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When You Know, You Know
When I was in high school, I had my mind made up.
I was going to attend Mankato State University in Minnesota. Mankato State had sent me a postcard that looked a lot like my dream school — Pepperdine (!) in California — but was a public school with in-state tuition (my mom’s requirement). Mankato was about as far away as I could get from home while still getting — you guessed it, in-state tuition — and the town seemed like a metropolitan place. (I know.)
But when I visited ‘Kato, I didn’t feel good. The town was small. I remember the whole campus feeling like it was made out of concrete. Nothing about my experience there inspired me, and I left feeling super disappointed. My family and I decided to hit as many colleges as we could on that one road trip, including going to another university in Minnesota on our way home to Wisconsin. (Wisconsin and Minnesota offer reciprocity to students, so I could attend as an in-state student either place.)
Driving to that other university was fabulous, all twisty freeway lanes alongside the Mississippi river, with big rock bluffs towering over the car. The town was pretty, with tree-lined streets and a quaint feel. And the campus was gorgeous, with tons of 19th-century buildings surrounding an enclosed courtyard.
