Sunday, 5 May 2024
Life, the universe, pies, hot-pink bunnies, world domination, and everything
As oxlin pointed out, we haven’t had a new one of these threads since 2009. Her description:
a place where people applying to college could ask questions of college attendees and I could ask questions about grad school.
Date: January 1, 2011
Categories: Life
Yay! Hey GAPAs, what do you think of a) applying to grad school next year (my senior year of college) and b) applying during a year off. I’d like to take a year off but I know some people who graduated a while back and haven’t gotten to grad school yet. Though they’ve had years since college by now and I think I’d apply after one or two years. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure that is what en thought, and en’s been working the same job for ages. Thoughts? Of course, now that I think about it, en only applies to a few grad schools and hopes to get in to one of about two. That might be part of en’s problem getting in.
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I am SO SO SO sick of college apps! I’m nearly done with them now, I just need to send in transcripts and SAT scores and stuff. But when that’s done I need to do scholarships applications. And I can’t really think of anything else right now, including Christmas Break homework, but there’s also nothing I can do without being at school and able to talk to a counselor. I can’t fill out the FAFSA or the CSS profile without calling the FAFSA people because my state of legal residence is very hazy, but I can’t call them on Sunday. But I don’t have internet, so once I go back to school I STILL won’t be able to do all this stuff, because I won’t have time to go downtown and use the cafe internet! GAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! -tears out hair-
On the bright side. I’m nearly done with my college applications! And in a couple weeks I’m going to go visit Lewis & Clark and Whitman.
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I’m really glad that I’m finished with college apps, but the whole process was crazy! Aside from college apps, I also had apps for Israel programs (I’m planning on spending a year there next year) which were also due the same time as college stuff. Luckily I was able to double up a few of my essays.
The work was worth it – I got accepted at University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC), which was my first choice 
I’m now working on applications for scholars programs at UMBC.
Plus, I just found out that I got an A in Psych 101 (my high school offers college courses through a local community college), so I’m eligible to win a 500 scholarship for next semester! Here comes another essay.
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I second oxlin’s request for opinions on grad school!
also, anyone with input on study abroad things? i was dead set on japan but i’m not sure right now :/ I definitely want to go somewhere though!
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1- Oh, grad school. Terrifying prospect. No idea what to do after next year. I was thinking maybe do the whole Take-A-Year-Or-Two-Off-To-Teach-English-Abroad thing. Or not. Life, y’know. Never enough time (most of why I haven’t been on here, on much of anywhere…)
4- Do it do it do it. That was the worst input ever, I know. I’m going abroad next semestre (leaving in a week, and still trying to get my home school to fix some of the paperwork, augh, why do the offices never cooperate with one another?) I presume your school has an office for study abroad? Talk to them, they Know Things. Plan far ahead. Talk to Financial Aid forever, they can probably give you more money for things like flights and lodging. It takes a good deal of effort, but it’s not hard to pull off if you pick courses you need… : )
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I desperately need to start working on essays for college applications. Any ideas what I should write about? I’m utterly lost. And please don’t reply to this with “Oh but Fern, you’ve had so many lovely experiences, why don’t you write about [sailing/living history/music-playing/growing up running around the woods like a banshee/having creative parents who build or make everything/being vegan/having three pairs of purple shoes/other].”
What aspect of any of those things would you recommend?
I had thought perhaps about the end of this summer, when I realized that after three months of sailing and working quite possibly harder and definitely a longer continuous stretch than I’d yet done in my life, that I wasn’t ready to give it up because it had become my home and reality far more than I’d thought. I also realized this on what was perhaps the most miserable night ever, as I was sitting in the rain, completely soaked through, shivering, holding a flashlight and looking at probably another hour or two of work before I could sleep, and all this after a crazy full day.
I dunno. It’s the only thing that’s really floating around in my head right now. I guess I could write about my family’s tradition of doing community service at Christmas time, generally playing music or doing craft projects at nursing homes or battered women’s shelters or something along those lines? I have no clue.
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At least in my opinion, it’s not so much the topic as it is what it reveals about you. I think “uncommon” experiences make it a more interesting reading (for example, I don’t know anyone else who does sailing and living history!) but it’s never just the topic alone. I think a lot of people miss that point actually…As long as it is insightful and reveals something about yourself then you’re good.
All of those ideas sound wonderful! But I especially like the end of summer one…just a personal opinion though
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I would actually tend to veer towards sailing. And really, come to think of it… Why are you discounting so many awesome college essay topics? Pretty much everything you mentioned could be made into a really cool essay, in my opinion.
My suggestion in full: Draft a bunch of introductions to essays on each of the topics you mentioned and post them here slash show them to friends/family/et cetera. You’ll get some feedback on topic choice, and then you can draft the whole essay, and then you’ll get feedback on the actual content. And so on.
-A
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Write about all of those. Write a draft -it doesn’t matter how bad- for every single idea listed above. Once you’ve got all those written, divide them into two piles: sucky and suckier. (I’m sure you’re a great writer, but I don’t think that first drafts should be expected to be anything more than sucky.) Rewrite all the sucky ones tomorrow, after you’e had them in the back of your mind for a while.
Now, memoir essays for college apps are weird. Remember that. They’re probably unlike anything else you’ve ever written because they have to be both non-fiction, and not research based. The best essays tell an interesting & insightful story, but it isn’t really about the story. It’s about you. Ask “Does the essay show (not tell) the reader how smart/funny/interesting/etc. I am?”
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6.1~ Thanks, and see below.
6.2~ I’m not discounting them as topics, I’m just asking that anyone responding doesn’t say “oh but you’ve done so many cool things!” What I’m asking for is possible ways to use those cool things in an essay.
7~ Thanks for the advice.
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I’m taking a semester off. I wish I’d just done an entire gap year and saved a few thousand. Fortunately I went to an in-state school so the cost wasn’t ferocious and atrocious.
I think gap year is something everyone should seriously consider while doing their college process. My mother was totally against it and so I didn’t consider it, but I wish now I had. Instead I completely messed up my first semester.
Now I’m just taking the time to reset, find myself, produce an album (music album, I’m a cellist), and apply to conservatories. Hopefully travel a bit too.
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hello! i am considering taking a leave of absence next year. have you (or anyone else) read about any other things people do in a gap year? i know a lot of people travel but i don’t exactly have the means…
my situation is pretty similar to yours, at least on the surface. i now wish i had taken the leave of absence for this semester, but ah well :/ good luck with everything!
i also agree the gap year is something that should be considered more.i didn’t think i needed it but i now see i wasn’t ready for college at all. le sigh.
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Most of the people I know taking gap [year/semesters] are doing it for mental or physical reasons, so dunno if it’s exactly applicable. But I think community service is looked upon favorably.
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yeah, that fits. my plan was to do that (or a job…) and take classes locally. i dunno. i’ve probably missed out on the gap year programs, but it’s all just as well.
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On the other hand, most people I know who took gap years did so to do pre-college projects. One did a navigation school and sailed all over the world, and also did on-land stuff on the trip but I don’t remember quite what.
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I can tell you what I’m doing during my gap year, but unless you have relatives overseas that you can travel to while studying another language I’m not sure it’s really applicable either.
That being said, I think everyone should spend at least some time overseas in any country studying. I think it’s very beneficial and it certainly has been for me, after senior year burnout and several college rejection letters.
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The only relative that I know of overseas might be coming back here, actually…I’d still love to hear about what you’re doing though!
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And I keep on meaning to tell the blog about it…I have a ton of pictures to post too! But it’s so easy to set it aside and say, Oh, I’ll get to it later, and later realize that there’s a ton of stuff to write and you don’t know where to start. I think I need someone bugging me.
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Well I’m bugging you right now! We’re all very interested, maybe you could just blog small anecdotes for now, and put off writing an all encompassing post until later? Please write!
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OK, OK. Today I’m going to be traveling to all the colleges I applied to and visiting their campuses, but I should still have some form of Internet access so I’ll see what I can do.
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hurray! 
also good luck on the visits!
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See, I WAS going to go on an Outward Bound course. 7 weeks in Utah, hallelujah! But my dad decided, without telling me, that he wanted me to join the Coast Guard. Even though I don’t swim. So I ended up with nothing to do except practice cello.
But no, I’m applying to 8 different jobs, 6 in retail, 2 coffee shops, no fast food for me! And I’ve applied to several different places to volunteer. One is a cafe that operates on an honor system – people leave as much as they can in return for food or extra if they have the means to. Surprisingly, the system works. It really inspired me to do more good in the community – being a poor college student can really change your perspective.
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Well, I have a tentative plan figured out. Major in Classics (with a focus on either Language/Literature or Religion/Philosophy) and a minor in Spanish. Hopefully study abroad for at least a semester. After that, seminary.
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My friend’s seminary likes people who majored in philosophy. And in my philosophy class we talked about religion a bit so the two seem to overlap. On the other hand, said friend was a physics major so you can probably study whatever you want.
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The seminary I’ll go to is probably a but pickier about their philosophy. Most universities teach philosophy and religious stuff in ways that greatly disagree with Catholicism. And I have no interest whatsoever in a philosophy degree.
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My friend’s seminary is Catholic. But majoring in what you are interested in is the best! And Classics is awesome.
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Oh, Classics is so fun, it was my minor until I needed too many credits for a double major with a minor. I’d say go Lang/Lit. Read ye olde philosophers in the original language and all
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Yeah, that’s what I’ll probably be doing. If my focus is on Religion/Philosophy, I don’t really study the language themselves much at all.
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I am taking a wintersession course in mythology! It’s a lot of fun, and we get to watch movies about the various myths that we’re studying. Some are very modern, others are very ummm…mythlike. Like they could actually have been recorded in ancient Greece, except that video cameras hadn’t been invented yet.
My opinion about grad school: If you need it to do whatever job you want, then apply in your senior year of undergrad college. If it’s not essential, then relax.
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Alright, if anyone sees this and has any useful input at all I BESEECH YOU please tell me.
So right now I have seemingly three options with regards to college. For background I’m a freshman going into my second semester.
1) Stay here for the rest of the semester, take a leave of absence for fall and/or spring to figure things out, apply for transfer maybe, get a job, etc
2) Try to transfer for next fall now. Places I am thinking of: Evergreen, Oberlin, Reed/Hampshire? I’m trying to look at less traditional schools without really rigid curriculum. I’m kind of wary of Reed because I’ve heard the workload is extremely rigorous but you know, rumors on the internet :/ but i just put it up there for a general idea of what i’d like…
3) deal with it and stay here
obviously these all have different pros and cons. i guess i’m kind of leaning toward a combination of the first two…i dunno. i really feel i have to do something differently, though, i don’t feel my current situation is something i can deal with for three and a half more years.
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I’m also beginning to think that college isn’t for me, thus the search for less typical schools…I dunno. I feel like I should go off on some kind of program for a year or something, can anyone recommend things like that either? Vague sentence is vague, I know. I was looking at the Conservation Corps with the National Parks but I’d rather do something in a bit larger group setting, perhaps? Argh. My head is about to explode with all the information I’ve been going through.
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What is your current situation? I would say 2, but I don’t want to tell you anything for sure before I know why you are considering all this. You say you’re a freshman going into your second semester. What school are you at now?
Also, look at Beloit as a place to potentially transfer to if you’re looking for slightly more alternative colleges. Good luck!
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So now I’m not sure if the major I want to do actually exists. They seem to be implementing two new majors starting this year: Classical Languages and Classics and Religious Studies. I don’t really like either major. But I can’t tell if these are in addition to the old majors or in replacement of them. Some signs point to one possibility, some to the other. But I’m meeting with some people on Thursday, including someone in charge of the Classical Languages major. Hopefully they’ll be able to tell me. Unfortunately, that major is the less attractive of the two.
Blurgle. Stupid university websites and their complete disregard for user-friendliness.
But I’ve applied for the Honors Program in hopes of getting the perks (especially better housing) that comes with it; I even have a possible dormmate or two.
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Why don’t you like either option?
I’m not convinced that majors are really all that important or should be decided upon until you have to. You’ll take classes, like some more than others, and take more in that vein.
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The “Classical Languages” major is only Greek and Latin. No history, no culture, no nothing. Just four years of translation. The “Classics and Religious Studies” major has no Greek or Latin whatsoever–solely history and culture. The “Classics” major had a mixture of both. I know that I can take all sorts of classes that aren’t in my major, but it would have been so much easier and less of a WOMBAT to have the requirements fit my interests.
I’ll probably go with the Classical Languages major for several reasons:
-The language side of it was most important to me
-It only requires 21 hours, as opposed to 30 hours for the Classics & Religious Studies major
-It’s a lot simpler–the requirements aren’t nearly as convoluted
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Ehh, if they do it Right and Proper, you’ve got to get a good deal of culture. It comes with the language thing. When you get to the “intermediate” levels (if not sooner), you’ll definitely be translating Important Ancient Writings, and you can’t have writings without culture. That, and free electives!
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So I have registration credits form collegeboard. org so I can send my SAT scores for free to colleges. Those credits expire on the 31st. My scores arrive the 10th of next month. AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH. I guess just send them and keep my fingers extra tightly crossed?
*whimper*
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Blurg housing forms blarg. I have made an agreement with a friend of mine to share a dorm, but the residence hall we’d live in is reserved for students in the Honors Program. His admittance to the program was confirmed early; mine won’t be confirmed until April 1st. So I just have to put his name on the form and hope I’m accepted to the program.
Also: daaang housing is expensive. Do I really need somewhere to live? I’m sure there are plenty of bridges around. I could grab a cardboard box and find a nice cozy highway overpass to sleep under.
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Good practice for a vow of poverty! It might be hard to study there, though.
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I can use my books to build a sturdier hut. I’ll gain real-world work experience panhandling and hunting squirrels. I’ll get in shape running from police officers. I don’t know why anyone would pass up the chance to be homeless!
