how to figure out which colleges to look at

[AngieW in Texas]

I don't know for sure what my dd will major in. She thinks she'd like to major in art and business. I don't see that happening. While she loves to draw, she doesn't enjoy any other type of art. She isn't at all interested in looking at art either unless it happens to be manga. She has no interest in business at all, but figures it's more marketable than art. She wants to live in Japan and thinks that a degree in international business might help with that.

I can see her majoring in digital art/graphics or Japanese or maybe Asian Studies. She should go to a school that at least offers a minor in Japanese. She wants to do at least a summer abroad in Japan with whichever college she goes to.

I've tried searches on collegeboard.com, but it isn't really giving me what I'm looking for. I was surprised to find that there are NO colleges in Texas that offer a major in Japanese. TCU actually comes up in the search, but they offer only a minor, not a major. They do offer both summer abroad and semester abroad in Japan.

Any other recommendations? She won't go anywhere that's colder than Texas, so only southern states will work.

[Jane in NC]

I particularly like the College Navigator over at IPEDS (http://nces.ed.gov/COLLEGENAVIGATOR/). This is not a particularly glitzy site given that it is based on statistics reported to the feds. But if you want "just the facts", this is the place to go. You can search for colleges by state and/or major. The key for me, though, has been to examine how many students graduate with particular degrees. It is one thing if a schools says they have a certain major. If there are only one or two grads in that major, one wonders about the strength of the department.

Hope this helps.
Jane

[AngieW in Texas]

Thanks for that link. I really like being able to see how many people they graduate with each major.

[Sharon in MD]

THey have a pretty decent drill down type of search engine where you can specify states and majors and so on.

And, although it may b a bit less technologically desirable, a trip to the library where you can get your hands on the various college data base types of books might be the easiest way to jump start your search. There are times when nothing beats a table and several volumes to paw through simultaneously.

Just my humble opinion...