Saturday, July 3, 2010

Dartmouth Road Trip


A view of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire
Welcome to Dartmouth College! A question may have already popped into your mind. Why is it labeled as a college when they offer both an undergraduate AND a graduate program? The reason is because they chose to keep the name Dartmouth College instead of Dartmouth University simply becasue they want to emphasize undergraduate education. Undergraduate programs are just as important as graduate programs but sometimes, they get a little less emphasis... but not here at Dartmouth. Located in Hanover, New Hampshire, this private institution has been around since 1769. Their newspaper, "The Dartmouth" is considered America's oldest college newspaper (founded in 1799). As a journalist myself, I had to pick one up to read and get inspired especially since I will become Associate Editor of our school newspaper, "The Titan Template" this Fall. I was surprised to see that the date printed on it was Friday, July 2. This shows that the journalism department is still busy and active during the summer months which is a great thing. I specifically remember visitng Boston College and seeing an empty newspaper stand. The tour guide mentioned that newspapers are usually filled during school months only. I'm glad to see Dartmouth publish year round. Afterall, news happens every season and every second of the day.


This is the Admissions building of Dartmouth. It is located right by the main green grassy area. At Darmouth, they have about an 8:1 student teacher ratio which is really neat because professors really get to know students and connect with them. Nevertheless, our tour guide Jocelyn mentioned how she was in a massive class of 100 students and even then, the professor knew every student by their first name. It is pretty rewarding to know that your professor really does care not only about your educational excellence but also your goals and what you want to achieve in life. At Dartmouth, students are pretty much guaranteed four years of housing. When I say pretty much, that means that if you do decide to live on campus, there will be space. But at the same time, if every single student decided to stay on campus, that cannot be accomodated. Yet, that case will be highly rare.




On our way back from Dartmouth, we passed by Virginia and was greeted with a life-size display of a train. It is part of a restoration project as shown in the sign. Visitors are welcomed to snap a few photos with the train but shouldn't pose on the train. We took a few photos of the train itself along with the scenic view and railroad track. Besides this, we were able to stop by the Conneticut River and White River which are connected. The trees, shrubs, flowers, and grass gave the area a very shady and nice place to read or even have a picnic.


The flip side to this area was the constant buzzing sounds. The bees were out enjoying the sun and flowers just like us!

2 comments:

  1. Stephanie,

    A couple of years ago we were at a Dartmouth dinner and I asked one of the recent grads how large his graduating class was. When he replied that it was about 750 I told him that my Math 1A lecture at Cal had more than a thousand students in it.

    He thought I was joking at first but when he saw I was serious he was dumbstruck.

    This is why I advise our kids to take a day trip to Cal and visit a freshman math or chem lecture to see what they might expect if they choose a Cal or a UCLA.

    They're good schools but if they want to actually meet their professors in their freshman years then Cal and UCLA may not provide them those options as much as a Stanford, a Dartmouth or a Brown.

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  2. Stephanie,

    You passed by Virginia? I just checked Google Earth and Virginia is still quite a ways south of both Hew Hampshire and Rhode Island.

    Unless you mean a woman named Virginia?

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