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Two short answer questions and one essay expounding on Christian Science for the one college application, in addition to agreeing to not drink, smoke, fool around or have any homosexual relationships. If I was applying to more than just Prin and Warren-Wilson (haha opposites much?) I would just say forget it. But I’ve gotten this far I guess. Urgh. I really hope I get into WWC. *dies*
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SAT scores arrived. I bombed math, as I expected, but not quite as terribly as I thought I would. Apparently all the people who say “there is no such thing as an innate knack for the critical reading sections” have not met me and my worthless skill for sentence completions and passage-based questions. Whoo. Writing was on the better side of okay as well. I’m confused about how the essay is scored though, I get how it’s done, kind of, but I don’t know what to make of my score on it. Meh. If anyone wants to share their font of knowledge with me, I’d be interested.
Also, I called Billy to ask if Wes would be able to write me a letter of recommendation, and he said yes, he probably would and he’ll nag for me. So that is a Very Good Thing.
Hum. Thinking of who to ask for recommendations is odd. Like, who will be impressive, write nice things about you and actually know you enough in a relevant situation. I thought of at least 2 people that would be good, and I can’t help but wonder if I decided right. Meh.
At any rate, I’m somewhat more optimistic about that. I’m still terrified by the Prin essays/short answers I have to dream up, and pretty much all the writing and stuff I need to get done, but urgh. At least it’s slightly more optimistic depression.
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SFTTP
Printing out stuff for the portfolio. *deep breath* I’ll put it all together tomorrow morning. For now what counts is that I have it gathered, printed out and there’s a lot of it. It’s not exactly “graded papers” because I don’t have graded papers. But I do have writing samples, math pages, biology pages, concert and tall ship fliers, blog posts, evaluation forms from supervisors and two essays.
And it’s actually quite a lot. *more deep breaths*
And I have an awesome SAT critical reading score. MAYBE IT’S NOT ALL FOR NAUGHT.
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I visited colleges a few weeks ago! I went down to California and saw Stanford, UC-Berkeley, Harvey Mudd, Pomona, UCLA, and CalTech! I’ll only post summaries if people want ’em, they’re all rather long.
Also: standardized test scores whee! I got a 35 on the ACT – 36 reading, 35 science, 35 english, 33 math, and 31 writing. (I’ve been told to retake it, but at this point I can’t tell if that would be very stupid or whether I should just accept a 33 on the math portion.) I’m retaking the SAT for sure, though – 730 on writing and math, 720 on reading, which disappointed me a bit. SAT subject tests yielded a 760 on math 2 (which I want to retake) and a 780 on US History.
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Don’t retake it. You don’t need to retake the SAT either. Your scores are significantly higher than mine and I got into many good schools with a 32 and a Math: 630, writing: 610, reading 760
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You got that high of a score on the SAT and you are disappointed?! You are crazy I tell you! I took that test 3 times and with a lot of prayer I somehow brought my score up like 200 points to a 2070. When I got my score I cried I was so happy. Trust me. If you got above a 2100 then you have nothing to worry about whatsoever. Don’t even waste your time and money. Colleges really don’t look at the tests as much as they do course load anyway.
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At some point in the near future I am going to have to Make Decisions regarding scheduling that will affect the rest of my college and outside of college life. Specifically, what classes to take next year, which will determine when I can study abroad my junior year. Agsdalg;sad I am not good at being responsible.
So. Things I should think about. I will probably put them off until later. OH LIFE.
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JADE– I AM SO WITH YOU ON THAT
Originally I was looking through classes and like oh haha yeah i’ll just take x and y and life is good.
But now MAJOR ANGST (NO PUN INTENDED)
Do you have to declare a major before second semester registration next year? Is that standard i have no idea. I feel like I need to know my major NOW since there are 9000 core requirements and 9000 majors requirements and UGH.
Nilly — I don’t know if you will ever see this but I think you would probably really like Harvey Mudd. Pomona is great too, but the one thing I will say is that the proximity to LA is GREATLY EXAGGERATED by the adcom, it takes at least 45 mins by car and longer by train.
GAPAs, am I allowed to say where I go to college? ?___?
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Axa: You are. Our restrictions on revealing geographic location apply only to MBers under 18.
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Aha! Well I don’t think I will say outright, but it’s good to know in case it is relevant to advice or anything
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Poo. I so can’t stalk you now…. lol
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I actually have big life-changing decisions to make too, and I need advice. I’m completely deadlocked when it comes to the college decision process. I’ve been accepted into–well, there are really only two that matter.
One is a traditional liberal arts college. Teh other is primarily a technical school. …I have no idea how I got into that one either, I never thought I was good enough in those subject areas. I wasn’t even seriously considering it…until I visited the campus. And then, well, my opinion did a 180.
So there’s my problem. I really did like the campus at the technical college. I’m just not sure I’m good enough at mathy-sciency things. part of me says that it’s just because I’ve slacked off and not due to any mental deficiency on my part, and part is wondering if certain stereotypes about girls and math are affecting me in this, and part would like to point out that that it’s not like the liberal arts college doesn’t have a science department I could go to. It’s just…I kind of liked the other school better, for some unexplained reason that has to do with vibes more than facts.
It’s just that…I like a lot of things, and things that I thought I liked last year I don’t like now and who knows what the future holds and a liberal arts college has a greater variety of courses. And more choice. I looked at the major requirements for the technical school, and I wouldn’t have a problem with a rigorous curriculum like that if only I got to take other things as well but there’s only room for one humanities course per semester and the variety is probably not as great as at other schools and I would really like to take a dumb pointless fun college course and I’m not sure what would be offered that I’d like and. And. And so on it goes.
It would have been great if I had gone to science camp over the summer or something to see if I liked things like that but i went to political science camp instead and then came down with a deep hatred of politics.
You know, engineering was one of the first things I crossed off on my list of Careers I’m Considering. Why am I taking a primarily engineering school so seriously then, even if it offers other things?
Part of me would like to test myself but throwing myself into the shark’s water. Teh other bit reminds me that I haven’t’ done any math this year more complicated than converting Celsius to Fahrenheit and dollars into dinars and I tend to get overconfident when I haven’t been in math class for a while.
There’s more, there’s more, like, the whole legacy issue and is that why I got in, but as I’ve been thinking this over for a while I’m just going to post. I actually meant to post more than two weeks but I couldn’t figure out how to say it and know there are emails about housing in my inbox form both colleges and i had better make up my mind soon. My parents and grandparents have been useless on the advice front. You guys are my only hope. Do you have any words of wisdom to break the deadlock?
PS And those words had better not be go to which one you like better(I know that technical school is your alma mater Grandpa, you’re not unbiased in this.) or play to your strengths (I know it’s not math. Thank you Dad.) or anything trite like that.
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Vibe is incredibly important.
The thing is, you’ve visited both. I have read a lot of college decisions stuff (like, A LOT) and time and time again people say that they are 100% set to go to their first choice, only to visit another school they hadn’t deeply considered and realize this is The One for them.
To slightly negate my own point, I don’t know how I feel about there being One School to Rule Them All. But I am a pretty firm believer in some schools being more suitable than others.
Possible narrow course selection, not sure if you want to do math and science at a math and science-y school…those reasons have more clout than “i want to see if i can do it.” Cause I don’t doubt that you can, I doubt whether or not that’s a valid reason for going to a school for three to four years. That’s beyond challenging yourself, it’s just kind of academically masochistic.
IMO legacy is not as big a deal as it might seem. unless your grandpa donated tens of thousands of dollars.
If you like a lot of things and want the freedom to change your mind, I would say go with the other school. That on top of the fact that you got a inexplicable vibe from the liberal arts college seems like a pretty convincing argument that way for me. But this is ultimately your choice. Don’t let your family sway you too much.
Also, I would recommend either sitting in on classes, doing an overnight visit, etc if you can, something more than just a walk around campus. I would also strongly recommend asking current students (there is usually some link to do so on admissions pages) and voicing your concerns/questions/etc. Once you get in somewhere, they try hard to sell you on their school. Let them convince you one way or another.
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I guess I wasn’t clear about some things in my original post. To clarify: I am getting vibes from the school of academic masochism. If I wasn’t I wouldn’t even be considering it.
Sitting in on classes or doing an overnight visit is a bit difficult form another country. I will check up on questioning students, though.
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So I have two weeks to turn in my college forms and decide where I’m spending the next four years of my life.
(I’m not sure if I’m supposed to post college names… I will leave them in parentheses, I guess, so they are easier to snip if need be.)
And last summer I visited my then-dream college (Carnegie Mellon) and it was awesome and I have a friend who goes there who loves it but it’s like ten hours away by car with the constant construction so I can’t go there even though I got into the school of computer science and it is one of the best computer science schools in the US if not the world and that’s what I want to major in.
So I’m probably going to this other school (University of Rochester) where I won’t have to decide my major for a couple years and it would be ridiculously easy to double major in math and CS because they have no core requirements and I could take music classes at pretty much the best musical school ever without having to be accepted there. It’s only five hours away, and I visited last weekend and I could imagine myself there.
But my new therapist is saying stuff like “if you’re not ready, will you be able to defer admission? Maybe you should go to a closer college for a semester or two.” and I don’t want to go to the very close and very prestigious one (Vassar) and I really don’t want to go to community college, because nothing will transfer to the second school (Rochester) because I’d have to take core requirements my first year at any other school anyway.
tl;dr DECISIONS ARE HARD
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Why does the 10-hour drive matter?
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I really wish it didn’t, but…
In case of emergency, or in case I become sick again and have to drop out, my parents don’t want to have to drive that far to take me home. I think they think a situation might happen where I could be in a nonresponsive and/or dangerous state until they come and get me, so they want it to be closer. I hope that I will be better by then, but they don’t want to take chances.
(Also, my boyfriend will be at community college for a semester or two and I’d like to visit him over the weekends sometimes. I didn’t realize last summer that we’d be this serious.)
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You should go to CMU! It’s awesome and it’s only a 5-minute drive from my house (can I say that?), so, you know, yeah. My dad could drive you to the airport if you needed to go home. (I don’t know if that helps at all.)
But, whatever happens, I’m sure you’ll end up somewhere where you’ll be happy and learn lots and lots and lots!
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For real, you should come to CMU and we can have tea parties and keep you safe! I literally pass by parts of that campus every day.
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Dodecahedron,
Have you considered the Rochester Institute of Technology? Or Rensselaer?
It’s too bad your medical considerations rule out Carnegie Mellon; it really does sound ideal for you.
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I’ve considered RIT (penguini got accepted there early decision and she was so happy, did you know that?)
But they don’t have a music major, and I want that option, since music is so important to me. Even though I want to major in a tech field, I don’t really want to go to a tech school.
And anyway, it’s a few months too late to apply anywhere…
I’ve pretty much decided on U of Rochester anyway, since another of my parents’ concerns (i.e. you have to pick a major your freshman year at CMU, essentially, and I have only actually taken one computer science course ever and I might change my mind to a related field, like math, and I would essentially have to apply to college again and/or do lots of paperwork to change that if I went there) is entirely valid. And U of Rochester is the complete opposite of that — they talk about how people accidentally double major just because they’re taking so many courses they want to take.
THF and Purple Panda, thanks for your offers of support, though! It means a lot to me that you would offer to help in such a big way. Also, I heart tea parties. If I’m at the Pennsic War again in a summer or two, I’ll definitely stop by and we can have all the tea.
Axa and Fiddler (both below me), also thanks! You have made me more confident that I will be happy wherever I go. Which is really what concerns me most.
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You know this really isn’t helping me any when even other people’s decision discussions end up sending me into even greater fits of indecision.
Just someone casually mentioning the name of the school should not do this to me.To wit, is RPI really the best school for me to study environmental science at? Which is what I am 80% sure I want to major in. I mean they have this environmental center on Lake George that sounds cool but it’s still primarily an engineering school and I’m not sure if it’ll offer enough variety in other subjects I like but I like the campus but. But this is just so not fair. I’m going to drive myself crazy before I even enter college, and then be tormented by what-ifs no matter where I decide to go.
Taking Axa and Midnight Fiddler’s advice is all very well and good and I am this close to just going already but unfortunately I am logical and paranoid and entirely to prone to thinking up worst case scenarios.
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The truth is that you’ll probably hate where you go at least occasionally no matter where you choose. You’ll also probably love it too. There will be different struggles and different successes at both, but I am confident that you will emerge triumphant no matter what path you take.
If you must think in terms of worst case scenarios, which worst case is worse?
You can always transfer or take a year off if it comes down to it.
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I think that you’re looking at this the wrong way. You seem to be thinking that there’s THE ONE college for you. But, and this is especially true if you’re having trouble deciding between places, there are many many colleges out there and many of them will be a great fit for you. Where ever you go, there will be interesting classes and interesting people. And you’re not signing away your life – it’s always possible to transfer. There really is no wrong decision.
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FantasyFan — Sorry, I misunderstood! In that case I would still tend to think that going with your gut (ugh, this phrase…) and the technical school is probably the best option.
Dodecahedron — That is a tough decision, and even though I don’t feel like I can help much it seems like either place would be really great! I think it might be helpful to go in depth with their websites and so on…even making lists of pros and cons, no matter how much people say it doesn’t help, can be helpful.
Pan — you are the sweetest person ever *hugs and pie* ;__;
So I am sort of decided on becoming an English major. I will see how this coming semester goes. I have things kind of mapped out and it might be tricky to get a minor in anything other than Japanese (which I want to keep doing) but ughhh. Core requirements can lead to fun classes but right now I am not feeling it. HFSDKJSHDNGfasdkjg
I am really pleased with my room for next year though I’m near a line of orange trees!
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FantasyFan~ Axa gives awesome advice, you should listen to her. Like she says, the vibe you get from the campus is important, because you’re going to be living there. You don’t want to live somewhere you feel uncomfortable or out pf place, because even if they have fantastic programs that environment isn’t going to help you excel in them.
