Palmetto Tour: Second Stop, Clemson University

If I had a dollar for every time I heard somebody say "Go Tigers!" during my Clemson visit, I would have lunch money for the rest of the year. There is a huge amount of school spirit here and at least one out of every three students I saw was wearing orange. Here are a few highlights from the admissions presentation and some pictures from my campus tour.

• Clemson not only has one of the country's top Engineering programs, but another bragging point is that freshman engineering classes are capped at 70. Very impressive for a school of Clemson's size.
• Thinking about the Honors program? This year they recieved 1100 applications for a class of 250 students (they did not tell us how many students they admitted). Students in the honors program have the option of living in a special residence hall and enjoy the same priority registration for classes as athletes and seniors.
• Clemson students who study abroad pay IN STATE tuition for the time that they are abroad.
• More about Engineering: there are 10 different majors within the schools of Engineering. All students study general Engineering in their first year, and then specialize during their sophmore year. Engineering is the largest college on campus (1042 freshmen - that's about 1 in 3 freshmen!) and there is an 85% retention rate in the school of Engineering (can you tell I was sitting next to an Engineering dean during lunch?)
• The Clemson campus is vast and covers a total of 1400 acres. As a point of comparison, Georgetown University's campus is about 104 acres.
• Wondering about admissions? This year Clemson received 18,401 applications and admitted 10,619 students. 12, 358 of those students were applying from out of state. 7030 out of state applicants were accepted. Clemson plans to enroll about 3200 freshmen.
• The profile for admitted students this year was an SAT score between 1160-1310 (on a 1600 scale) and a 4.18 GPA. Clemson admits students by major and all applicants are encouraged to indicated a first and second choice major on their applications.
• Fun fact: According to the Clemson power point presentation, 8 students from Gonzaga enrolled last year - making Gonzaga one of the largest out of state feeder schools to Clemson!

Here are some photos from our tour of the shiny new facility dedicated to students studying Package Design Science. Have you ever wondered who is responsible for thinking up the packaging for products in the grocery store, boutiques, and every other retail establishment you frequent on a daily basis? We had an up close and personal tour of how product packaging is researched, created, tested, and mass produced.

Here are a few examples of student work:

Here is where the magic begins:

This is the big, expensive machine that creates the packaging! Those are Actual Students working on their project.

After the extensive tour of campus, it was time for a snack and the lovely Clemson admissions folks treated us to Clemson ice cream (made on site!). Delicious.

The big finale of our Clemson tour was a visit to the football stadium. As we all stood there taking in the magnitude of the scenery, something started happening on the scoreboard. I didn't get a great picture, but hopefully you can make out my name in lights! It was a very exciting way to end the day.

Thanks for the wonderful hospitality, Clemson! Go Tigers!
Published by TSM