Final school and home Again!

Sunday night saw us safely in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago, which somehow seemed very similar to Memphis. We were instructed to walk PAST Pizza Capri and into the nearby neighborhood to have the best Chicago deep dish pizza in the area.  We were not disappointed!  

Stuffed full of pizza, we walked back to our swanky Chicago hotel and went to bed early.  It was great to be back in the central time zone!  The next morning we had breakfast, got our final cup of Starbucks (My souvenirs as we traveled were the "been there" coffee mugs from all of our fun places!) and waited on the shuttle to take us to our final destination, the University of Chicago.

The University of Chicago is yet another urban campus.  Same song, different verse... we listened to an admissions presentation and then went on a tour.  The speeches were beginning to sound strangely familiar at this point... We heard the joke about siblings getting dragged along against their will, we heard about holistic application processes, and so on. We joked about the common story of the mom who tested the blue light safety system and was surrounded by campus police within 60-90 seconds.  Was this the same mom traveling to all of the schools we were? Did she really test the blue light system at EVERY college?  Or was it a different mom at each college?  Whatever the case, the blue light system is a good idea and seems to have improved campus safety around the country!

One funny story unique to U of C pertained to their annual scavenger hunt, which is an elaborate, fun event.  According to our tour guide, the challenge was to re-create a nuclear reactor.  Some highly intelligent students took this too far, created a real nuclear reactor, and were raided and arrested by the FBI.  When the misunderstanding was discovered, the students were subsequently released, and they were eventually offered jobs working for the government upon graduation.  Now, the University clears the scavenger hunt list with the FBI beforehand. This story cracked me up!

Here is the list of pros for University of Chicago:
Beautiful campus
Students are paired with a career advisor as well as academic advisor
90%+ students do internships, and there are internships reserved all around the city for students
There is an online platform that helps you find research opportunities
Dorms/ houses seem to have feel of community
Smaller school- 6,000 students
Students use ID to get passes to museums and cultural opportunities in the city
Chicago Transit is free with ID
You can check out artwork from the art museum to put in your dorm
More research is available for undergraduates than there are undergads to fill them
Financial aid follows you with study abroad
The school meets demonstrated financial need

Cons:
The marine lab is in Massachusetts
Registration for classes is random and based on a computer algorithm

After our tour, we loaded up the car and hit the road for the last time.  Our 9 hour drive home seemed like a piece of cake.  About 10pm we completed our circle around the eastern United States.  The week actually flew by, and we all had a great trip! It is fun to go, but it is always good to come home.