I’m sure that no matter what choice you take you’ll do well.
Annie~ How likely is it that you’ll have an emergency? If Pan, THF and their family offer a safe environment should you need one, could that affect your choice and your parent’s comfort with the distance?
As I said to FF, whatever choice you make I’m confident that you’ll do perfectly fine.
I don’t want to be all “sorry about y’all’s problems, but LOOK AT ME AND MY HAPPYNEWS”, but…
I sent in my deposit for first WWC today. Multiple reasons, mostly because I just really prefer it over Prin, I got accepted and the deadline was is coming up fast.
Prin didn’t know what to do with my homeschool transcripts, and pretty much said “uh, so…that’s nice and all but we really can’t deal with anything that isn’t exactly by the book, we need grades and scores and numbers, not ‘this is what we did and how we did it.'” Which I can understand, but still. They claimed to be really flexible with homeschoolers and non-traditional schooling approaches, but in reality the entire application has been/was a fight between the people and the system. I took the GED (at long last) this past weekend, but it takes 6 or 8 weeks to get the scores, which is when Prin would make their decision, but that’s way too late for the WWC deadline. So WWC it is, and I’m quite happy about it.
As an example of their differences, when I was doing the Prin application I called my admissions counselor (who’s really nice) to get clarification on the schools “no homosexuality” policy. She said pretty much it’s “you can be gay, just pretend you’re not or you’ll get expelled, and you can get expelled for not being gay but supporting gay rights. There are people here who are obviously gay, but it’s okay because no one says anything.” That bothers me.
Then when I was poking through the WWC [site o’ videos] channel, one of the first videos was about how the college community is very supportive of all identities, and how it had responded to some recent attacks on GLBTQ students and faculty.
HUGE DIFFERENCE. I liked Prin and all, but there were too many “in print” vs. “actual practice” discrepancies, which I’ve not seen at WWC.
tl;dr
I’m going to the school I really want to go to and I’m excited about it.
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Why are you guys the only ones who understand that beating yourself up and torturing yourself until you almost die so you can get into the Best College You Can isn’t a good idea?
I feel like I’m trapped in an insane asylum.
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*hugs* Because by then they’ve had plenty of time to figure it out, and they’ve seen more of how the Real World works?
I understand it, but I’m worried that it might only be temporary, since I’m still only in middle school.
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You are so wise Cat’s Eye. I tell you… my parents wanted me to go to UNC Chapel Hill. For them it was the school of all schools. Of course, they also said that they would rather me go to Davidson or Harvard or Duke, but we didn’t have the money. None of those places had Animal Science programs though. So let me tell you… I fought to get them to see reason and now I am exceptionally happy!
The school’s prestige doesn’t matter. What matters is if the school has the program you want.
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biblio — oh my god, please do not even think about college now. i only began forming amorphous ideas about where to go in sophomore year and i’d always been in honors/AP/whatever classes so i was well aware of it all. SERIOUSLY, DO NOT. i am distressed to hear this.
cat’s eye — i am not sure what grade you are in but being able to recognize that fact will make you much happier during the process and in the long run.
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Oh, I don’t think about it. That’s not what I meant. Don’t worry; I misspoke. I didn’t mean I worried–I certainly don’t. I meant that there was no proof that it would last forever, but that’s honestly not something I ever think about at all. Again, don’t worry; I never do think about it.
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Tenth. And I recognize that fact, but the people who are actually in charge of my life don’t. I live in a town where the (only) public school might as well be a private school, and there isn’t a single kid in each year who doesn’t get into a “good” college. We’re extremely isolated. The Internet is the only reason I know what life is really like outside of the bubble.
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I’m sending in my deposit to University of Rochester today. I’m sad that I can’t go to Carnegie Mellon, but also really happy that I am going to college at all somewhere that isn’t fifteen minutes away. (because one of the schools I applied to, a good one, is literally closer to my house than community college. Yes, they have dorms, but I would still probably have to go home for laundry because it’s so convenient and free)
I think I’ll be happy there.
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28 (Annie)~ I’m glad for you, and I’m certain you’ll do excellently. *hugs*
Talked to Morning (HP reference-catching admissions counselor from college I’m going to) yesterday, told her I’d sent in the deposit, GED score info (scores will be available in 6 or 8 weeks), asked when I need to have a final transcript in. She said that they’ll just take the GED scores as a final transcript, that I don’t need to worry about writing out a whole other thing because they trust me to get what I need done. HUGE RELIEF.
Talked to Kelly (also cool admissions counselor from college I’m not going to) today, she was happy that I’d made a decision, even though it wasn’t for her school, so that was good. Said that if I ever transfer it wouldn’t be a problem for my record to show that I’d not submitted my GED scores, that I’d have to re-apply anyway, so it’s all good. Apparently she’d told another girl she’d been working with about WWC, and Other Girl had applied and was seriously considering it, but hadn’t made a final decision yet. So that’s kind of cool, found her on VoldyNet and sent a request for friendship, so it should be interesting to talk with her, at any rate.
I’m still looking at the WWC website and thinking “I’m going to be GOING there. For real.” 
Housing, work, tax and health forms and stuff. I should probably get on that. O.O
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It is official now! I am going to NC State University next year to major in Animal Science! Plus, I got into the Honor’s Program, which is totally amazing. I’m so excited! ^_^ I even have my NCSU hoodie on that I love so much and will keep forever and ever and ever!
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Ooh, congratulations! That’s fantastic!
You will probably meet people I know!
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You guys, I’m super excited for college right now.
I was chatting with some of my future classmates on voldynet, and we now have plans to go skinny dipping FIRST THING. Apparently skinny dipping is a regular part of orientation week. (regular campus life too, there’s just an extra explosion of it for orientation.)
Also spontaneous costume-wearing. (Only not for orientation week but always.)
I AM IN LOOOOOOOOOOVE.
Also my apologies if naked river-jumping is too much for MB. I’m not trying to be bad, really…
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If we weren’t pretty sure that 90 percent of MuseBloggers’ parents have gone skinny-dipping at some point, we might pretend to be scandalized on their behalf.
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I am…not as excited for college as I was. I really just don’t want to be tied down for the next four years, just as I’m shaking off the last eighteen years of tied-down-ness. And it’s a lot of debt and I’m not sure it’s something I’m really passionate about. You know?
I’m sure I’ll feel different once I get there, and I have to go because if I don’t I’ll never know what I missed and I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. But unless it turns about to be worth 65,000 in debt or whatever, I’ll probably leave after the first year, pack a bag, and walk south.
I’m just not sure that what I really want to do is go into professional theater. I can see myself getting crazily in debt and needing a career to work it all off, but I don’t want a career. I want to be a wandering environmentalist anarchist who does plays and plays the fiddle on street corners. I want to work on a tall ship and not have to worry about deadlines and a lack of income. I want to DO theater without making a profession out of it–because then it becomes an obligation. I want to travel and work on farms and wear my patchy pants and fall in love with a minstrel boy.
I need college to hurry up. The waiting is driving me crazy. And I’m making tons of money but it always feels like not enough because my parents are going 10,000 in debt this year and I’m going 6,500. That’s a LOT OF MONEY.
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FIDDLER YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE SO MUCH FUN
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I feel like all the college admissions pages and bits of advice are meant to reassure people who don’t have absolutely stellar grades — but as someone who is academically strong but has a lukewarm resume in all other areas, they make me feel like I’m going to be rejected out of hand because I don’t have enough extracurriculars or service hours.
By the way, I got my SAT scores back… 2300 total, which is supposed to be good, but I’ve been reading that ACTs are more important anyway and SATS tend to be just a formality, etc. etc.
Basically, I constantly worry that I’m not well-rounded enough for university, even though I’ve gotten straight As since seventh grade.
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haha this was my life. your SATs are higher than mine though (and EXCEPTIONAL, by the way!)
i’m not sure about the ACT being preferred, i thought the general trench was away from standardized tests as a whole but it probably depends on the school (state schools seem to put more emphasis on them than private schools)
i am the most lopsided, least well rounded person around and i got into several nice schools so really, don’t worry.
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Thanks, it’s especially reassuring to hear that from someone who’s actually in college.
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Where to start…awesome SAT scores, by the way. I got like 2040 and thought I was doing pretty well… I never took ACTs, and got accepted with fantastic scholarships to all the schools I applied to.
I also had like NO community service and pretty much no extracurriculars besides theater and Salmon Bowl. Don’t worry about it.
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Well, it depends on where you’re applying with ACT versus SAT… in general coast schools prefer SAT while the ACT is catching on in the midwest. Most will take either, though. Really I just think you should go with whichever test you’re better at (I was a lot better at ACT than SAT, for example).
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East coast schools, for the most part, want you to have both. Or SAT II.
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Hm, it’s changed since I applied then. When I applied to a lot of east coast schools two years ago I was fine with just the ACT. I think two of the 8 schools wanted me to have SAT subject tests, so I took those but they didn’t care about ACT/SAT really.
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I didn’t apply to a ton of east coast schools, so you may be right. Actually I never finished applying to any…
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POSOC – What schools are you looking at? 2300 and all As sounds like a strong base for an application to me.
I’m starting my applications around now… I’m going to apply early to Brown, and among the other schools I’m applying to are Tufts, Wesleyan, Yale, Harvard (ha ha those two are not happening), University of Chicago, Brandeis, probably Swarthmore, maybe Oberlin. I feel pretty confident in my grades/scores (2370 SAT, 800s on Math 2, Biology E, French, and probably all A’s, although I might end up with a B in Calc or French this year, report cards haven’t come yet). Extracurriculars could always be better but aren’t shabby either: Marching band (captain, president, etc) and Science Olympiad (officer, president) are the two big ones although I have a couple of other things here and there. Right now what I’m really worried about is the essay. I’ve got some ideas, but I don’t know if any of them are really big enough to grab the attention of an admissions officer who has read thousands before. My absolute favorite idea involves Harry Potter and the past and moving on now that the series is (just weeks from being) undeniably over, but I’m sure Harry Potter is a topic that is overused among out generation, so I just don’t know…
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And Lewis & Clark. Yes.
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Hey! On one of the past College threads I posted reviews of my visits to several of those colleges (and I currently go to one of them)! If you want to read it, it’s post 54 on this thread https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=3578
And if you have any questions about Oberlin, feel free to ask me! ANd let me know if you visit it
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That is really helpful! Thank you
It is not unlikely that I will visit at some point in the fall. I will definitely let you know if it ends up happening!
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If you do an overnight visit I will show you a good time. And by a good time, I mean I will show you the spacesquid painting in scifi hall and depending on the weekend possibly a nerf battle or a contra dance. FUN STUFF YO.
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That sounds extremely awesome!
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♥ ♥ ♥ MBers’ ideas of a good time.
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My major extracurriculars are Creative Writing Club (three years, president one year) and Academic Decathlon (two years). Essay is not something I’m terribly worried about, except for the “only 750 words” part, and the “finding a topic” part. Writing it should be fine.
As for schools… there’s so much choice. I’d go with “anything that will accept me” if that didn’t sound a wee bit desperate. My chosen career path is unreliable and difficult to enter (author) so at some point I’ll need some other job, but all the jokes about useless majors are directed at English, so… maybe I’ll minor in English and major in something else, or the other way around, but most of the things that interest me are even less practical than English.
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You could go to the Naval Academy and be a real captain.
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Major in English. It’s cool.
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36- You should come to Lewis & Clark. -dazzling smile- Because I’M going to be there! Well, maybe.
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POSOC– hmm wow my original post was supposed to say “trend” not trench, fyi…but yeah reading your post above, i’ve heard that’s it’s actually better to be really invested in one thing rather than have spent a couple months doing dozens of unrelated things. i think the passion is what makes the difference.
this might be a shot in the dark but i think maybe sarah lawrence would be a good fit for you? i never visited so i can’t speak for any uh…actually helpful advice BUT they are very well known for their creative writing department and general emphasis on writing.
tesseract — okay i do not want to be a jerk, and with those stats and your status as a muser there is almost certainly no need for this, but i would add some safety schools to that list because those are almost all upper tier (except for Brandeis i think but i don’t know all that much about it)
i’ve just heard horror stories, so i thought i’d mention it. again, probably not worth worrying about with your stats and everything, but yeah
i wouldn’t totally discredit the HP idea, if you’re writing from the heart and use the series as a launching point, i think that could be a really cool essay!
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Oh yeah I’m also applying to UNC Chapel Hill, which I’m about 96% sure I’ll get into (based on their stats, who has gotten in from my school in the past, etc), and looking into a few true safeties. I’m concerned about being rejected everywhere too, but my parents are all “Psshhh you will get into Tufts” and I’m like NO. YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND. PEOPLE ACTUALLy DO GET REJECTED FROM NON-IVY SCHOOLS (they both got into like all the Ivies back when they applied so I think their hold on this concept is pretty weak). Basically though yes you’re right and I know.
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I think my parents also have a less than perfect grasp of how DIFFICULT it is to get into Ivy League.
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oh my god THIS.
“YOU HAVE TO APPLY TO AL THESE SCHOOLS”
“MOM THERE IS A “C” ON MY TRANSCRIPT AND I MOSTLY GET B’S (though admittedly in honors/AP classes so they counted as A’s towards my GPA cause my high school was WEIRD AND DUMB)”
“APPLY ANYWAY BLAH BLAH BLAH”
WHATEVER MAN.
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I’ve gotten straight As but still.
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Is it really difficult?
I was going to apply to Harvard and Dartmouth, but decided Ivy League wasn’t really what I wanted, and east coast definitely not. But I never felt like it would be that hard to get in. I don’t know anyone who’s been rejected from one, I don’t think. But I don’t know all that many people who’ve applied either. I do have a friend who applied to nine places (not Ivy League), got rejected from all of them, and then got accepted to Princeton. So.
