St John's College Visit

[outtamyshell]

We spent a couple of days in Annapolis last week so DD could visit St John's College. If your kids are interested in attending this school, I highly recommend a visit. The students were very friendly with the prospies and happy to tell them all about the school. DD loved every minute of it. This was one of those strange moments where I had to let go and let my kid be the grownup. I dropped her off and picked her up the next day. I didn't have any kind of official tour of the campus or anything. But DD stayed overnight in the dorm, ate on campus, and attended three classes. She showed me around the campus the next day and we bought some stuff at the bookstore. We didn't find anything in the visit that conflicted with how the school is advertised. I was expecting DD to find the social atmosphere something she wouldn't want to be a part of. But her favorite part of the school was its size (everyone knows you're visiting because they know everyone there) and the conversations outside of class that included things like Aristotle that they were studying in class. She also loved the music library and the pianos and organ and harpsicord.

 

I know there was concern on these boards about drug use at St John's. I can tell you there is a lot of cigarette smoking, but the St John's students' reputation in town was that they smoke a lot of tobacco and read a lot of books.

 

Students can apply to St John's after finishing the first semester of Junior year. The application includes some great essay assignments including 'why do you want to go to St John's and what do you want to get out of college?' I think the application process will be a good experience for DD regardless of where she ends up attending. The application is free as was DD's overnight visit. So no matter where DD decides to go to school, she had a great St John's experience.

 

My original goal was to get DD out of college with no debt. Now that we are looking at St John's College, I feel like all we have done with her education has lead us to this school. Perhaps we will be going into debt for college. DD is excited about school and wants to get a jumpstart so she can be ready to attend St John's after next year. This is what I was hoping for to get some focus and energy around her Senior year. But now I am looking at colleges differently. I want DD to get a great liberal arts education - not vocational training, and not a specialized major. Is St John's as unique as it seems? Could she get a similar education studying in an honors program at a public university? How would she choose a major? Are there other secular liberal arts schools where the student body talks about academics outside of the classroom? We were looking at UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-Asheville and BYU. Right now everything that's not a Great Books education falls short of what I want for DD. She could study classics and learn Greek at any of these schools, but she'd be sacrificing Ptolemy and Einstein. I always knew DD would want to be a part of small classes with lots of conversation rather than lectures. I always assumed she'd find that at the graduate school level. Now I'm feeling rather out of sorts on what direction we should go.

 

Is everyone else's kids haivng an easier time choosing a specific major and following a conventional path for college? I'd love to hear how you are approaching the big college decision. DD doesn't have a specific career path in mind. Her main interests lie in classics, language, and political science. I still imagine her attending graduate school and can't imagine starting down that path already in debt. I sure would love to find an option that we can afford.

[Ria]

Is everyone else's kids haivng an easier time choosing a specific major and following a conventional path for college? I'd love to hear how you are approaching the big college decision. DD doesn't have a specific career path in mind. Her main interests lie in classics, language, and political science. I still imagine her attending graduate school and can't imagine starting down that path already in debt. I sure would love to find an option that we can afford.

 

Dh and I are both in total agreement that we won't send our kids to college unless they have a strong idea of a career choice in mind. Schools are just too expensive these days. To help facilitate the kids finding an interest, we begin discussing careers/interests when they are in 7th and 8th grades, just to get them thinking. By 9th grade we expect them to be looking into careers of interest...this works well, because by their junior years the oldest three have all known what they wanted to study (dd is getting her BS in nursing, ds is studying civil engineering, and ds (16) has decided on studying business and/or business management).

 

It really helps to have narrowed down the final goal, because then you can select colleges to look at that will help facilitate reaching that goal. For example, ds just went to look at one college that claimed to have a management major, but when he visited he found that the management department was almost an afterthought, and was located in a 4th floor attic (no kidding, and this is a good private school!). It was very easy to cross that school off the list, even though it's got an excellent reputation and lovely campus.

