This site has the same layout as BBW Personals Plus, Canadian Personals, and Catholic Mingle. The most striking difference right now is that College Personals Online is FREE FREE FREE. They'll be switching to a subscription system soon, but for now, you can either use all the features for nothing, or pay $40 for a lifetime membership. Good deal.
Now, here's the catch: The reason the site is free is because it's so new, and there are only about 500 members.
Non-paying members can create a profile with multiple photos, browse ads for free, have matches emailed to them, read message boards, and send/receive "smiles" and e-cards. I was pleased to find a “Pagan/Wiccan/Umbanda” option in the religions list (I don’t know what the heck Umbanda is, but whatever), and you get to write in your profession instead of having to choose one from a list, and I like that one of the questions is about your reason for joining the site. I dislike the option in body type “I should maybe lose a few.” Too judgmental, not size-accepting. Also, you can only choose M or F for gender.
The "education" profile question can be anything up to doctoral degree, so you don’t have to be an undergrad to join. Indeed, you don't even have to be enrolled in a college to join. Likewise, any age can join, but members are mostly from 18 to their early 20s. I noticed that there are half as many women as men, which isn't a bad ratio, considering that on the adult sites, it can be as low as 1:10.
Premium members can post on message boards, participate in chatrooms, use instant messenger, and both send and receive "Mingle Mail."
I spoke with D.A., a 27-year-old hetero man in CA. He joined the site, he says, "Because I wanted to meet different college people all over the nation." He works full time and goes to school full time. "I like the fact that you can check friends' profiles and you can chat at will."
He did say he would recommend this site to others, especially freshmen, so they could meet other students. But he was unhappy with the site traffic. "I think this site needs to be posted on campus at every college. It needs to get its name out there a little more."
D.A. also had some technical problems with the site. "Ninety percent of the time, nobody's online, and sometimes it's very hard to connect, and sometimes very slow to start up."
Then I interviewed B.W., a 29-year-old hetero man in NC, who has been a member for a couple of months. He joined "to meet new, interesting people, preferably local, but not necessarily." He continues, "It's a very good site. I wonder how they're paying for this, though. No ads to speak of, and no membership fee." He appreciated the free membership and email notifications, and said he would definitely recommend the site to others, but echoed D.A.'s criticism of the low membership numbers. Finally, he added, "They could have a better search mechanism for finding people in your local area."
As to why he belonged to the site when he wasn't enrolled in college, D.A. answered, "I date a lot of college girls; they are usually bright, interesting, and energetic."
Finally, I heard from A.K., a 20-year-old hetero man in Glasgow, U.K. He heard about the site from a spam email, and actually followed up on it. Folks, don't do this! Don't ever respond to spam! Aigh!
Anyway, he says, "So I soon signed up and searched around for some young and attractive college ladies across the pond. Intially I thought positively; and for a period of a week I used it every day to see who had looked at my profile and if that girl with that special profile and picture had replied to my advances that I delivered direct to her 'mingle mailbox' the previous day. But my attentions soon went elsewhere for the reasons that there just did not seem to be enough people using the site to keep me interested; and well between me and you, there seemed to be more mingers than stunners if you know what I mean. Even as I glance to the top of the screen there are only 5 members online, and although they are mostly female, only one has a picture in their profile, and on examining the profile I can conclude that, well as they say were I come from 'Aye, she's nae dream.' In comparison with other sites, it's refreshing to use a site which solely targets my age group and with no hidden costs, but there just aren't enough people or enough interesting people to keep me coming back on a regular basis."
Finally, I heard from L.D.T, a 21-year-old hetero woman from GA. She says, "I joined this site a little over a year ago, because I thought it would be a fun way to get to know new people. I wasn't really expecting too much, but so far I am very pleased. I have met (not in person) a few nice guys that I keep in touch with though e-mail. I don't have too many complaints, except that there are a few guys who ask pretty uncomfortable questions about sex and my body. I'm not really into that. I would definitely recomend this site to other people. My advice would be to just put yourself out there, and if you see someone you think is attractive, or if you like their profile, then let them know. Don't take things too personally, because you never know who is on the other end, and don't give out too much personal information."