POSOC- Have you looked at St. John’s? They are strange and literature-based.
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wellllll harvard’s acceptance rate is about 6% and this year they got 35,000 applicants.
ivy leagues are notoriously selective.
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That’s crazy. I guess I’m glad I didn’t actually apply, and have rejection crush my soul. Er, ego.
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i personally think it’s ridiculous though, that rate is out of control. i agree with the ivys not being a thing though, i mean there is no way i would have ever been accepted anyway lol but bleh
i agree about st john’s! i only found out about them after i was in college but they look pretty nifty
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I’ve been told that if I want to get going on my college search, etc. before junior year, I should search for scholarships as a priority. Does anybody know how I should go about doing that?
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39- I’m not quite sure I understand. Do you mean actually going to school early and not finishing high school, or just looking at colleges?
As far as searching for scholarships, most schools have a scholarship page on their website, you can look it over and see how likely you are to get any of them, etc. Some of them you can apply for, others are awarded based solely on the application (so make your application AWESOME–I thought mine was sort of mediocre). That said, you can’t really be sure how much you’re going to get until your awards letter comes. The school I thought I was going to get the least amount of money from actually gave me the most.
If you’re fairly low-income, a lot of the Ivy League schools give out SPIFFY GRANTS automatically. A lot of non-Ivy private schools too, but usually not as automatically.
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39- Our school put together a packet for all the local scholerships and we could fill out the ones we wanted. I would say look into your town’s township office and local banks and see if they offer any local scholarships to your school. There’s also a lot of random ones you can apply for online (“scholarship for left handed people!” “scholarship for if you are female and over 6 feet tall!”) but those are iffy. I had a lot of trouble finding ones to apply for, honestly, because almost everything I could have applied for wanted to know where you were going/was money to a specific school and I didn’t know where I’d gotten in until after many of them were due. Which was weird. Our school itself also had a couple scholarship stuff (Presidential, etc) that they selected students for, so you could see if they have any to offer.
40- Pretty sure she just means starting looking at colleges and scholarships early, not starting college early.
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Re: grades
I had a 2300 on the SAT and 790 on the subject tests Math 2 and Physics. I never took the ACT. I applied only to schools on the East Coast. The ACT was never required, and sometimes the SAT or subject tests were. I didn’t apply to any Ivies but I got into schools like Vassar and Carnegie Mellon. (Also my final class ranking is 10/850, that might have helped with admissions)
Re:Ivies are hard to get into
Our class salutatorian is going to Yale. But I hear the person ranked third in our class got rejected from a lot of schools and ended up going to Duke, I think. (I don’t know what his essay was about, and the salutatorian’s essay was about doing math with her father iirc. Essays are important. My essay was about the time I spent in a mental hospital. An essay about Harry Potter could be good if you’re really passionate about it, but I would stick to writing about you and things you have done.)
(Also, the one safety school I applied to stopped offering my major for the class of 2015 and beyond because it is a state school. Luckily I got into two of my top three choices.)
Moral of the story: Apply to several safeties, and make sure you would actually like to go to them. Just in case.
Re: scholarships
Look junior year, if possible. I applied for a scholarship that was offered junior year just because all it required was a list of extracurricular activities. And then I ended up going to that school.
Also, if you are good at test taking, shine on the PSATs. I got a 240 on those, and since I’m going to a school that offers merit-based aid, I’m getting almost a third of the tuition of the school covered by a National Merit Scholarship (they took away the other scholarship and just gave me National Merit aid, but still. It’s a lot of money.)
Also also, my school had a file cabinet in the guidance office full of scholarships. You could get them for living in a certain area, having cable television provided by the scholarship offerer, for going into nursing or business or education or not-education… You just had to walk into the office and look at it.
POSOC-
Come to the University of Rochester. Not only is it awesome because I am going there this fall, but the cluster system that they have instead of gen ed requirements is really nice, so you can take lots of courses on random stuff that interests you in order to find a major you’d like if you don’t want to major in English, or if you want to double major in English and something that you can get a more stable job with while you launch your writing career. It’s really easy to double major there, compared to the other schools I looked at.
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I did shine on the PSATs, and I’ll def. consider Rochester.
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You people and your insanely good SAT scores are making me feel unworthy of being here.
I’ll just go hide in the corner and clutch my critical reading score to my chest like a deranged miser now…
I didn’t do college applications the way most people do college applications. I applied to two schools, and never even finished the one for my second choice. I also didn’t really do a huge amount of searching, because the whole thing scared the bejesus out of me and I was entirely clueless. I’m still mostly clueless.
Seriously, I watched the information DVD with HAWK’s family and decided that I wanted to go to this school because it looked completely awesome and they included bloopers on the film.
The point of the above ramble is that even though it’s generally a smart move to apply to lots of schools, to reach high and have safeties and a wide selection, etc., you’re not doomed to fail if you only apply to a small number of places that you really want to go to.
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Starting apps.
35 ACT (36 reading, 35 science and English, 33 math), with a 760 in math 2 and 780 in US history (might retake biology – 740 – or chemistry – 690, sigh – depending on the requirements for various colleges). I’m worried about the subject test scores in particular. PSAT yielded a 216 and therefore probably National Merit Scholar.
3.8something GPA and a therefore abysmal ranking (gah); basically, mostly A’s but a couple B’s.
Extracurriculars: Science Olympiad (3 years, nationals 3 times, captain), quiz bowl (3 years, qualified for nationals, captain), math team (2 years, alternate at state once), colorguard (2 years only), debate (2 years).
Applying to JHU, Harvard, Stanford, Carleton, Northwestern, Harvey Mudd, U of Minnesota (safety), UW-Madison (safety), and probably others. That’s a basic list, though I think I need more safeties. I’d probably do something along the lines of pre-med or biomedical engineering.
Thoughts? I’m so afraid I’m not going to get accepted anywhere. My stats are so low compared to your guys’. 
(yes I should take this to College Confidential; I shall do so eventually)
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You will totally get in places! Your scores, grades, etc. are strong and your extracurriculars are really good too. Plus you’re two-ish (?) years younger than everyone else applying which they can’t possibly disregard. And SciOly nationals = very accomplished, in my book. 
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Honestly I think you will probably be fine. Maybe not Harvard because they’re snobs and like to make everyone feel inferior, but I know people going to Northwestern and you’re definitely in the same range (probably above) as most of them. I’d say pick one for SURE safety if you’re really worried but from what I figure you’re pretty set.
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I saw UW and got excited because in my world that means University of Washington and that is in my state. It is also a fantastic school, one of the best in the west and especially great for a public university. I’d like to go there if I end up staying in-state. Anyway, I digress.
College Confidential is a great resource for some things, like knowing what prep books are the best for AP tests, but one can go crazy reading too much into statistics and student profiles. It’s a blessing to have found it but also a curse.
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You´ll be great! And yay for schools from my part of the world. I applied to Carleton and U of M (Morris and you are probably planning on applying TC). Your scores are definitely higher than mine (I posted them upthread) and I got in to most of the schools I applied to.
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…You’re from Minnesota? WHY DID I NOT KNOW THIS
But yeah, I’d be applying to TC.
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I dunno. I’ve known you are from around here for a while.
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44 (Kokonilly)~ My Mom went to UW-Madison.
You’ll do fine, I’m sure.
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HARVEY MUDD! their dining hall is my favorite. what did you think of the campus, etc? also you are definitely going to get accepted lots of places– and you skipped a grade right? 3.8 is in no way abysmal!
haha oh man college confidential….soooo many wasted hours when i was applying to schools. i still go there from time to time, i won’t lie 
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44.1 – Heh, yeah, I skipped 2 grades. I hope that plays a role somehow.
44.2 – Hmm, okay, thanks!
44.3 – Haha, I meant Wisconsin, as you probably guessed. And yeah, CC is intimidating and addicting. It’s discouraging at times to see what people say about stats.
45 – Sounds great!
56 – Oh, yeah, Mudd’s dining hall is great. I loved the campus; 70-something degrees, sunny, green, southern California. (I went in January, so the contrast with Minnesota was considerable.) I really like it; it’s definitely high on the list. And haha, thanks. I don’t think a 3.8 (it’s probably more like a 3.85) is bad, but my ranking is really low because people take much easier classes than I do and get all A’s. (This is why I advocate the 5.0 GPA system.) I don’t think an A- in Calc 3 is anything to sneeze at, but meh.
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Eh, all the colleges I went to say they like when people take harder classes, even if they get the ocasional B, because that shows they were pushing themselves. BUt i had the same problem at my school even with the 5.0 point GPA system (5 for honors, 4 for regular) but that was also messed up because then if you take any extra classes you can’t have honors in (band, choir, creative writing) then it actually counts AGAINST your GPA even if you get an A. It’s all a mess >.<
THERE WAS A POINT IN THERE AND IT WAS THAT YOUR GPA IS PROBABLY FINE and definitely fine for most schools
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My school has a 6.0 system (4.0 regular, 5.0 honors, 6.0 for AP) so the regular-classes-bringing-down-your-GPA problem is ever further propagated. The automatic As I get in marching band actualy hurt my GPA. It’s a little ridiculous.
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The alternative is having people like a girl at my school who has said outright that she won’t take AP English next year (from the best English teacher at the school) because it might ruin her 4.0 GPA and her chances at being a co-valedictorian. (Her loss, if you ask me.)
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…I never thought about that. Huh. Well, that’s dumb. >.<
Haha, thanks though.
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Looking at the course catalog. Can’t I just sign up for everything, please?
Also, can’t I major in everything? Pleasepleasepleasepleaseeeee?!?!?!?!?!
Looking at the history section: “Whoo history!”
Philosophy section: “Wait…maybe I want to major in this….”
English section: “Ooh, ooh, OOOHH!! THAT ONE.”
Gender studies: “Forget history and philosophy. This is where it’s at.”
Anthropology: “No wait, I want to do this.”
Art: “THIS.”
Theatre: “THIS TOO.”
I am hopeless.
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Yep, sounds familiar.
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With my degree program (music performance) I basically only have room for one non-music class per semester. And so every semester I go through what you’re going through, but I can only choose ONE class.
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SAME
THIS IS THE PLIGHT OF THE MUSER
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48.1 (Robert)~ GAAAAAHHHHHH *dramatic deathflop*
Here’s the advice I got: “Step 1: mark all the courses that are awesome. Step 2: mark all the courses that are prerequisites for the courses that are awesome. Step 3: mark all the required courses. Step 4: check the fall schedule to see how many of 2 and 3 you can fit in.”
BUT STILL. *deathflops off pathetically to make beaded hair adornments*
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Every time I opened a course catalogue I contemplated changing my major. I didn’t stop with undergrad, either. In fact, I dare not look at course catalogues even now…
*realizes this is a less than helpful comment*
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Glad I’m not the only one. I’m bad at specializing even in my area. I want to know /everything/. My mom called me a renaissance woman and claimed there are jobs out there for folks like me but I’m less sure…
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I’d add: 5. Find out who the most awesome professors are, and take their courses. That’s usually a good policy, even if the course title didn’t catch your eye at first — or maybe especially if it didn’t.
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This is…good advice. I think I’m going to apply it to my own choices too.
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By the way, professors will often let you skip the prerequisites for classes if you seem bright and enthusiastic enough. That usually works best after you’ve been around long enough to prove how wonderful you are.
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49.1 (Rebecca)~ No, it is okay. I’m not alone. And you’re awesome, so I’m okay with having some of the same shortcomings (or not, depending on how you look at it) as you.
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When is everyone off to school? I think dorms open on the 28th so that’s probably it for me, but classes don’t start until the 30th.
I have a sink in my room this year, shedding tears of joy (although the closet is kind of weird so splitting that up will be interesting)
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(30th of August, that is)
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I move in on the 18th, and classes start…sometime? I too have a sink, as far as I know.
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I move in on the 20th, but my family will be taking the road trip down to Georgia a couple of days earlier.
I am not looking forward to a 12 hour road trip with the entire family. (But I don’t have to make the trip back up. I will be off in Collegeland! Yaaaay!)
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I move in on the 24th! I’m still not really believing that it’s going to happen though.
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Not until the 4th of september And moving in early is expensive and I missed the deadline anyway, alas.
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i am moving in to my HOUSE OFF-CAMPUS WHAT UP on september 1, but school doesn’t start until late sept sometime (yeah, we’re on quarters…for one more year at least)
the two years i was in the dorms though i always had a sink/bathroom in my room because i was supercool and lived on north campus where they had actual semi-nice dorms and not badly kept barracks
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51 (Axa)~ August 17th. 19 days, but it’s not like I’m counting or anything.
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Fiddler (48): THAT IS MY LIFE. Last year, I read through the entire course catalog almost every single week. I spent so much time trying to decide what sounded the most interesting, what sorts of classes I wanted to take the next semester, etc. etc. etc. And especially at the end of last semester, I was having all of these “what do I want to major in?” crises, because every professor of every class I was taking told me that I should major in their field. My advice: don’t think about majoring in anything right now, just take what classes sound interesting, and eventually you’ll know what to do!
Fiddler (49): Robert’s advice is the bestest advice.
Axa (51): August 22 or 23, I think? Classes start on the 24th.
DID I MENTION MY ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EPIPHANY? THIS MAY BE THE SINGLE GREATEST WEEK OF MY ENTIRE LIFE.
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Pan — omg please tell me how you came to know what you should major in. i am 90% certain i’m going to major in english but it’s much like a romantic comedy in which the heroine realizes she’s been in love with that one dude she thought she hated all along. IF THAT MAKES ANY SENSE AT ALL….
but anyway that sounds like a really cool and exciting major! TELL ME ALL THE THINGS ABOUT IT SO THAT I MIGHT LIVE VICARIOUSLY THROUGH YOU
and on the topic of schedules! WHAT ARE YALL PLANNING ON TAKING?
my ancient mediterranean plan fell through because actually walking across two campuses yesterday made me realize it’s not humanly possible with my stubby hobbit legs. i’ve replaced it with a medieval history type class but that’s probably going to change again too…*sigh*
other than that i have my brit lit class, a philosophy class, and victorian novels ♥___♥
fiddler — lol so totally not creeping on your college’s website right now our school colors are the same! TRUE LOVE, OBVIOUSLY!
