Test Prep » Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming, and Just Plain Different (Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Direc
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Fully revised since the first edition, COOL COLLEGES covers the most exciting schools in the U.S. and Canada, with a new chapter on eco schools, an update on tuition-free schools, and the total low-down on the so-called top-ranked schools. Are you hyper-intelligent? Self-directed? A late-bloomer? Or just different? Then you need a great school that will challenge, nurture, inspire, and motivate you-and COOL COLLEGES has got '¬?em. It will also give you the scoop on:
- What the Ivy league is and what it really wants
- Totally free schools, including one where financial need is a requirement for admission
- Universities that don'¬?t give grades
- Schools that don'¬?t want your SAT scores
- Data on the highest (and lowest) paying majors
- The schools that graduate the most millionaires
- Men'¬?s, women'¬?s, and minority-focused colleges
- Schools where you can design your own degree program
- A college where you can hike and camp your way to a degree
- A college that runs its own ranch on an 80-square-mile campus
- Science and engineering schools where undergrads get their own labs
- The most competitive colleges, including one that rejects 95% of applicants
- Campuses where students love to study, even on Saturday nights
- Schools that offer programs in computer game studies, comedy, auctioneering, special-effects makeup, and more
Plus a link to the Web addresses for every college and university in the United States and Canada.COOL COLLEGES is the resource for finding your dream school-and gives you the edge you'¬?ll need to get accepted.
Reviews"Worth a look, if you'¬?re headed for college or getting ready to apply."-San Diego Union Tribune
I received a used copy of your book, Cool Colleges (2nd Edition) in the mail this morning and (admittedly) out of vague interest and the slight boredom that comes with not having a driver's license, I picked it up and went about my usual hole-up-in-my-bedroom-with-new-book-and-blinds-down-and-stay-holed-until-I-have-finished-the-text-in-it's-entirety routine. The purpose of this message is to express my nearly inexpressible gratitude to you and your associates in research. I have read life-changing books, articles, and speeches but I have never, not once, been so deeply affected by a work of this type: A guidebook? I have perused U.S. News & World Report's 2007 College Guide and the Newsweek/Kaplan 2007 College Guide, each with their individual talents and faults, but your book was different. For once I felt like the book was directed to students such as myself. I'm not an athlete and I'm no an academic superstar: at my school, that's what it takes to be a favorite. I am just another mediocre teenager in millions who wants to save the world.
Your book made me feel, for once, as though someone was looking at those of us hanging by our fingernails on the edge of being completely lost in our distinction. I love to learn for the sake of learning and not because I'm aiming for any star-studded diplomas or accreditations, but because there is so much to learn. Your book not only allowed me to see that there were other "Lost Kids" (that's what my guidance counselor called me) but further that there were places trying to find us because we aren't as lost as some of our superiors like to think. Again Sir, thank you for all your work. It has not gone unnoticed nor was it in vain. If nothing else, you made at least one girl's life (and future) a little brighter. -Carina, 17St. Petersburg, FL
Customer Reviews
Average Customer Review
(29 customer reviews) 95 of 99 people found the following review helpful
A most unique college guide. Highly recommended.,
December 1, 2002 John H. Hwung (Fair Oaks, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming, and Just Plain Different (Hardcover)
Read this college guide togther with books such as "Colleges that Change Lives", "Beer and Circus", and "The Distinctive Colleges". You will see that the opinions expressed in this book is quite on the mark. This book should be regarded as a college guide to college guides. Plus, it tells you the representative colleges from each categories such as the scholarly colleges, the "great books" colleges, etc.U.S. News and World Report's College Guide is pretty silly. It tells you how selective a college is. I.e., how good are the incoming students to each college. Well, we don't want to know how healthy are the patients that are admitted to a hospital. We want to know how much the hospital is going to do for a patient. Likewise, a college guide should tell us how much a college is going to do, educate, mentor and enable a student. Choosing a college is like buying a product. I want to know what that product will do for me, not how well I am.Buy...Read more
93 of 97 people found the following review helpful
Cool book! Must Read when choosing a college (parents, too!),
October 17, 2000 Carolyn K. "Mrs. Hoagie" (Hoagies' Gifted Education Page) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming, and Just Plain Different (Hardcover)
Cool Colleges is not only fun to read, it's full of the kind of information I wish I had when I was picking a college!What's the difference between an Ivy League and the other top tier universities? How about the seven sisters? What schools invite young high school students to go to college instead? What are the top public colleges and universities in the country? Which colleges can you attend for free? What schools have the strongest educational environment (to the point of being called 'short' on social opportunities?)? This book will answer these questions, and tons more. And best, it's FUN to read! I couldn't imagine a college selection guide being a "can't put it down" book... but this is one!They aren't kidding in the subtitle: "for the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming, and Just Plain Different." This book has colleges for all of those, and everyone else, too! Plus lots of college application and life hints: don't take up...Read more
40 of 41 people found the following review helpful
Worth a look for its different perspective,
August 31, 2002 Balto Reader "bils" (Baltimore, MD United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming, and Just Plain Different (Hardcover)
I considered giving it 3 stars, because it's mostly filler, but it was... well, "cool", and it provides a fresh perspective on colleges that might be quite valuable for some kids and their parents. The author's basic concept is to look beyond the popular reputation of colleges and the "U.S. News" type of surveys. There are lots of essentially unknown places that would be very rewarding for the right kind of student. Some people are hung up on whether their friends have ever heard of the college; this book encourages people to get over that status-oriented thinking.The college featured in this book that struck as unbelievably cool is Deep Springs, on a huge ranch in the high desert of Eastern California. The students (all 26 of them!) not only run the ranch, they also run the college... interviewing applicants for admission AND for faculty positions. It's only a 2-year school, and the students go on to top-tier schools (Ivies, Berkley, Swarthmore). And it's...Read more