I'm back
...for all of those who care... I just got back a few days ago from a fantastic trip up north. We went to our usual vacation spot, Good Hart, MI. Our family was fortunate to have a cabin on Lake Michigan for years, but this year was the last year we will be seeing it up there. Long story... anyways so it was a fun trip. Kevin and I went up there together, but we went via Pittsburgh, PA to pick up his gf (eh.. about a 6 hour drive?). We stayed at her house for the night after our trip to Pittsburgh. The next day, we went into downtown Pittsburgh to look at the University of Pittsburgh1 and Carnegie-Mellon2. We got a little lost afterwards, but we made it home and started for Michigan at midnight.
So after about a 10 or 11 hour trip to the cabin, we unpack our bags and enjoy about a week and a half of fun. I won't explain everything because I will never stop... trust me...
On the way home, Peter, Kevin, and Annie (Kevin's gf) went together and did the same thing that we did on the way up, just with Peter along instead of me this time. (Oh yea... my parents and Peter came up to the cabin a few days later, so they were with us in Michigan) Mom, Dad, and I went home via Niagara Falls and New York State.
The reason we went through New York on the way home was for me to visit more schools. We spent the first day of our "on the way home" trip traveling down the state of michigan and ended up at Niagara Falls around 4ish. We spent that night in a hotel there... it was amazing.. the next day we spent traveling to Rochester, NY. I am looking at Rochester Institute of Technology(RIT)3, so we visited there. Immediately following our tour, we rushed to the car so that we could make it to Troy, NY before sundown. Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute4 is in Troy, so... yea you understand. After spending the night in Troy, we took a tour of the school the next day and spent the rest on the day en route to Richmond, VA (thats where I live-wow it was a long trip too... ugh).
So that was my vacation in a nutshell- anyone who made it this far gets 2 cool points, but you have to tell me what I wrote in reaction to the sight of Niagara Falls. That means you at least read some of it :-)
1. The dorms are cool because they are in big tall city buildings and they overlook the city... umm.. there is a big "cathredal of learning" (so they call it) which is a major central part of campus- there are a lot of tiny classrooms in the thing... i dont really like that...lets see... the campus is really spread out throughout the city... its kinda like a VCU campus if I had to choose a school to compare it to, so I have kinda ruled it out.
2. Way too expensive. Didn't look appealing. I don't think I would enjoy learning in an environment like that. This campus is mixed in with University of Pittsburgh's campus, except all of these buildings are all fancied up and obviously where the money lies. Maybe a good option for grad school.
3. Better than I expected. I figured that I would tour it and it would be just another tech kinda school, but for some reason it really appealed to me. I like the way that the campus was layed out and how all the buildings looked. I also like being in NY... everyone is trying to get me out of that state of mind, but I think that I would enjoy the snow contrary to what some people think :-) Actually one thing that I REALLY didnt like is that the school is on a quarterly system. Almost all colleges nowadays are on the semester system... something to think about.
4. Ah... the big one.. this was the school that the trip was all about... well we got there and at first... what a dump.. the whole town of Troy is around the school and it is just so economically depressed and it looks awful. We went on the tour of the school the next day and it actually looked a lot better though. The school and buildings are a lot bigger than I expected. The school is big on intramural sports (fun).. lots of other fun things. The school does require specific laptop though... there are advantages and disadvantages to that.. but the main thing that bugs me is that the guy/girl ratio for the college is 4:1... no good. I want to enjoy myself a little bit in college.
These are just some of the things I got from visiting the places. I bet you are wondering why I haven't even mentioned academics of each of them. Well, the reason I visited those schools specifically is because of their academics- I know they have what I want and need. So its all good...