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I visited my university again today with my family (for some reason my sister really wanted to go?) and walked my schedule. Not too bad. My history seminar, luckily enough, is actually in my dorm building, so that’s fantastic. My Latin class is in an engineering building (not sure why). The other three classes are sort of the other end of the campus, but they’re easy to get to. Unfortunately, my longest walk is my earliest class–8:30 every MWF. Macroeconomics. Blurgh.
A question: Bringing a bike. Is it worth it? Keep in mind that the ground’ll be covered in snow and ice for quite a while, especially since they’re apparently not going to salt the sidewalks as much to “cut down on costs”. They’re also cutting down on how often they clean the stairwells in the dorms (just once a week now). Meanwhile they’re adding even more onto the football stadium. *sigh*
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don’t remember where you’re going, but i’ve really missed my bike the last couple years and am really excited to have it with me at college this year. the reason i didn’t bring it before was because i didn’t want it stolen – there’s a pretty substantial amount of bike theft around here and the dorms don’t really offer much in the way of protection, just big racks out front that nobody pays attention to. if you have some sort of sheltered area (or better yet, can fit/are allowed to keep your bike inside your dorm) i’d say do it but if it’s just racks, you probably want to check out some of the campus security info and see how prevalent bike theft is
re snow and ice, don’t worry about it so much. if your bike is safe you can choose not to use it during the winter although you may find biking in ice isn’t quite as bad as it sounds. another option if you’re planning on going home during breaks is to bring your bike back home when it gets cold and bring it back to campus again when everything melts
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(I’m going to the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, FYI.)
I’ll ask around and see what bike security is like there. I know there’s racks outside pretty much every building, and it looks like they’re used quite a bit. Keeping it in my room wouldn’t be ideal, because it’s a tiny room and I think there’s only one or two elevators in my dorm building, but it’s a possibility.
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Our dorm had an indoor section for bikes, which still wasn’t ideal but was better than keeping them outside.
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53 (Pan)~ ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES, WHOO! That is the coolest. You should come to Wilson because, like, ALL THE ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES YOU CAN HANDLE. Not even kidding. And also because I’d be there and it would be awesome to go to school together. (I think it would be awesome, at least…)
54 (axa)~ How could we have anything other than true love? I mean, seriously. 
I…actually don’t know what my school’s colors are. That’s pathetic. I did go a’creepin’ on your school a while back though. I was impressed.
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Fiddler (56): Yes! I think I’m going to stay where I am, but it would definitely be awesome to go to school together! I will undoubtedly visit you at some point while you’re there in the next few years. Also, there are two dorms at my school called Warren and Wilson! They’re mirror images of each other. Last year I lived in Warren, and this year I’m living in Wilson! Also, I think our schools are really similar.
Axa (54):
re: ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES EPIPHANY.
So, I entered college with no allegiance to any field, though I knew I liked social sciences. On our advisor questionnaire, there was a question along the lines of “if you had to pick a major RIGHT NOW, what would you pick?” and I said either History or Peace and Global Studies. Mostly because I liked history in high school, I did lots of Model UN, and the Peace and Global Studies program sounded really interesting. I took a wide variety of classes first semester–Biology, Spanish, Politics, Outdoor Education, Music, which worked out really well.
As the year progressed, I began thinking more and more that I wanted to major in Peace and Global Studies (PAGS). I read through the course catalog all the time, trying to narrow down majors that I could be thinking about–not that I wanted to be married to one by any means, but I liked knowing what sorts of classes to be looking at, etc. Second semester, I also took classes in a variety of disciplines. International Relations, Art, Outdoor Education (again), Philosophy (though I dropped that one), English/Environmental Studies, Music.
The art class I took second semester was ceramics, and I fell in love with it. I was learning so quickly, and by just a few weeks, the professor started teaching me lots of extra things–more advanced throwing techniques, how to load the kiln, how to mix glazes, etc. She approached me later in the semester and told me how much she thought I could be a ceramicist (I think that’s the right term), and how I should really consider a Studio Arts/Ceramics major. The very next day my International Relations teacher said she wanted to talk to me about majors, and the same thing also happened with my English teacher. So I was in a constant state of “zomg I have no idea what to do with my liiiiiiiiiiiiifeeee,” trying to figure out what classes to take next year, torn about everything. At that point, my biggest pulls were in Peace and Global Studies and Art.
[[Interlude: I’ve known that I wanted to minor in Outdoor Education for pretty much the whole year (there isn’t a major, just a minor). I went on a month-long backpacking trip before school started, and my school has an amazing wilderness/outdoor education program that I became involved with right away. I loved my Outdoor Ed class first semester, I took another one second semester. Second semester, I also worked at the climbing wall and the Outdoor Education Center. I got my Wilderness First Responder certification in May, and by the end of the summer I will be a Nationally Registered Emergency Medical Technician/ Wilderness EMT. I’ve always been interested in education, and I fell in love with the outdoors and experiential education, and how they can all work together and be wonderful and *lovefest*]]
So yeah, I quickly realized that it would actually be impossible to double major in PAGS and Art and also do an Outdoor Ed minor (and also keep my sanity), so I went back and forth and back and forth for weeks. When signing up for classes for next year, I decided to definitely take Macroeconomics–it’s a requirement for PAGS, but I also wanted to take it because I think it’s an important thing to know about and understand. My main problem was that a required class for PAGS (History of Non-Violent Movements, which allegedly has great readings but not the most engaging teacher–so I wouldn’t want to take it unless I was pretty sure I wanted to major in PAGS) and two required art classes (recommended for sophomore art majors to take) were at the same time, so I had to decide into which basket I wanted to start putting my eggs. When I registered, I decided that I’d take the PAGS class–I thought I’d major in PAGS and just take lots of art classes (which is still what I’m planning to do, hopefully).
The problem was, I wasn’t even too excited about PAGS. It sounded like a great program in pretty much every way–a mix of international studies (which I like, but not enough to major in), politics (same), philosophy, and peace stuff. But I wasn’t excited about it. The classes sounded interesting, but they didn’t sound fantastic. I felt like I was just settling for the major that I thought fit me best, because I couldn’t find one that was better. Now that I think about it, I don’t think I would have been happy studying theories of peace for the rest of college. Not at all. I like the international relations part, but I get tired of the theory part.
So anyway, now the answer to your actual question, THE EPIPHANY. I bike to and from class/work every day, many many many miles with several giant hills. Often, when I’m biking, I think about how wonderful it would be if cars didn’t exist, if we had a flawless public transportation/train/bus/whatever system and everyone rode bikes and the world would be happy and we would all sleep in beds of moss and flowers and breathe clean air and dance under the stars every night…….you know how it is sometimes. So, I had just biked up a monster hill and was now biking down the other side of said monster hill, which took me right beside the street where my middle school science teacher lives. My thought process gets a little muddled right around here, but I started remembering a yearly science-education-camping trip we took every year with her, and how awesome it was. And then I was like, ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah, pretty much like that. Basically, I realized how much I love that sort of thing, and how I’m excited about it all the time. When I got home, I read about all of the Environmental Studies courses, and they’re all so wonderful, and it makes me happy just thinking about the program, and that is how you should feel about your college major! I think, anyway.
Basically again, it was looking at me the whole time. I have no idea how I didn’t see this major before, because it’s perfect. It goes hand in hand with Outdoor Education, and it’s flamablamablous in every way! Recommendation: If all of the classes are exciting, if you enjoy it, if there is general happiness toward the subject, major in it!
So, that’s my brain for you. This has definitely turned into another absurdly long borderline-incoherent post about nothing. I don’t know if I even answered the question. But I’m posting it ANYWAY. BECAUSE ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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oh gosh, reading this post makes me so happy! thank you for typing it up, it’s wonderful to read! keep us all updated our your adventures the major, too, seriously! i’m sorry i don;t ahve anything constructive to add, this whole post just makes me want to give you a big hug
that’s so crazy all three teachers encouraged you to major in their field at once XD and the eggs & basket comment is so true!
oh man…this actually gives me a lot to think about, because i feel that way about english, i like it but i don’t know if i love it. hmm this semester will be telling, i suppose.
*HUGS AND CHOKLIT, JUST CAUSE*
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Lulz I only know/remember what my school’s colors are because they are the same ones as Gryffindor. Although it’s technically more a maroon-ish shade of red than crimson.
Schedule: Well at the moment I am in a dilemma because I (and a lot of other second years) was locked out of all the bio classes I tried to get into. So I’m registered in geology (Earth Surface Processes, looking forward to more geo stuff), organic chem (I AM GOING TO DIIIIE), intro to computer science (programming! Cool stuff! Also one of my roomies is a comp sci major and I’m taking it with a friend so we will all get to spend fun time in the lab together), and intro to the advanced study of literature (I really have no idea about this one… originally it was another geology class before I couldn’t get into anything bio, and when I added the other geo everyone was all “DON’T TAKE FOUR SCIENCES AT ONCE YOU WILL DIE” and they are probably right sadly).
Well technically I’m waitlisted for the geo class but the teacher was certain I’ll get in. So in theory I’m really registered for intro latin but that conflicts with my 3 labs anyway so I wouldn’t be able to really take it.
Also even though I am only in 4 classes this semester I will be in class 8:30-4:30 3 days a week x_x Oh labs.
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piggy – ugh on tuesday/thursday i had japanese at 8:10 which was so bleh by the end of the semester, but sometimes the morning walk can be nice because there are fewer people around and such like. although…yeah no snow here so definitely not the same. /cool story bro!
fiddler- omg lol i am the worst, i was on the website and i was like 8| THESE COLORS REMIND ME OF MY SCHOOL’S……TO WIKI!! and i checked and they were! I have a lot of free time okay
i’m just going to continue to spam this thread
i’m trying to think of ways to make my dorm room more home-y this year. my room has a better view but the walls are so BLANK and WHITE. i have a couple posters, but…hmm :/
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i’m taking a light-ish schedule next quarter because i realized if i keep taking lots of credits i might accidentally graduate early and i don’t really want to do that. plus it’s always nice to have a lighter load in the fall
so next quarter is contemporary lit (my last required major class, i was supposed to take it last year but oops was too busy being awesome and doing the upper-level electives), ancient greek history (yeah probably adding history as another major…again with the not-wanting-to-accidentally-finish-early), and cultural anthropology (not in any way required but i was sad when i took anthro before and it was physical, i think cultural is a lot more interesting. plus there miiight be a research opportunity with one of my mom’s colleagues in the nearish future and she recommended i take cultural anthro)
and of course band
i will also be working more hours so i can pay RENT and BILLS like a GROWNUP
axa: yeah when i was in the dorms (god i love saying that in past tense) my wall was always covered in posters. you don’t have to spend much money on them, i usually grab them free after concerts or beg them off the movie theater or get them at festivals or whatnot
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I don’t even know if my school has colors. Blue and white, maybe? We don’t have any athletic teams, although there were rumors of a pickup soccer game against Eastman..
I think I’m going back somewhere around the 20th. School doesn’t start for a week after that but I want to get my beautiful new apartment all set up (plus have time to practice which I can’t do as efficiently when I’m at home).
Next semester I’m taking:
Lessons / junior recital
Orchestra
World Rhythms II, which is taught by this guy who plays in Paul Simon’s band as well as with a lot of other people and it’s basically about improv and non-classical music with an emphasis on non-western rhythm.
History of Western Music III, which covers from 1900 to the present day.
Suzuki Pedagogy I, which together with the lab for it could result in my becoming a certified Suzuki teacher
Orchestra Repertoire, where we learn how to play excerpts
Form and Analysis, which is a theory class
Chamber music, assuming the faculty ever gets their act together and lets me register
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57 (Pan)~ You’re awesome, just so you know. That was an excellent and very helpful post. I lol’d at the sleeping on beds of moss part. (And yes, I do know how it is sometimes.) xD
59 (axa)~ It’s totally fine. I’ve creeped on your college a fair amount too. I also now know what our school colors are. I looked them up. I feel smart now.
61 (Lizzie)~ All of those classes sound super interesting but also terrifying. The World Rhythms sounds really interesting, in particular. Tell me how it goes? (By the way, lessons swap, we still need to do that. Nag me about it, plz. Hopefully when I get to school I’ll have consistently better internets that won’t randomly die.)
I only know one thing I’m taking, which is my first year seminar. It’s called Coming Home: Live art @ [school] and it’s about exploring a sense of place and home by doing various kinds of performance art, installations, research about a place’s history, etc. It sounded really interesting and apparently the teacher for it is good. I figured it’d also be a good stretch while including things pertinent to my intended major; I’ve never done many art-y things (though I’ve spent about 70% of my life in art museums), and the research stuff should come in handy for history. So yeah.
But freshmen have to register for classes at orientation, which means that we get the dregs. I’m not thrilled with this, but such is life.
Basically I want to take everything. EVERYTHING. 
Also, about majors and stuff…I’m intending to major in history, ut I don’t know. After looking at the catalog yesterday and squeeing over everything I’m pondering again. Anthropology seems really awesome. As does philosophy. So do the Peace and Global Studies. Same with gender studies. Same with the environmental studies, though I don’t know about all the science. I’ve never really done much science-y stuff. And when I was visiting colleges and deciding which classes to sit in on a lot of the math classes seemed to call my name. Weird, since I’m a self-proclaimed math-hater.
*sigh*
Hopefully stuff will make somewhat more sense when I get a chance to try out a variety of things.
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Fiddler – yes, absolutely lesson swap. The internet at my festival is horrible, but I’ll be home in a week (:-( ). And then back to Cleveland with a fiber-optic network.
