If the previous comparison was serious, this one may be a bit silly, but I still think it works! :-)
First, if you're not familiar with the "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" story, you can read the (annotated) original here. Or even watch a cartoon.
I thought of writing this after K told me how fancy his room in the Inn was on Tuesday night as I remembered his description of the shabby NJ university buildings he had given me over the phone the night before. Since the universities are not being named here, I don't think it will be too bad to write about them, right? :-)
So, K had three interviews at very different universities. One a distinguished undergraduate institution (it does have some graduate programs, but not in K's area) in an idyllic country setting, the other a mostly undergraduate school for working students (it even has night classes) in a gritty urban area. If I'm not mistaken, both are part of their states higher education system. Then, there was the Ivy League institution (I don't want to give that one away, if you're really curious, you can email me).
There are many factors one has to take into consideration when evaluating these universities and I am not going to do a full evaluation here, I'll be over-simplifying for the sake of the argument. Well, for the fun of it, actually!
So, some of K's main impressions of these three places made me think of Goldilocks and the bears' porridge, chairs and beds. The elite school feels too big, too fancy, too intimidating, too hard (to get into and get tenure), the gritty urban one has an affable (if small) group of faculty and crumbling buildings which feel small, cramped and outdated. The country one, on the other hand, has shiny new buildings, large and friendly faculty, and they want him to go there. It seems just right, no?
Hopefully he won't "break" the "just right" offer, like Goldilocks broke the chair, by taking a bit long to accept it while waiting to see whether anything will come from the fancy place. Waiting is hard, isn't it? More on K's interviews soon.
JMU?
ReplyDeleteMost universities require someone to successfully pass a credit check for actual employment. Are you ok on that front? If not, it can be handled or addressed but you need to be prepared this could be a stumbling block.
Good luck to you.
His credit should be fine thankyouverymuch, our financial troubles notwithstanding. As for where, I won't be discussing that right now,OK?
ReplyDeleteUnderstand your reasons. I used to work at UVA.
ReplyDeleteI only asked about the credit because most mortgage modifications required you be behind on a mortgage to qualify. Being behind on a mortgage will indeed impact credit and is a big red flag. I'd hate to see you blindsided, but as I said there are ways to address this with the school.
Thankfully, we never defaulted on a payment. All we had to do was to pay a bit late, but within the grace period, to make the bank finally pay attention to us. Otherwise, they'd never answer our calls. Our bank also went under and was bought by a bigger one, so the situation is still very confusing... I don't think his credit has been impacted, though. We were about to check anyway.
ReplyDeleteI'll leave it up to K whether he'll want me to disclose our location once he accepts an offer and we move. I already write too much as it is! :-)
Good luck with the waiting game, Lilian! My fingers are crossed as always...
ReplyDelete