mix, but having just got back from leaving my daughter off for her freshman year, I wouldn't be feeling good if I knew she was going to the place with the worst rated professors and that was canker-sore ugly to boot.

the #68 ranking is for all national universities, where uconn is ranked #58. the #25 ranking for rutgers is for national public universities, where uconn is ranked #19.
i suggest that you look carefully at the u.s. news rankings again, paying close attention to the universities that are ranked below rutgers. for example, the SUNY system in nearby new york is considered a very good group of schools. yet, rutgers is rated ahead of all of them.
regarding the Garden State, i prefer to accentuate the positive, and there is plenty of positive in new jersey. their big cities, like many big cities all over this country are not wonderful places. the new jersey that i described is the one that most people just are flat-out ignorant of. as the state song says, "from the twin lights to the delaware, from cape may up to high point, we share new jersey with the world."

 

[DobbsRover2]

the #68 ranking is for all national universities, where uconn is ranked #58. the #25 ranking for rutgers is for national public universities, where uconn is ranked #19.
i suggest that you look carefully at the u.s. news rankings again, paying close attention to the universities that are ranked below rutgers. for example, the SUNY system in nearby new york is considered a very good group of schools. yet, rutgers is rated ahead of all of them.
regarding the Garden State, i prefer to accentuate the positive, and there is plenty of positive in new jersey. their big cities, like many big cities all over this country are not wonderful places. the new jersey that i described is the one that most people just are flat-out ignorant of. as the state song says, "from the twin lights to the delaware, from cape may up to high point, we share new jersey with the world."

Well, I'll certainly agree that NJ has a lot of great and beautiful areas, and certainly where I went to school not far from Boonton was great horsey country, but getting there also took me through some of NJ's true pits. The top NY SUNY's best beauty mainly lie in dollar-for-dollar value, and I doubt any NYer would play up anything particularly compelling about Albany, Binghamton, Stony Brook or Buffalo unless heavily paid to, though many get great educations there. One more thing about Rutgers is the train lines down there are a constant disaster. Might not matter that much to a stay-on-campus student, but my New Brunswick-based neighbor at work can tell some entertaining stories about what happens to the NJ Transit line she's on whenever a cloud throws a shadow or squirrel decides to have some fun. Even worse than the LIRR.