 

I went to an excellent private college without a clue of what I wanted to do. I graduated with a double major (biology/English) and have been kicking myself ever since. I only wish my parents would have forced me to think in terms of a career, because I would have gone down an entirely different path.

 

Ria

[Carol in Cal.]

 

I went to an excellent private college without a clue of what I wanted to do. I graduated with a double major (biology/English) and have been kicking myself ever since. I only wish my parents would have forced me to think in terms of a career, because I would have gone down an entirely different path.

 

 

 

I think your comments about the management major are spot on--yes, it's important to really thoroughly evaluate colleges to decide whether one has what you're looking for.

 

When I was applying for college, I couldn't imagine applying for a major that wouldn't turn out to be a 'something' and I liked chemistry, so I signed up for chemical engineering so that when I graduated I would be an engineer. (I thought, if I sign up for English, what will I be in the end?) Also, I wanted to be well-rounded, and I figured that I would always read on the side but would never learn science or technology on my own.

 

But I attended a very good public college, and when I realized that I really wanted to major in history rather than chemical engineering, it was less than 4 months into my Freshman year. I came home and mentioned this to my mom and she said that if I was not going to study engineering there was no reason for them to pay to send me to that school and that I would have to fall back to the cheaper of the state school systems. My parents had never allowed me to get a summer job, so I had no work experience and no idea how to even begin to pay my own way. So rather than cut off my nose to spite my face, I stuck with engineering.

 

I had a pretty good career, and it turns out that I could save up enough money to stay at home for quite a while with my DD.

 

But, if I had gone on and majored in history, I would have been a lot happier with my career, and I'd probably be a tenured professor now and have written several books and generally enjoyed my life a lot more.

 

I think that being realistic about your career is important, but I also would like my daughter to be able to focus in the areas that she loves most. I would like her to get a good liberal arts education and then decide what to do with her life. I think that she should take real science and math breadth courses, not just the 'science for non-majors' classes, to keep her options more open. But I know too many unemployed nuclear and hardware engineers to think that college major choices should be all about career training.

 

I would be perfectly satisfied if DD got a good, solid liberal arts education and then became something like a plumber. It's hands on, you have control over your work hours, you can leave your work at work instead of taking it home with you every night, it can't be offshored, and the education would make you an interesting and interested person regardless. If she had a strong inclination in any particular direction, I would do my best to get her the best possible education in that field as well, but I really want her to be a well-rounded, educated person regardless of what she does next. I want to give her the platform from which she can soar in any direction. And I am willing to retire late or borrow myself to do so. I will not allow her to be burdened with debt.

 

However, if she is not taking her education seriously at all, she is on her own until she starts doing so.

[mcconnellboys]

I'm glad your visit went well.

 

My older son wishes to major in classical studies, with an emphasis on literature. He believes that he'd like to go all the way through and become a professor. Even if he doesn't, there are various other career paths he could pursue that relate.

 

While he likes the great books schools a lot, he really wants a larger college community for his experience at school, so he's not currently looking at any of the great books schools.

 

You might try looking at smaller, more conservative schools that offer Humanities programs, as well as Classics, if you wish to expand your search to include more options.

 

Also, Shimer, near Chicago, is another great books school. I feel certain it's about the same price as St. Johns, however. Most of them are about 32-50k right now....

[Nicole M]

Which St. John's is this? I know of two, and neither are in that area!

[iwka]

My 5 cents: I think that the formative years are hitting people in different times. Some know who they really are and what kind of career they would like to pursuit early on, some need few years to realize what this world is all about...Searching is a great process.

 

I really like that St. John college. I think I would like to sign up... I did not know schools like that exist. Great idea.

[Carol in Cal.]

My 5 cents: I think that the formative years are hitting people in different times. Some know who they really are and what kind of career they would like to pursuit early on, some need few years to realize what this world is all about...Searching is a great process.

