Choosing a college or university can be a tough task, especially when advice is coming from books written by people who graduated long ago or by a tour guide who only talks about the positives of the school.

Prospective students will soon be able to visit a new website that features feedback from students who attend different colleges.

The website, www.rateyourcampus.com, also informs its visitors about recently graduated individuals and how they are faring in the working world in terms of salary and job placement.

‘We want the website to develop some sort of real-life guide for a high schooler,’ said Mike O’Brien, the CEO of FinancialAid.com, the parent company of rateyourcampus.com.

The website has a survey that any college student or recently graduated student can take. It asks questions about food quality, class difficulty, the best places to study, and the best places to hang out and party. He added that college students helped assemble a list of questions for the survey.

‘We couldn’t be happier with the results that we have gotten so far,’ O’Brien said. ‘I am blown over by how open and honest students are.’

O’Brien said 8,800 people have taken the survey so far for 101 colleges. Of all the people who visit the website 77percent start the survey, and 75 percent finish it, he added.

As of right now, the website does not post any feedback, but O’Brien said that initial results should be posted either this Friday or the next Friday.

‘There is no one database like this one across America,’ O’Brien said. ‘This questions so many people from so many different places.’

The idea for the website originated several months ago, O’Brien said, when financialaid.com looked at the relationship between the average loan a student receives to go to college and how much he or she makes after college. He then expanded the idea to include what the first-hand college experience is like at each school.

‘We have been in business for quite some time. We have a lot of experience with college students applying for loans,’ O’Brien said.

The website’s founders are pleased with its progress so far, but are also excited for it to get into full swing.

‘Once the high schoolers get involved it will be really fun,’ O’Brien said. ‘We can’t wait to get answers that tell us what the high schoolers would still like to see.’

Still to come on the website is the ‘How you doin” feature, which will allow graduates to come back to the site and compare how they are doing against other graduates in the country.

Representatives from the website will attend college and career counselor events and promote the site. Its publicity relies most on word-of-mouth.

‘I couldn’t be happier with the results,’ O’Brien said. ‘Because of the willingness to share opinions, we have had a phenomenal result.’

Some students agreed that had rateyourcampus.com been around when they were applying for schools, it would have been a big help.

‘I certainly would have used the website to get as much varied input on the school that I might choose,’ said Michael Fee, a junior accounting and magazine major. ‘I would value a person’s opinion that attends the school rather than an adult on the sideline.’

Other students thought the comments on the website would provide a greater insight into the experience at particular schools that books could not properly grasp.

‘It definitely would have been helpful,’ said Lisa Wiswell, an undeclared sophomore in The College of Arts and Sciences. ‘I used the Princeton Review books but there is not too much that they can help you with.’

Published on November 19, 2003 at 12:00 pm