During my junior year of high school, people began to ask me the hardest question I had ever heard, to that point: “Where do you want to go to college?” Some of my friends didn’t know the answer up until graduation, while others knew right away. For me, it wasn’t that easy. I visited almost ten schools before finally making the big decision, but in the end, I definitely made the right choice.
Vanderbilt was the first school I visited, and I immediately fell in love with it. I loved everything from the Commons, to the people, to Nashville in general. Despite feeling that Vanderbilt was the place I wanted to be for the next four years, I did not want to make a decision after visiting just one school. My plan was to visit as many schools as I could to be sure that Vanderbilt was the right place for me.
Not one of the colleges I later considered, however, impacted me like Vanderbilt did- not one. I visited schools to the point of frustration, and sometimes I just wanted to quit. All my visits were to top notch institutions- Columbia, Wake Forest, etc. Still, no matter how many schools I visited, I never got the feeling I experienced while at Vanderbilt. That’s because at Vanderbilt, I got the “feeling”, the feeling that everyone talks about when the subject of choosing a college comes up. I felt as if I was home.
Every school I saw had a beautiful campus, wonderful academic programs, and friendly people. But those schools just were not for me. In the end, choosing a college or university all came down to where I believed I could be happy. I had to decide what school was going to help me achieve my goals and help me grow. Vanderbilt and everything about it makes me feel confident that I made the right decision.