Learn About Colleges via Web
Carole and Richard Smith of Redwood City, Calif., spent 18 years nurturing their son, Ryan. Now he’s a West Point cadet, living nearly 3,000 miles from home. But just because Ryan is away at school doesn’t mean that his parents have to be completely out of his life.
Thanks to the Internet, the Smiths are well-connected to the West Point community. They subscribe to a parents network mailing list, which provides more information than they ever wanted to know about class schedules, transportation, campus social life and life at the U.S. Military Academy. There is a Web site dedicated to keeping people informed (https://www.west-point.org) about what’s happening at West Point, and the Smiths have the e-mail address of a nearby bakery they can use to order goodies for their hungry son.
My kids still have a few years to go before they start college, but when they get there, you can bet that we’ll use the Internet to keep in touch. Of course, we’ll exchange e-mail (assuming they’re willing to write) and I’ll probably use my online banking system to transfer money into their accounts. But there are plenty of other ways to keep posted on what’s happening on campus. I don’t think I could get away with planting a “Web cam” in their dorm rooms, but I might spend some time on their campus Web site to see what’s happening in their world.
Just about every college and university has a Web site, and most provide comprehensive information for students, prospective students, parents, alumni and “friends” of the institution. Finding the site is usually pretty easy. The address of an educational organization typically ends in “.edu,” so it is often obvious, such as https://www.harvard.edu or https://www.ucla.edu. If that doesn’t work, you can find the address using Yahoo, Excite, Lycos or another search engine. Or you can ask a student. They know everything.
In addition to basic information, a lot of campus Web sites include links to pages maintained by departments. These sometimes include detailed course information and faculty biographies and e-mail addresses. Some campuses have a directory of student phone numbers and e-mail addresses, but for privacy reasons, access is usually restricted to students and staff. Some campus sites, including UC Berkeley’s (https://www.berkeley.edu), have a password-protected area where students can look up their grades, class schedules and financial aid status.
The sites are also a good way to get a glimpse of the campus. The University of Massachusetts at Amherst (https://www.umass.edu), for example, has a guided tour of the campus. Parents and friends of students at USC (https://www.usc.edu) can view a live still shot or video of the center of campus by tuning into the Tommy Cam(https://www.usc.edu/dept/TommyCam/).
The UCLA Web site includes information on upcoming lectures, a calendar of campus events, alumni association information and detailed information about most academic departments. As with many colleges, you can also read the campus daily paper (https://www.dailybruin.ucla.edu), which is a good way to keep posted on campus events.
Harvard University has a campus life page with information about student housing, arts, music and cultural resources. Yale (https://www.yale.edu) and most other colleges allow students to post their own home pages. Student home pages can serve as a postcard for friends and family. Cara Marr, a Yale junior from Encino, calls her home page (https://pantheon.yale.edu/~ccm7/inside.html) Cara’s Playground and uses it to share photos and other information with parents, grandparents and other relatives on both coasts.
The same goes in the other direction. AOL and most Internet service providers allow users to set up free or low-cost home pages. GeoCities offers free personal pages as long as you’re willing to let them place ads on your page.
You don’t have to wait till your kids head off to college to start surfing campus sites. The Web is also a great tool to find out about admission requirements, financial aid, course offerings, extracurricular activities and campus environs. Some schools even let you apply online.
In addition to college Web sites, there are a number of commercial sites for students in search of a college. Peterson’s, which publishes printed college guides, maintains a Web site (https://www.petersons.com) that offers profiles of all accredited colleges in the United States. The company also operates https://www.applytocollege.com, a free service that allows students to fill out a standardized “universal application” that can be electronically submitted to about 1,000 campuses. Although there is no charge to use the service, students will be subject to the college’s regular application fee. On Sept. 8, Peterson’s will launch https://www.collegequest.com, which will allow students to enter their own criteria to get a list of matching schools. It will also have a database of 800 scholarship awards and a calendar and checklist for organizing a college search.
Peterson’s doesn’t rank colleges, but U.S. News & World Report does. The magazine’s Web site (https://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/) not only provides general rankings but also specialized ones such as “most men,” “smallest schools,” “tuition-free” and, for those who are academically challenged, a list of schools with “100% acceptance rates.”
Excite just launched a college and university page (https://www.excite.com/education/universities_and_colleges/), which has a college locater and links to other resources, including a matchmaker feature from College Edge (https://www.collegeedge.com) that helps students find the right “school, scholarship or career.”
Other useful college search and financial aid sites include CollegeNet (https://www.collegenet.com), Kaplan Educational Centers (https://www.kaplan.com) and Princeton Review (https://www.review.com). Each has information about schools, financial aid and tricks for increasing your chances of getting into school.
Finally, if you’re a parent who wants to tune in to college culture, check out Student.Com (https://www.student.com). You’ll find sections with news, sports, culture and travel and links to online college papers.
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Lawrence J. Magid can be reached via e-mail at magid@latimes.com. His Web page is at https://www.larrysworld.com or keyword “LarryMagid” on AOL.
