PassedOut, on 2024-July-17, 11:36, said:
My personal experience leads me to agree with Ken.
I grew up in small-town Wisconsin, attending 6 schools before college, including 3 high schools. I always had a knack for scoring high on tests like IQ, merit scholar, college aptitude, and so on, so I found myself recruited by colleges looking for students with my background. I chose Princeton with a full scholarship plus the promise of jobs around the campus to earn spending money. Those jobs included working in the student cafeteria, selling refreshments at sporting events, and singing in the chapel choir, so I didn't accrue any debt.
However, my earnings weren't enough to pay for many of the social events that most of my classmates enjoyed. And in those days, Princeton students were all male, and over half had attended all-male prep schools--including my three roommates, who had all attended the same prep school. One of them became my good friend, but the difference in our experiences--particularly with girls--made bonding difficult. One particular incident raised a lot of anger in me: One of my roommates opened my desk in my absence, found a letter from my girlfriend (who attended a state college in Wisconsin), and read the letter aloud to the others.
On the plus side, the academics were great, and I decided to major in math. And I made some good friends in chess club and music.
But I was always tired, and I never really fit in, so I withdrew from Princeton, worked for a year in Minneapolis/St. Paul (Ken's old stomping ground), and then enrolled as a sophomore at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
Now I can't say that anyone else sent me to Princeton. On the contrary, all of the gentle advice I got from relatives and friends suggested that I consider attending a state school instead. And I certainly knew that Princeton students were all male, but I underestimated how much that warped the school's culture. It was my decision alone to go, and I don't really regret it--I learned a lot in many areas of life!
Nevertheless, I certainly don't think anyone should be sent to an elite school, accruing a lot of debt as a result. And I now give out the same advice that I didn't heed when I chose my first college.
Your Princeton experience is a dramatic example of what I am saying. My birthday is in January so I started college when I was 17. No longer a kid, but not an adult either. I was buying my own clothes and I had bought my own car when I was 15, but I was living at home and, if I had decided to join the Navy, which I seriously considered, I would have needed a signature from my parents. There was a pizza place that would serve me beer when I ordered pizza, but of course they were not supposed to. You mention girls. Yeah. Marriage? No no no! was living at home so I could afford college, marriage was not on the table. But also I was no longer 14, when a date consisted of me going to a girl's house, the two of us walking to a movie, then I would bring her home, kiss her goodnight at the door, and see her next week. And so, at 17? Bob Seger, in Night Moves, says "Working on mysteries without any clues". A good description.
As to academics, the U of M was very good. I learned Fourier Analysis, Tensors, Electromagnetic Fields, Relativity etc. For the humanities I read Oedipus Rex, Dante's Inferno. Goethe's Faust and, again, etc etc. That's a pretty good sylabus for a guy who, at a younger age, was asked by friends if he would like to go to a Monet exhibit and replied "Who is Monet?"
Sometimes well-intentioned planners forget what it ws like to be young. I think that was very much the case with a lot of education choices during covid.
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