>
> > I'd like to know what it is about a particular
>>college tour that makes a school seem more or
>>less interesting to you? Is it how genuine the
>>tour guide seems? You can get most of the stats
>>and everything from a book. What can a tour
>>guide do to attract students like yourself?
>
> I know you were asking Kikipeg, but here are my
>two pesos. The tours ment nothing to me, my
>parents liked them. I visted Carnege Mellon,
>Elmira, University of Wyoming, St. Johns, and
>several others. I really don't think any of the
>tours affected my opion at all. I was raised as a
>military brat (U.S. Air Force) and have been on
>Base tours, elementary and high school tours, and
>other such tours when ever I moved (every 3-4
>years). I develepoed a sorta internal alarm (or
>B. S. dectector as I call it) and it when off
>loudly at each and every college tour I was on
>(and also when I was read the pamphlets, 80% of
>all statitics are ussless after all ;}). So why
>did I chose to come to Elmira? On one of the
>tours I had of Elmira there was a quasi-protest
>going on. The tour guides wouldn't talk about it
>but there was deffinatly something going on. At
>all the other colleges I saw no sign that any of
>the students were involved in stuff like that. It
>sorta clicked with what I thought college was
>supposed to be like.

You saw a bunch of kids acting like goobers and that made you want to join up? Yeesh.

Student protests are perhaps the most useless, time wasting, all-around-pointless endeavors there are. I mean, it's not like this is the 60s, there's no great issue to protest like the Vietnam War. Most student protests today, in my experience, are all about kids wanting more than what they have, which is generally already a considerable amount. I remember in high school we had a sit-in to protest the fact that we couldn't wear shorts to school. I participated because it got me out of class. I think most protestors at schools are like that--'you'll get me out of class? Sure, I'll march or sit or scream or do whatever you want!'

I remember at UNH I once saw a 'march' for women's rights or something like that (Actually, it was probably about 'taking back the night' and 'making the campus safe for women to walk around at night'--never mind the fact that I don't think anybody, man or woman, got attacked in the entire four years I was at UNH) that consisted of maybe a dozen screaming coeds carrying signs marching about a tenth of a mile down main street then quitting and going home. Wonderful. That accomplished *so* much.

My general take on student protests are that they generally consist of two or three kids who *truly* believe in whatever cause they are demonstrating for, and a whole slew of tag-alongs who will dissapear as soon as something more fun comes up, or the going gets a little tough. And in general, they accomplish approximately nothing.

-- Dave