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Hello, I'm a high school senior from Pittsburgh who loves my city as well as PA's naural beauty. Unfortunately, I feel like college is the time to grow and change in a NEW environment.
I'm interested in Boston College but I'm worried I won't learn to love the city... my parents are convinced it will be too different and I'll end up getting tagged as the hokey, PA kid with a weird accent and poor fashion sense.
I'm personally more concerned that it won't ever feel "right." Anyways, I'm looking for anybody with a good sense of both cities who can tell me more about how they're similar and different, if Boston will provide personal growth and a new home, whether or not a Pittsburghese speaking yinzer can fit in... etc etc
Location: northern Vermont - previously NM, WA, & MA
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What I'm wondering is you don't make any valid points or justification as to why you need to go to Boston in the first place. So why even bother considering it?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sweezy
Unfortunately, I feel like college is the time to grow and change in a NEW environment.
You negate your reasoning with the first word in this sentence. Again, why are you even considering Boston? I don't get it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sweezy
I'm personally more concerned that it won't ever feel "right." Anyways, I'm looking for anybody with a good sense of both cities who can tell me more about how they're similar and different, if Boston will provide personal growth and a new home, whether or not a Pittsburghese speaking yinzer can fit in... etc etc
People from every walk of life from all over the world go to Boston for education. Your situation isn't all that rare. My question is, with all the places in the world you could go to college, what is it about Boston and BC that interests you? That would be a better start. If you think you have to force yourself to love a city from the outset, well that's not a very good start.
Last edited by Champ le monstre du lac; 07-26-2015 at 11:49 AM..
Agree with Desert--you're not exactly starting out with the best mindset.
Not to mention, it sounds like there's some excess concern about the differences between Pittsburgh and Boston. Certainly there are differences, but it's certainly not the culture shock that you may be envisioning (for what it's worth, I'm from Eastern PA and have spent much time in Massachusetts/New England. I find very little there that is substantively different).
Also, I think there's more similarities/parallels than you may realize, as they're both older, Northeastern cities. I mean, we're not talking about Phoenix, AZ, here. Also, for any Bostonian that makes light of your Pittsburghese, that's not exactly a city that has room to poke fun regarding local accents. ;-) I'm sure there are plenty of other Pittsburghers who've gone/are going to school in Boston--you're bound to run into them.
I think you should build on your instincts (and it's okay to disagree with your parents). You want to challenge yourself a little in your college years and go a bit outside of your comfort zone. Again, I think Boston is a great place to provide that kind of experience, without being dramatically different than what you're used to.
Pittsburgh is a poor man's Boston. They have six glaring similarities:
1. Both cities were hit hard by deindustrialization but have since been able to parlay their significant higher-education assets into a research-oriented economy.
2. Both cities were developed in a haphazard manner that makes moving from Point A to Point B difficult and frustrating, and this extends to each metropolitan area as well.
3. Both cities have distinctive dialects that they promote like no other cities do, though Boston's is often romanticized while Pittsburgh's is often ridiculed.
4. Both cities have winning professional sports traditions that have manifested themselves into civic arrogance that's insufferable at times.
5. Both cities have cultural, economic and civic monopolies over their entire metropolitan areas, and relatively few suburbs of any consequence.
6. Both cities have "white" reputations, though Boston is very diverse in both the city and metropolitan area, and the increasing diversity in the city of Pittsburgh gets washed out in its metropolitan data.
More simply put, if Pittsburgh doubled in size, received a $10,000 boost in per capita income, and grew a critical mass of Hispanic residents, it'd become Boston.
You'll enter BC normal and exit a complete D Bag. That's based off one kid I grew up with and one kid i work with. Its a very small sample size. But in general BC is a great school.
I'm interested in Boston College but I'm worried I won't learn to love the city... my parents are convinced it will be too different and I'll end up getting tagged as the hokey, PA kid with a weird accent and poor fashion sense.
Boston is full of transplants and particularly full of out-of-town college students. We're talking about probably the No. 1 college destination in the country. Compared to kids from, say, the South, you'll seem positively familiar. And this is how you improve your fashion sense!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sweezy
I'm personally more concerned that it won't ever feel "right." Anyways, I'm looking for anybody with a good sense of both cities who can tell me more about how they're similar and different, if Boston will provide personal growth and a new home, whether or not a Pittsburghese speaking yinzer can fit in... etc etc
I think I've got a decent sense of both cities. They're both northern cities in the eastern half of the U.S. (whether Pittsburgh is "Northeastern" has been debated here many times, but still). I don't think you'll have a harder time fitting in than anyone else. You'll even fit in better than kids from rural parts of New England. Will people make fun of your regional dialect? Sure! That's what happens when you leave town for college -- it certainly happened to me. But it'll be good natured, and you'll be permitted to give it back to them.
This is exactly the time in your life to make a move like this. At your age, four years sounds like forever. If you're 17 now, you were 13 four years ago -- that's a very big difference. But years later, you'll probably think of your four years in college as a time that flew by. If you don't like Boston, oh well. You'll have gotten a good education, you'll almost certainly have made some very good friends, and you'll have learned about what kind of environment you like and what you don't. Maybe you'll spend the rest of your life in Pittsburgh, knowing it's the only place you really feel comfortable. But you'll have had an invaluable experience. And if you do like it, you'll have learned something important about yourself and what kind of life you want to live as an adult. Maybe you'll stay in Boston after school, maybe you'll move on to another place, maybe you'll even return to Pittsburgh, but you'll always use those experiences as a reference point.
I can almost guarantee you this: In four years, you'll be a different person than you are now. You ask whether Boston will provide personal growth. The answer is yes, no matter what kind of impression the city ends up making on you.
As others have mentioned here, make sure you're choosing Boston for the right reasons. If you enjoy Boston College enough, and it offers what you want from a school, then I'd say that's enough.
Your parents are mistaken in their belief that you're going to be tagged an "outsider". Of course there are lots of locals who study in the area, but there are large swaths of people from all over the country and world. You're certainly not going to be singled out for being the guy from Pittsburgh.
I'm interested in Boston College but I'm worried I won't learn to love the city... my parents are convinced it will be too different and I'll end up getting tagged as the hokey, PA kid with a weird accent and poor fashion sense.
I went from western PA to orlando... I would say boston is a city in particular you should go to after you graduate but not necessarily while you are in college. I'd say unless boston is providing a superior college for you there could be better places for somewhere new. Going to college in a city that provides a lot of jobs in your field though is important for getting an internship (jobs normally care most about your internship / real world experience).
I went from western PA to orlando... I would say boston is a city in particular you should go to after you graduate but not necessarily while you are in college. I'd say unless boston is providing a superior college for you there could be better places for somewhere new. Going to college in a city that provides a lot of jobs in your field though is important for getting an internship (jobs normally care most about your internship / real world experience).
I'd actually argue the reverse. Boston is a fantastic city to be a college or graduate student in - probably the best in the country. But it's less appealing as you get older due to the sheer extent to which higher education just totally dominates the city. It's possible you'll start feeling "old" by age 30 there. Plus there's of course nothing "affordable" once you decide you want to live somewhere better than a student slum.
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