I took World Rhythms I first semester of this year. Basically we learned to play various patterns on frame drums, and listened to a lot of music. It was really fun.
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Update on college colors:
So, Wikipedia lied about my school’s colors. Sort of.
It claims they’re white and green.
The college sports page claims they’re green, blue, and gold.
Then other things say blue and gold.
Then other other things say blue and gold are official, but most of the uniforms and suchlike are in the “adopted” colors, which are white and green.
This is all very confusing.
I give up trying to understand.
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Axa (54): re: class schedules–I’m taking
Macroeconomics
American Literature and Ecology
Intro to Psychology
Advanced Piano (lessons)
Environment and Society
Environmental Colloquium
Though, I think I might want to drop the colloquium, because that might be one too many credits for one semester. I’ll also hopefully be TAing the Intro to Outdoor Education class. So yes! Classes!
Also, how did everything work out with schools and such? Are you going to a different school than last year? And victorian novels! College has such awesome classes.
Piggy (55): DEFINITELY bring a bike. If you have a really nice bike, you can store it under your bed in the winter, otherwise, there should be lots of sheltered bike racks you can use. If you’re worried about it getting stolen, just get a good bike lock (u-locks work best). Make sure to lock both the frame and the front wheel (especially if it has a quick-release) to the bike rack. I brought my bike last year, and it was really handy for going into town–also, I just really like going on bike rides. Also also, I had an 8:00 class MWF both semesters last year, and it wasn’t that bad. Just make sure to have breakfast before you go!
Axa (57.1): Haha, thanks! I’ll definitely keep everyone posted on all things Environmental Studies. At some point, I can talk all about how the major works at my school, but that’s for another day. And yayayayayyy English! From what you’ve said so far, it sounds like it’s perfect! Definitely tell us all about your classes and how awesome everything is.
Jade (58): My friend is taking an intro computer programming course this summer–she just learned how to write tetris! You’ll learn so much awesome stuff and then you will be able to rule the world with your computer skills!
Axa (59): Maps! My walls were pretty empty for the first few weeks of school last year, because I only had a couple of posters (mostly art prints), but then I got MAPS! I got a giant 4-foot-tall-3-foot-wide geologic map of the Canyonlands (it’s so pretty and colorful!) from the Outdoor Ed Center’s gear sale, a satellite world map, and a map of the Grand Canyon. So yes, maps! Also, colorful fabric. [[If you want, I can get you some maps in October or so (whenever they have the gear sale) and mail them to you! Map love!]]
Ebeth (60): Ooh, ancient greek history! Cultural anthropology! I really like hearing about other people’s classes, because they all sound so flamablamablous!
Lizzie (61): What is involved in becoming a certified Suzuki teacher? Is there just a lot of learning about the method, etc.? Both of my siblings played Suzuki violin (my sister stopped Suzuki after awhile and just played other stuff, but I think my brother is still working through the books). Also, those classes sound awesome!
Fiddler (62): Thanks! You’re awesome, too!
(BEDS OF MOSS. When Jade and I were out looking for Ebeth, we came across huge patches of it, and we both lay down to fully experience its beauty.)
And you should definitely tell us all about your classes and which ones you choose! First-years at my school register during orientation, too, but I don’t think anyone had much trouble getting into classes they wanted–they usually reserve spaces for freshman (or let you in if you ask nicely). So fear not!
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oh man that moss felt so good on bare feet YOUR EPIPHANY IS TOTALLY UNDERSTANDABLE IF ONLY FOR THE MOSS PART
re getting in to classes, don’t be afraid to ask the professor to let you in, even if the class is technically closed. usually they won’t care about one or two extra people. if you’re on the waitlist, just show up the first day as if you’re in the class and talk to the professor afterwards and then it’s generally just a matter of filling out some paperwork. i’ve gotten into both waitlisted classes and classes i wasn’t technically supposed to be taking this way. the administrative side of registration might seem inflexible, but it’s because they have to stay organized. the teachers have the ability to be a lot more flexible and they can and often will override the system if you ask nicely
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(that second part was meant as a general reply. forgot i nested the comment D:)
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THE MOSS, SO THICK, SO PILLOWY, I WISH I HAD IT IN MY ROOOOOOM
No seriously guys we stepped in it and my feet basically disappeared it was so spongy and thick
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65 – Pan – basically you learn teaching techniques, what to focus on in each piece, what to expect, etc. Am hoping it might help get a TA-ship for grad school.
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Re: Moss: Of course! The tardigrades have impeccable judgment; didn’t you realize? If they live in moss, that means it must be amazingly awesome and beautiful.
Re: Suzuki: I don’t know what that is, but I’m ecstatic at the thought of a MuseBlogger possibly teaching anything. If anyone decides to become a school principal and found an academy on a small island off the coast of Iceland, we’ll have at least one other staff member besides the GAPAs now! You do usually need more than 4 teachers/heads of Houses and 1 principal.
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Okay, as promised my major and how/why I chose it post, based off Purple Panda’s.
So. I go to school at a small liberal arts school in the midwest. My first semester, I had no idea what to take and somehow ended up in English, Spanish, my First year seminar, and Calculus. This was the most boring college schedule ever. All my classes (minus my first year seminar which was cool) were classes I’d had in high school! Why was I not in intro to philosophy or anthropology or sociology or art something or women’s and gender studies or something interesting I don’t know. But that is how it was.
So second semester freshman year I say “pah! to classes I took in High school” and take… Hieroglyphs, Geology, Intro to Cultural Anthro, and English (but this time it was because I had to add a course and it focused more on the history of the language which I was interested in and was cool. It wasn’t on some boring topic I didn’t really like.)
By the end of that semester I’d decided, “I don’t really like this English thing” and knew I didn’t want to be an English major. What with the anthropology and the Hieroglyphs I sort of thought I wanted to be an anthro major but I wasn’t sure. Sophomore year I took intro to archaeology in the fall (and absolutely loved it) and also anthropology and science fiction (which was fun too). I declared that semester. (I also took two other classes but I’ve forgotten what they were and declare them irrelevant for the purposes of this post.)
Second semester sophomore year, I continued along taking anthro classes. One of the other classes I took was on Artificial Intelligence and cognitive science. It was /awesome/ and that professor became one of my favorite professors. I’m really glad I took that and got to learn something really cool outside my chosen field. That is what I wish I had done more of.
Also second semester sophomore year, I was hanging out with a group of freshmen friends and they were all talking about the minors they wanted. My brain went “Er. Minors?” and panicked a bit after deciding I totally wanted a minor. Fortunately, my friend was much calmer than I and very good at advising and I eventually decided I wanted a museum studies minor. That has been awesome too.
This past spring (of Junior year) I took a History class and that was really neat. This coming fall, I’m taking intro to Russian, which I’m excited for.
So the moral of my story is: while I like my major, I wish I’d done more dabbling early on.
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DEBT
I woke up this morning and remembered how all the adventures I want to have are made not-possible by my college debt.
And I quite literally think that I will not be able to afford books at all.
I am crying now.
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Do you mean textbooks or just books to read? Because if it’s the first, I’m pretty sure you can get used ones online for cheap (or relatively cheap, at least). And if it’s the second… well, despite its sinister initialism, Half Price Books is supposedly pretty good. And there might be local used bookstores, which tend to be awesome.
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On a happy note… Re used book stores: I’m going to be in Portland. That means POWELL’S.
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loans, loans, scholarships, loans
you don’t have to pay everything off right away! obviously you should remember that you are super poor and not spend TOO much money, but don’t starve yourself of books either!
basically you’re going to spend a very long time paying back these loans, whether you spend a few bucks here and there on a book or not. so go ahead and get the books. it’s a tiny percentage of what you owe
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I mean textbooks. If I don’t have money for textbooks, that’s Bad. I probably will though, I just…
Money used to seem so reasonable! If I worked a lot, I got a lot of money, and could go on cool trips and do cool programs and stuff. But now with these massive figures that are tuition, and loans, and textbooks, there never seems to be enough money. I’ve been working incredibly hard all day every for a week at twelve dollars an hour, and still have half a week ahead of me, and it’s hardly even going to make a dent in my debt picture. I worked every weekend all summer and made five hundred dollars to start paying off the PLUS loan that’s in my parents’ names–but it’s a 10,000 dollar loan. And it’s gathering interest. How am I ever supposed to pay something like that off?
I’m 17, my adult life is just beginning, I’m supposed to be free. But I’ve got this massive gnawing anxiety all the time. I’m too young to wake up in the morning going “Oh cake, how am I going to pay off these loans?”
College is going to be amazing, but I can imagine that it’ll be entirely worth it.
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I think the idea is that college gives you the tools to get a job that will make more money than $12/hour.
Spend some time looking around for scholarships. You do theater, right? There’s often some small local artsy-type scholarships that give you $100 here and $100 there, but every dollar counts.
Also, re: textbooks, half dot com has good prices. If you know any students at your college who have taken the classes before you can try to buy the books from them or see if they want to swap for something. Does your college have an online forum? Try poking around there to see if anyone wants to sell their books. Also, often the libraries have copies of the textbook.
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On the whole, having a college degree is better than not. It won’t guarantee you a living but at the very least it will raise your odds and keep some doors open. This is especially true during sour economic times when every advantage counts. I personally know people who were shut out of raises and any number of job opportunities simply because they didn’t have that degree — even though they attended college for some years.
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Hmm. That helps, thanks Rebecca. I’ve felt similar things to Alice before. It feels so overwhelming and I hate being in debt to anyone, bank, person, whomever. Bah.
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Lizzie– Yeah, I have to look for more scholarships next year, I applied to like all of them this year and only got one for 4,500–which was awesome until I realized it was spread over four years in tiny increments.
Re: college degrees: My problem is that the direction that I want my life to go in right now doesn’t really involve a steady job. I don’t even know if I want to work in professional theater anymore. I want to be able to save up and buy a plane ticket to Europe without even worrying about when or how I’m getting back. Do some wandering here, some farmwork there, some traveling theater in this other place…I could get sail training and live on a tallship! Most of them don’t pay unless you have special skills, but once you’re trained, I believe you get room and board just in exchange for working. Maybe this isn’t the way I always want my life to be, maybe someday I’ll say “gosh, I’m tired, I want to settle down for a while”–but that bridge can be crossed when I come to it. I can wait the four years for these adventures–college is going to be an adventure in itself–but I don’t think I can wait the five or ten or fifteen or twenty more that it’ll take to pay off all the debt that I accumulate. By then, I’ll have settled down, maybe have a family–who knows? I don’t want to never have my adventures.
I’m going to college more because people want and expect me to go to college than because it’s a burning desire of mine. I need some incentive to get out my town and start doing things. And I’m excited. Really excited. I’m excited to learn stuff and meet new people and get out of my house and become an adult. But I don’t know if I’m 200K worth of excited. I don’t know that it really fits with my future as I see it. I don’t even know that I’m going to meet people who feel the same way I do. I wasn’t even going to go to college nine, ten months ago. But everyone convinced me that it was the best thing for my future and I would get all the money and it would be brilliant. And I knew that I’d be lonely out on the road, or in Europe all by myself. And I thought that school would be less paperwork, easier than trying to deal with visas and passports and nonsense. And now I’m thinking again.
I don’t know what I hope to achieve by thinking so much. My situation remains the same, and I’m going to college this month. My mom understands, but I can’t even start to tell my dad how I feel about it.
If I can’t get it all paid for next year, I’ll probably drop out.
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what school are you going to? i may be biased (half my extended family are professors at various colleges, my mom was in grad school most of the time i was growing up, grandma has wanted to go to college her entire life and makes da[ng] sure we appreciate the opportunities we have) but i would super strongly advise against dropping out.
200k seems like a lot of money. if you can’t pay, you could transfer to a community college or another cheaper school to get your degree
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also, what i said before still applies. don’t stress so much over the debt. it will be paid off, but not any time soon. the best thing for you to do right now, rather than try to pay everything off at $12/hr, would be to use that money for textbooks, have a good college experience, and use your degree to get a well-paying job that will allow you to gradually pay off your loans while still living comfortably
and those adventures you’re talking about? that’s what college is for. do study abroad! take road trips! i hesitate to say don’t worry about money, because obviously there are people who are financially irresponsible and end up in unnecessary amounts of debt, but it sounds like you have the complete opposite problem. seriously stop worrying so much about it and just trust that you can acquire the skills and means to pay it off by figuring out what you love and doing it. if that sounds like a huuuge risk, it sort of is. but i think if you can have the sort of experiences i’ve had in college and make a career out of doing something you love…it’s well worth that risk.
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That’s one reason why I’m so excited about going to college! There are so many possibilities that will open up! Especially since I want to be a vet and I’m going to be in the middle of a school that has it’s own farm and dairy smack in the middle! There are tons of opportunities for research as well and even cooler study abroad programs for Pre-Vet students! There’s one summer program where one can travel to India and work with animals there in a preserve! How cool is that?
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Re: adventures / farming, have you heard of WWOOF? It sounds like something you might be into – organic farming program where you stay with a host family and work on their farm in exchange for food / board / education.
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By the way. When do I have to start worrying about FAFSA/Fastweb/scholarships? Assuming I’m going into my senior year of high school next week?
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the sooner you apply, the better deal you’re likely to get. especially with scholarships – some scholarships have really early deadlines, and most people miss those so if you apply for them you have a much better chance at getting money
i don’t remember when i did the FAFSA though. i would talk to your guidance counselor or whoever it is at your school that helps with college stuff
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OK, will do.
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You don’t have to worry about that until next calendar year unless your college tells you otherwise.
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And by that I mean the FAFSA. Worry about other scholarships whenever. You can keep getting them for years so It is really up to you.
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I would start with Fastweb now. I mean, you can apply for random scholarships there all year long and you especially have the time for essays and stuff like that now. As for FAFSA, you’ll have to wait until your tax stuff is in before you can fill out the form.