QUOTE]

 

 

I think that when I was in 8th grade I had no real idea what to do with my life. I assumed that I would be a teacher, probably a Lutheran school teacher, because I didn't want to be a nurse or a secretary. By 9th grade I wanted to be a social worker.

 

I knew that women could be anything except pastors (at least in my church body), but I still really only pictured myself in traditionally female professions. I'm not sure why that was.

 

I ended up wanting to study chemical engineering, and later wanting to switch to history. Looking back on it, I probably would have made a fantastic history researcher/professor.

 

I had no idea until I was 18 what I really wanted to do. But I knew for sure that there were two things I absolutely never wanted to do--secretarial work or housework. Both of those sounded utterly boring to me, and I hated boredom more than anything else in life. Yet by the time I had DD, I was delighted to stay home with her.

 

Bottom line--people do change, a lot, and many middle schoolers and high schoolers have no idea what they are going to want to do in life. Everyone should be able to make an independent living, though.

[Gwen in VA]

Both dh and I have degrees in engineering, so we went the "practical" route. We are actually NOT necessarily encouraging our kids to do the same!!!!!

 

1) I have read too many articles about how the best background for many many careers (and life in general) is a broad-based liberal arts education. (Yes, I have probably been listening to LAC propaganda, but as the only person in my family growing up who doesn't have a liberal arts background, during every family gathering I am reminded of the many deficiencies in my educational background!)

 

2) Many people do make a living doing "impractical" things -- art gallery owners, classics professors, musicians. Yes, the finances can be tough, but who am I to make financial decisions for my children? As long as they have food on the table and a roof over their head, in some sense they have "enough."

Edited May 19, 2009 by Gwen in VA

[creekland]

Both dh and I have degrees in engineering, so we went the "practical" route. We are actually NOT necessarily encouraging our kids to do the same!!!!!

 

1) I have read too many articles about how the best background for many many careers (and life in general) is a broad-based liberal arts education. (Yes, I have probably been listening to LAC propaganda, but as the only person in my family growing up who doesn't have a liberal arts background, during every family gathering I am reminded of the many deficiencies in my educational background!)

 

 

 

Being married to an engineer I can attest to the "difference" in learning. However, even with having a broader education myself, I sure wouldn't be able to do his job!

 

I definitely think the best thing for each youngster is to allow them the freedom in the way they should go - to find the niche they are best designed for - preferably one that can also pay the bills.

[outtamyshell]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on liberal arts vs vocational training. It is interesting to see how our educational philosophies and goals can be so different. It makes me wonder how anyone thinks one, public school system could meet everyone's needs.

 

If nothing else, our St John's visit has inspired us for DD's Senior year studies. She is taking 2 classes each semester at a large public university. But it looks like we are going to focus on the Ancients and do our own Great Books study for Senior year. Yeah! She may even take Greek at the university.

 

My family thinks we're nuts, and I am just beginning to understand how different my educational philosophy is from the norm. The only value my family sees in educaiton is vocational training. But I see education and vocational training as two different, very important things. Not preparing DD for the business world would be like sending her out of the house without her knowing how to do laundry. But education for us is so much more than that.

 

Now that it's been a little while since we were at St John's I'm trying to be more realistic. It's not terribly responsible to load up on debt for an undergrad degree. I know the first level of financial aid is student loans, and if DD goes down that path, I will help her pay them off. But St John's for grad school is looking better and better. Tuition is only about $10k for their graduate program. And they have a program with Univ of Maryland law school where you can get a JD at Univ of Maryland and a MA at St John's at the same time. Based on DD's career goals, I think law school is going to be a part of her future. Right now she thinks she's going to end up living and working in DC.

 

Regardless of what decision we make, our visit was a great experience. If for no other reason than that DD has now seen that we are not the only people like us. And I'm inspired to get more serious about my personal study. Perhaps I will find a way to take ancient greek too.