UNC chapel hill

For as long as US News and World Report has done rankings of the top public universities, UVA has been #1 or #2 along with Cal-Berkeley. They have a solid record in academics, plus new buildings such as the newly finished state-of-the-art PTJones basketball arena/facilities and several other initiatives that complement the beauty of historical campus will keep it top ranked for years to come. It's a great place for a total college experience.

kartelite, rank those schools in terms of overall running experience (xc). I don't think you ran at any of them, but you must have some insight. I can't imagine that you would rank William & Mary above UNC. And don't you think the OP would have a better running experience at a d3 program, say W&L?

Without a doubt W&M's program is better than UNC's. On the men's side, I think UNC pretty much concentrates all their effort on basketball recruiting. William & Mary has been a regional powerhouse for the past few years now in cross, plus it's a great place to train. Virginia has come a long long way the past three or four years and are turning into a perennial contender for a bid to D1 nats. It's not a bad place to train, but personally I preferred Williamsburg--more scenery and less traffic. W&M is also known for turning 9:30-10:00 guys into solid college runners, so if you get that 3200 time down a little next year you may be able to get a look. But the atmosphere is rather competitive, and even if you "make" the team freshman year you'll probably have to keep up progress to stay on due to roster limits.

I don't know how active they are right now, but a couple years ago William & Mary had a number of guys who weren't even on the varsity team (at the time) running 2:30-2:40 marathons, so there would be a good running group even if you aren't on the team.

Another option, especially if you run fast this year but don't get the SAT scores or grades you need to get into UVA, W&M, or UNC, is to go to State. I know it's got a bit of a redneck reputation, especially among Duke and UNC students, but there are plenty of smart kids there and it is a very nice area. The outdoor track was getting a total makeover this past year, but the distance squad, along with W&M, is tops in the region.

And by the way, I don't really think W&M or UVA are better academically than UNC, I just get a little ticked when people tout their own school as "the best" all the time. It is more a question of individual fit; I don't mean to stir up anything.

On the other hand, there are a number of good smaller schools in the region. Academically, the best ones are probably W&L, Davidson (I was rejected there, alas), and Mary Washington. I don't know much about the running environment at Davidson, but a lot of people who have times like yourself end up going D3 and having a good experience.

Another one to keep in mind is VCU, their distance squad is definitely on the upswing.

dissolute tribe wrote:

I can't imagine that you would rank William & Mary above UNC.

I misread that the first time, thinking you said "can't imagine that you wouldn't," assuming you were talking about running. Is that what you meant? Academically there's hardly any difference in admissions rates and incoming student GPA/SAT scores, though I think at last check W&M was just a fraction more competitive than UVA/UNC. But obviously it helps being a Virginia resident getting into W&M/UVA and NC resident for UNC.

kartelite wrote:

I don't know how active they are right now, but a couple years ago William & Mary had a number of guys who weren't even on the varsity team (at the time) running 2:30-2:40 marathons, so there would be a good running group even if you aren't on the team.

Along this note, I think a match cross country race between the W&M "club" and the UNC varsity team would have been a pretty close contest.

U of Chicago is a great school but it's private.

To sum up, UNC Chapel Hill is usually pretty bad at Men's XC so you're right on track to make their team no problem.

I grew up near there in the 70's and they used to have some pretty good men's distance runners - Tony Waldrop was a great miler, running multiple sub-4 miles both indoor and out. Ralph King, Gary Hoffstetter (sp?), and Jim Farmer all won ACC championships and were competitive nationally. Now I think it's been about ten years since they've had a single great male distance runner (while the women's side has thrived, with Felnagle, Flanagan, etc.).

A decent coach should have no problems recruiting - the town is beautiful, the academics are good, and the facilities are decent. They couldn't even keep Jack Bolas, who grew up in Chapel Hill there, let alone other in-state talent like Sandy Roberts, Matt DeBole, etc.

I no longer live there, but it seems like they need to make a coaching change...

To the original poster:

You have a ways to go, but you might have a shot at walking on if you keep working hard. Hopefully you're in state, because getting into UNC from out of state is really difficult if you're not a scholarship athlete.

Chapel Hill is a very good school with a great campus life, within one of the best college towns in the country. Of course it's always ridiculous to say any school is the "best" at general categories. It's definitely in the top tier of public schools overall (along with Michigan, UVA, Berkeley, etc..). But if I were an NC high school student and wanted to be an engineer, of course I'd choose State. That's the stupidity of overall rankings--schools are strong in so many different areas it's so hard to lump them all in together and rank them.

I think i can get in off academics (33 ACT, 3.7 GPA, mad good ECs). Seeing as how the team is pretty bad, would it be reasonable to say i could walk on with a senior 3200m pr of between 9:40 and 9:50?

thanks a lot everybody for the feedback by the way.

...yeah, looks like you should go there. seems like you've already figured out how to post on letsrun, and get people to talk smack about the program...looks to me like your set. now, all you have to do is go there, drink your ass off, get fat, and blame it all on the coach.

warren martin wrote:

...yeah, looks like you should go there. seems like you've already figured out how to post on letsrun, and get people to talk smack about the program...looks to me like your set. now, all you have to do is go there, drink your ass off, get fat, and blame it all on the coach.

AMEN

I'm considering going there and I run sub 4:20 and sub 9:15. Do you guys think this is scholarship material?

Do you guys think sub 9:15 is scholarship material at UNC?

high school runna wrote:

Do you guys think sub 9:15 is scholarship material at UNC?

stop asking questions twice..just let us ignore your first question...damn

you haven't run those times. you think you might be able to run those times. if you ever run those times, you won't be interested in unc.

just to add a bit to the discussion:

2008 us news rankings:

21. UC Berkley

23. UVA

25. UCLA

25. Univ of Michigan

28. UNC- Chapel Hill

33. William and Mary

NCState is fine if you want to hang out with dirty rednecks. State is a decent school if you want to be a engineer and thats about it. Maryland is a much better school then State. FSU and State are the two shit schools in the ACC.

UNC guys distance program is absolute garbage... dont go there if you want to get better