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69.1- The first. And yes, relatively cheap, but how cheap is relatively? Like, what if I have two hundred dollars? Probably not going to cover it… I do have a five hundred dollar scholarship for this semester, which I can maybe use to buy books. I don’t know.
70- Well, the FAFSA isn’t even available until January. But you should definitely start looking for scholarships and putting together an activities list and stuff soon. Activities list–VERY IMPORTANT. And do community service, if you haven’t done much.
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Thanks, everyone. I can’t wait to get to college.
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oxlin (68): Hurrah! It sounds like your school has lots of really awesome anthropology/archaeology-type courses. My midwestern SLAC has a combined sociology/anthropology major, but I think the class selection is rather limited–we certainly don’t have anything as interesting-sounding as hieroglyphs! Do you think you want to do museum work in the future? I’ve been working at the Carnegie Art/Natural History museum this summer, and I’ve been learning about all of the wonderful museum-related fields there are.
Alice (71): Two hundred dollars should cover books! I spent about $200/semester on books last year, and I made some of it back re-selling them at the end of the semester. As everyone said, make sure to check the half-price book websites (Amazon’s “used” section also has some good prices sometimes), and talk to your professors and classmates about where they’d suggest, too. You can usually sell your books back to the same place you got them or to students taking the class the following semester.
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Of course, the books are less if your professors are nice. :/ Half of mine have insisted that we get new editions printed in 2011, so we can’t get used. Meh.
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you should still look on half dot com to see if you can find the right edition there! but yeah i find that kind of ridiculous personally, unless there has been a significant change between editions ~_~
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Blargh, textbooks are ordered. $580 in total, but $250 should be covered by the textbook scholarship. It’s the stupid macroeconomics class and its stupid expensive stupid books. But it looks like there’s some interesting reading for anthropology and my history seminar, so that’s good.
Also, daaang, I only have one more full week of collegelessness.
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73 (Purple Panda) – Yes! I have an internship at a local historical society and I would love to work at a museum. Right now I get to do artifact research and find out what weird things are. It is really neat!
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Where are good places to start looking for scholarships? I’d like to get a start before I go back to school, so guidance office isn’t an option, but I don’t know where to look… Where did you guys find yours?
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So I just noticed that the clueless lady that added my second major also somehow changed my main major from Classical Languages to Classics and Religious Studies. Now I have to figure out how to get that changed back to what I actually declared. I also got an email from my macroeconomics professor saying that the syllabus had been posted, that sort of thing, and also that a prerequisite for ens course was at least 12 credit hours. Technically, I think I have that as transfer credits from my dual-enrolled classes, even not counting the credits I got from my AP tests, but I’m not positive. I guess we’ll find out.
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It turns out that my Latin 301 class is way too easy. Insultingly easy. So now I have to try and find something else to take instead. Unfortunately, there are only a couple 400-level classes and I don’t know if any of them are being offered this semester. This throws my entire plan out of whack, and I may end up having to take a lot of Greek and only a little Latin, instead of the other way around. Mneh, I’ll email one of my advisers and try to make an appointment with him.
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Guys I’m in college and I’m not dead. Yet.
I’ll let you know how that goes.
So far no major assignments, so I’m not terribly behind yet, but I am scared of when I actually have hard things to do. Because I will have NO TIME and NO SLEEP and that is BAD.
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5 classes, 17 credits. (One less than the maximum allowed without extra fees.)
Three hours of working on the paint crew each day.
A singing part in the musical.
Maintaining sanity, personal and social lives, and playing music.
Spinning poi obsessively (for funsies and also with the fire legion).
Getting healthy amounts of sleep.
Not failing all the classes.
Either I am going to own this or I’m going to crash and burn very soon.
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SO I AM IN COLLEGE
My hall is the best hall, I swear I spend more time in Khoa and Tucker’s room than I do my own, and I know almost everyone on it (our hall is coed by random room, meaning it alternates male/female. luckily for me the female bathroom is in our hall and male one in the opposite hall)
Classes started last Wednesday, I’m taking, with credit hours:
(I want to double major in math and computer science)
4-Science of Programming
5-Honors Calculus 1 (proof-based, my favorite so far)
1-Discrete Math (add-on to calc)
4-Science Fiction and Society (required writing course)
4-Music Theory 1 (probably going to drop this and sit in on it when I have time before taking it next year, I have no prior theory experience and theory’s hard for me)
1-Brass Choir
2-Music lessons at Eastman
1-hopefully Jazz Ensemble (audition in half an hour)
for a grand total of 22 credits, maximum of 19 allowed for freshmen, requests to overload are pretty much never approved…so, yeah…
I also want to join some clubs:
fencing
trombone ensemble
Pride Network (GSA)
simulation gaming association
computer interest floor (is this a club?)
computer science undergraduate council
Still haven’t gotten textbooks, expecting them to cost $350 ish (add $100 if I get the music theory one though)
I’m really enjoying it here!
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If you need help with music theory, I believe you know how to contact me. Feel free to do so.
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Thank you! But for me it’s stuff like, second class in he goes over intervals and I have to count half steps by physically looking at a piano keyboard… I still don’t know how to read treble clef so anything in that takes five times as long… (I made flash cards though! One side has the note on a staff and the other side has the note name)
So I think sitting in on the class when I can this year and having a year’s practice with treble clef and theory (most people in the class already took AP Music Theory) will really help me when I take it next year. But I will definitely contact you if I need help!
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With intervals, there’s little mnemonic tricks to help you identify them by sound – i.e. perfect fourth is “here comes [the bride]”, major sixth is “my bonnie”. Minor third, greensleeves, etc. With note names, it just takes practice. It helps for me if I think of them on a staff – thirds are two lines or two spaces right next to each other, etc.
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Changing it up a little on this thread to talk about applications again! I’m applying early decision to Brown and regular decision to Tufts, Wesleyan, Harvard, Yale, Chicago, UNC, Brandeis, and also almost definitely Oberlin. I am alternatingly pretty calm about the whole thing (“Eh, nothing more I can do about grades, classes, extracurriculars, and so on, so I’ll just have to see what happens”) and completely flipping out (“My application sucks and I won’t get in anywhere and then I’ll die aloneeeeee”). More towards the calm end mostly, thankfully. I’m pretty happy with how far I am in the application process at this point. I’m done with the common app and the Brown supplement! I’m starting Chicago next; their questions are great. They do a fantastic job of inspiring thought. My personal statement is about this picture book I had when I was younger and learning oboe. I suppose the broader theme is persistence and hard work (appropriate since this thing gas gone through about seven drafts and is 40% of its original length…). Anyway, I’m pleased with it.
I wish I could just know where I’m going to end up without going through the application process! It’s an interesting process, though, writing the essays… I have to think about myself a lot more than I have before.
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HEY SO MY SCHOOL WAS ON THAT LIST
COME VIST ME
And that’s a lot of the same places I applied to/visited. If you’re interested, I have a list of my notes/reactions to the places on this thread https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=3578, post 54.
Ironically, the college I didn’t finish reviewing on there is the one I am now going to
And yes start those essays SOON you do not want to be panicking over them the night before, trust me because I know things like this.
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You linked me to that last time I posted, and it was very helpful
If/when I visit I will most definitely tell you! And then it will be good times! Probably if I visit it’ll be some time between when I get deferred/denied at Brown and when I hear back from other schools. So… Early spring? I’ll keep you posted.
Oh my goodness if I tried to write my essays the night before
I’d basically be a sobbing wreck for about six hours, punctuated by brief periods of actual productivity. And then more sobbing.
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oh yeaaaaah I remember that now XD
No wonder it felt familiar.
Anyway yeah, good luck with brown and all your applications!!
And yeah that is basically what it is but with a healthy dose of numbing panic.
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MY SCHOOL IS ON YOUR LIST TOO COME VISIT ME TOO.
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WAIT WHICH ONE IS YOUR SCHOOL
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UCHICAGO… And I’m not there yet; I’m just a freshman and two weeks to go until orientation. SO DON’T VISIT RIGHT NOW.
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Okay well I will tell you if I visit it again! And you should post about how it is.
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I know someone who’s going to be a freshman at UChicago!
Also, we were invited to an MUN conference there which we may or may not go to, and I’m not sure when it is – is that still too much information, GAPAs? If so you can delete this whole paragraph. Sorry if it is!
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Oh, I guess universities aren’t too specific? If that could be confirmed there’s another, similar post I’d want to make.
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That’s cool! A lot of people know someone who’s gone there. “Oh, UChicago? My aunt went there!”
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Yes, please post about how it is! My friend and I are really impressed with UChicago based on what we know already, and as Tess said, those essay questions really are lovely. It seems like a nice kind of school.
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I AM AT COLLEGE AGAIN
♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
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JUST SPENT $400 ON TEXTBOOKS DEAR GOD WHY
(true, I’ll be using all of them for years to come, but still DDD:)
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So, question: Do you need SAT subject tests to apply to universities if you want to have a chance of getting in?
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A lot of major schools require one or two of them. (Or the ACT with writing.)
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Building on what Tesseract said, they usually like one math test and one something else test. For a technical/science school, the “something else” would be a science.
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Nope. I didn’t take any. Likely, though, it depends on the school.
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Some schools require them, some do not. Check up on where you might want to apply to get a feel for if you think you should or if it might not matter.
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i know in california many state/public schools require them, but it’s kind of case to case basis. they can help with fulfilling requirements though, so you should look through the college websites to see if it would eventually be a benefit to you to take them.
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Doesn’t it also depend on the system of schooling you’re coming from? If you go to school in the UK you’d be doing either A-levels or IB, so you wouldn’t really have the chance to take SATs, and I don’t think (but I’m not sure) they’d absolutely require it from everybody.
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I don’t really know how school works in the UK, but IB tests at least are mostly at the end of senior year; you can only really take one or two at the end of junior year. And junior year is when you are supposed to take the SAT, both the reasoning and subject variety.
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My point is that if you’re coming from a different school system, they won’t really expect you to have done everything American-system students would do, I think they would just accept your IB scores as an indication of how you perform academically. It’s not like SATs are required for every student in the world applying to US colleges, right?
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I’m from the Austrian system, which is similar the the UK insofar as there is one big school-leaving exam, the Matura, taken at the end of senior year. However, this isn’t standardized so I don’t think it’ll be accepted and I only receive my score after I’m done with it, i.e. in late June. Also, as a foreign student, I’m required to submit some for of test that proves I speak english or score well enough on some form of standardized test to prove I speak english. Unfortunately, my guidance counselors here haven’t been helpful at all so I’m still trying to work out all the details. I could probably fit in the SATs, but not if I have to do two extra subject tests.
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This isn’t precisely education-related, but…
I need a job. What can I do? There’s not much open, and what jobs are available I’m not qualified for, either for lack of experience or being too young. And the rest don’t work with my schedule. There’s not many jobs on-campus, and most of them are just short-term things (e.g., helping with research for 8 weeks). I found one job that looks doable and interesting, but it’s based on collecting plant samples from the field, and since winter’ll be here before too long, I don’t expect that I’d be working much at all.
Maybe I could just panhandle.
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Are you looking for work purely for its financial benefits, or for experience as well?
Why not try the short term ones? If there are plenty of them you could just go from one job to the other, and you might be offered a more permanent position along the way!
The plant collection job might end in winter, but not all field work does. I understand your winters are a bit more chilly than mine, but we do transects and collect samples all year long here.
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It’s mostly for the cash, but I need some sort of experience as well so I have more qualification for other jobs in the future.
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If it’s mostly for the cash, there are always tables that need to be waited.
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Again, my schedule doesn’t work.
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if you honestly need the money, you’re going to have to find a way to make your schedule work. if i tried to fit my work schedule around my life all the time, i wouldn’t have any time to work at all. sometimes your life has to make a few concessions to your work schedule.
i’m not saying omgz work all the time don’t have any fun, but i mean it’s work. there are always things you would rather be doing. some of them are less important.
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Good news/bad news. Good: I’ve fallen in love with a university. Bad: it’s notoriously difficult to get into and one of the best universities in the world. So I’m on this see-saw of OMG maybe I can study there (it’s not unheard of for graduates of my school to go to such college and one of them is even studying there currently), their specific requirements for the Matura are really easy and OMG I had Bs in math last year and my overall GPA for the last two years is only 3.7 and I don’t have enough extracurriculars- I’m such a moron!
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Give it your best shot! We all know that any university in the world would be be lucky to have you.
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APPLY ANYWAY
also about extracirriculars, a lot of colleges now prefer if you have more things concentrated in ONE area, so if you don’t feel ~well rounded don’t worry because 1) no one is relaly and 2) that might not even be what the college wants
but yeah seriously apply anyway, admissions are crazy and also since you are a muser you are def qualified for anything imo
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The problem is that I’m a sort of wavy line. I took Spanish and Psychology 2 and Biology/First aid as extra classes but do best in physics, chemistry, music and pe, did stints on the chess team, do capoeira, write novels and sometimes go jogging in my spare time, am on the jury for a not-completely-unimportant-but-yeah-not-so-great book prize, did a math olympiad in Junior high and ballroom dance. I just don’t have any edges, especially math-related ones. Anyway, the college is in England and they’re looking for mathy people.
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No edges, no limits. Go for it!
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I’d admit you.
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Apply!
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ugh scholarships and applications and preview days and everything
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My sympathies.
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but I am applying to Yale and maybe I’m insane but it would be awesome if I got in.
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Well, then you DEFINITELY have my sympathies, because you know how Yale worked out for me. Go show them what real genius is.
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That’s one of my major worries, because if you didn’t get in what chance have I got?
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Getting into an Ivy has a lot to do with intelligence and character and drive, etc., but it also has a lot to do with luck. Maybe they’re looking for a bass clarinetist or someone to round out the chess club, or someone who knows both judo and opera. I have several friends at Ivies, and most of them were rejected by the majority of Ivies they each applied to. Some other traits they all have in common? They’re highly intelligent, good at what they like to do, they express themselves clearly (especially through writing), and driven to succeed. You’re in good shape.
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No worries–Yale was actually the only college I applied to that I was outright rejected from. I never really expected to get in, but there was always this niggling feeling of KJHGSHLGJKS HOW AWESOME WOULD IT BE IF I WENT THERE?!? Just go for it!
But in retrospect it probably wouldn’t have been quite as awesome as I was expecting because someone who went to my school and was actually my acquaintance and who had the same interests as me is going there and it would have been super awkward because I don’t really like him and probably would have seen him around. As opposed to the one person that goes here who went to my school whom I only know because he was a) the star of the soccer team and b) sat behind me in history class all of last year and I never talked to him.
Anyway the point of this post is APPLY TO UCHICAGO
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They’ve actually sent me some material, so I’ll have a look at U. Chicago.
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At the very least you’ll have fun writing the essay.
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I don’t mean to butt in but I am having so much fun with this essay. (I’m doing #3–Spanish poet Antonio Machado wrote, ‘Between living and dreaming there is a third thing. Guess it.’ Give us your guess.)
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Um… MuseBlog?
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Actually, I wrote about MuseBlog for one of my Brown prompts! ♥ So if I get in, it’s thanks to you guys.
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I like #6 on their extra essays.
(Shh. I’m in college right now but I wanted to see what you all were talking about. I have always liked UChicago’s mailings when they sent me them.)
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I liked it, too.
I think, overall, the essays are better this year than last year (when I applied), but you just can’t beat “Find X.”
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‘Find X’? What did you write about for that prompt?
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I wrote about how I was sad that in calculus x loses all of its mystery and becomes a placeholder for something you already know. I don’t know if a majority of people actually wrote about math, because it’s definitely possible to write about something completely different for that one.
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Wait… x is gonna lose all of its mystery?
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STFP: There’s a guy in my dorm house that did his on the prompt “Dog and Cat. Coffee and Tea. Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye. Everyone knows there are two types of people in the world. What are they?”
His two types of people are those who like Beyonce and those who don’t.
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I found a list of them on the UChicago website. Old ones that is. GAPAs, can we have a thread devoted to answering old questions from the UChicago and asking our own?
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The prompts their website shows me are amazing!
I like “What does Play-doh have to do with Plato?” and “In the spirit of adventurous inquiry, pose a question of your own,” and “Don’t write about reverse psychology.” I also like the one Tesseract wrote of.
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How exactly do class levels work (i.e., having so many credit hours makes you a sophomore, etc.)? Because of AP tests and dual enrollment, I’ll have 55 credit hours at the end of this semester, which apparently should make me technically a junior? That doesn’t make sense to me.
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That’s right – it doesn’t actually affect which classes you take, but at least for me it affected when I could register. I’ve been a senior since my freshman year.
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That sounds awesome. Actually everything about college, ever, sounds awesome.
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Not everything.
For instance:
UGH SO EXPENSIVE HOW CAN A BOOK COST 400 DOLLARS I DON’T EVEN
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Was that a biology textbook or something? My physics textbooks cost $100 each, and they were paperbacks.
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No, my most expensive so far was economics, about $250 (although the required study guide added almost $150 onto that). That was paperback too.
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ugh i hate study guides you have to pay for
last year we had to buy this ~binder of supplementary materials aka stuff i could have PRINTED MYSELF or you know just downloaded to save paper so i was really 8| about i tell you what
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Buy them used, and if possible, buy older editions. That really brings the price down. For instance, I got an old edition of a software engineering textbook for around $8, including shipping.
The only drawback is shipping time, because the used books often come from random resellers, so it can take a while for them to get to you. So order them early!
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On that note, please check where they’re being shipped from. It can really affect the shipping costs. I bought a $12 Environmental Science textbook online, but it was shipped from India and cost about $40 bucks in shipping. Still cheaper than the books at the bookstore, but not the books students themselves were reselling. Also, my copy is the international edition and made on really cheap paper without color. If the total cost had actually been cheaper I wouldn’t have minded, but for the same price I could have bought some other used textbook that was higher quality.
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Brown and Chicago: Submitted.
I am officially a college applicant oh my god
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Finally got around to figuring out what classes to take next semester. I’ve already hit the end of the road for Latin here–I’ll take 492 next semester, but to take classes higher than that I’d have to apply to graduate school. In contrast, I’m starting in Greek 101, oh goody. I think I’ll try to get into Spanish 305, since that’s an absolutely required class for my major, and possibly Spanish 331 as well–Latin American Civilizations–because that class counts towards my major and a general ed requirement. I just need one more class. I’m thinking Drawing 101 to get another general ed requirement out of the way. That would be interesting, considering I’ve never demonstrated any talent for drawing. I’m trying to avoid taking a math class too, and I think I can take one of two philosophy classes to satisfy that requirement. Meh.
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piggy — is one of those classes for your math req Logic? i took logic for my math req and it was SUCH A GOOD DECISION not only because what are numbers but because i’ve found it’s helped with the philosophy class i’m in this semester. I think you might enjoy it, idk
tesserect- CONGRATS!! (this is late lol)
i think i’m going to be overloading my scheduling next semester l o l we’ll see how that goes.
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I can’t remember the specifics, but one of them may be logic, yeah. Unfortunately, the cruel hand of fate completely messed up my schedule for next semester, so pretty much everything in comment 92 is irrelevant.
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Hey, I’m taking logic right now! I quite like it. (Of course, I’ve liked most of my classes this semester. I’m hoping that next semester will be as good.)
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I REGISTER IN 10 MINUTES
and Changing Genres of Erotica (WST267/ENG267/FMS231) is already full because freshmen register last and AP/transfer credit counts for nothing here (i.e. since I am a freshman I register as a freshman)
so I’m probably registering for:
MTH172Q (Honors Calculus 2)
CSC172 (Science of Data Structures)
CSC210 (Web Programming)
MTH233 (Introduction to Cryptology)
and I’ll drop MTH233 and add WST267 if the professor gives me a permission code…
YES, I AM A CS/MATH DOUBLE MAJOR
YES, I AM INSANE
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apparently it’s called Mathematical Cryptography (someone has been reading too much Cryptonomicon, guess who?!)
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Soo…
College is a couple years off, but I’ve been thinking about what I’d like to study. I’m interested in some different things (some of which are more practical than others), and I think I will probably end up double majoring. Is anyone here a double major? Can you tell me anything about your experiences?
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I’m currently a double major with Classical Languages and Spanish. So far it hasn’t been a big deal–just a few more classes to take than if I had a major and a minor. Both majors are in the same college, though, so I don’t have to worry about meeting requirements for two different colleges–if the majors you’re considering are in different colleges, I’d definitely check to make sure that A. you’re allowed to do that and B. it’s feasible to do. If both majors are pretty intensive, it could get unmanageable pretty quickly.
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It depends on what you’re doubling in and where you go. A lot of the gen-eds will be the same, but if you’re trying to do something like chemistry and english, you’ll be taking a lot more courses than if you were doing a single major.
If you’re interested in a lot of things, I’d suggest going in undeclared and taking a large variety of classes until you figure out what to do.
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It really, really depends on what the two degrees are, and on your school. What were you thinking of majoring in, and do you know where you want to go?
I plan to double major in math and computer science. At my school, one is in the College of Arts and Sciences and the other is in the School of Engineering. This actually doesn’t mean much–engineering has a few more restrictions, but since computer science isn’t an accredited program, I still have to fulfil distribution requirements in the same way for both majors.
However, if I were a double major in Music Performance or Music Education and basically anything else, it would mean that one major would likely be in the School of Arts and Sciences and one would be in the School of Music. The School of Music is a conservatory, so they expect that music is the only thing you do. This makes it very difficult to have a dual degree, and you have to apply for the conservatory separately when you apply for college. (It doesn’t help that my school has different campuses for the two schools, a 20 minute bus ride apart).
Another note: At my school (which by the way I highly recommend for the undecided and for potential double majors, since there’s few distribution requirements and a major is only 10 courses or so) you are required to complete only a major and a cluster in each of the other two distributional sections. Both my majors are in the natural sciences, so I have to complete a cluster(three related courses) in the social sciences and in the humanities.
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This is for Piggy, Lizzie, and Dodecahedron:
First, thank you for replying!
It’s not set in stone yet (obviously), but right now I think I would really like to double major in Theatre and Anthropology. Theatre I love and is more or less a given, for me, and Anthropology wraps ever so many of the other things I am interested in into a fascinating package. (Archaeology! Sociology! Psychology! Linguistics! History! Non-intimidating science! It means that, instead of just reading theories and rolling my eyes, I can write my own theories with some credibility and make other people roll their eyes! Anthropology, you make my knees go weak.)
Piggy mentioned the possibility of taking the two fields at different schools, a prospect which tears a resounding “NO!” from my mouth. No, I want to go to one college that offers both fields and allows double majoring. Both Anthropology and Theater are considered “Arts and Sciences” at the schools I have checked; I imagine that being under the same heading–(department?)–would make things easier. I know that the two don’t have much visible overlapping, but they aren’t vastly unrelated. (Like, say, Marine Biology and Medieval Studies.)
I haven’t decided on a dream college yet. I’m interested in William & Mary, and also in Swarthmore. I haven’t been looking for very long. I probably want to go to a co-ed, rather than a women’s, college. I prefer liberal arts. I prefer small or medium-sized schools. And if they throw their football team in my face, I lose interest.
Lizzie–does “gen-eds” mean “general education (s)”? And, yes, I am conscious of the larger workload double majoring would entail. I think, though, that I would prefer to do more work to achieve degrees in both than to choose between them. I would like to start out undeclared, so that I can dabble and make sure I’m comfortable before committing.
Dodecahedron, is your school the University of Rochester?
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I was referring to colleges, not universities. Obviously you’d only be going to one university, but universities are subdivided into, say, the College of Arts and Sciences or the College of Engineering. The basic hierarchy is university -> college -> department -> major.
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Ah, I see. “College” and “University” are used interchangeably so often! I hadn’t figured out the difference. So, yes, what interests me are in the same college division.
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Oh, yes, there’s a difference, otherwise Boston University and Boston College would be the same school.
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I feel like the use of University and College isn’t really consistent, though, in the states.
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Yes, I do attend the University of Rochester. Our football team sucks! You should go here!
Note that theatre here is not a degree program, but a concentration available in English. But! English fills a humanities requirement and anthropology is a social science, so you’ve got that going for you.
I actually have a friend from Computer Interest Floor here that’s sort of an Anthropology/English double major, but she’s probably dropping the English major, and anyway she’s a transfer student so she filled her distribution requirements before coming here… where I was going with this is that it’s a valid path of study.
Side note:
If one major were an engineering school major, I’d advise you to tell colleges when you apply that you’re going into that major (as a computer science intending student, I get a computer science advisor instead of a random pre-major advisor… I also have to go through more paperwork to add/drop courses, though). But since they aren’t I don’t think it really matters.
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I am so glad your football team is unimpressive! It sounds like a nice university, but I would rather have theatre available as a degree option, so I doubt I’ll be applying, but thank you!
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My school, Beloit College, has a really good anthropology department, particularly if you’re interested in cultural anthropology.
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And yes, you can double major, and yes, you can major in theatre!
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Noted! Thank you.
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Oooh, next semester’s classes!
U.S. History I (every day for the first term at 8am I am going to die.)
Beginning Music Theory (this should be an easy class, but I want to take it because the professor is awesome and I can get all my music theory in one chunk, getting the parts I’ve missed in my musical career thus far.)
First Philosophy (apparently this class basically asks you to make up a coherent life philosophy. I’m cool with that.)
Traditions of Work and Music in the Southern Mountains (what. What even. This one just sounds so cool I don’t know what to do with myself.)
Old-Time Fiddle II (again, awesome with awesomesauce.)
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Fiddler! We’ve already talked about this a little, but I have a 6:30am class twice a week (ornithology! yayyyy birds!) and an 8:30am class on the other days, so we should cheer each other on and be morning class buddies! You can do it!!!! And I hope philosophy goes well! I took half a semester of Ancient Greek Philosophy last year, and it was really interesting but also really crazy.
Next semester I’m planning to take Ornithology, Psychology of Sustainability, America’s Middle East (history/politics class), Ceramics II (though I might not take this; I have to decide whether I want to take it the following semester and instead take Comparative Environmental Policy), Piano, and I’m going to TA the Introductory Psychology class. I like that we sign up for new classes just as we’re getting really tired of our current classes, so we have something to look forward to as we sink into the mountains of work at the end of the semester.
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Alumni interview #3 coming up tomorrow! It’s for University of Chicago. My interviewer graduated in 1971, so I’m not sure what to do as far as coming up with questions to ask him is concerned. The school is so different than it was 40 years ago. I’m not even 100% that the Core existed yet.
Anyway, I’m kind of nervous. Wish me luck? Any tips?
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I had an older interviewer, too, and he was awesome! It was my only interview where I didn’t feel intimidated and was actually able to strike up a conversation.
The Core did exist back then; the official website dates it as 75 years old.
My interviewer admitted to not really knowing what the university is like today, and I think he might have only been in the law school. Personally, I think it’s gotten a lot crazier, what with Scav and all (Scav is only 25 years old). I think the UChicago of the ‘seventies really was “where fun goes to die,” whereas now, not so much. Probably because our standards of fun are radically different from the rest of the world’s.
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So you know, I will probably end up pestering you with a lot of questions about UChicago over the next year or so, since I’m strongly considering applying.
By any chance, do you happen to know anybody on the womens’ soccer team, or anything about it?
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No, sorry, I’m not really a “sporty” person, and the athletic facilities are literally almost as far away as possible from where I live and still be on campus.
I’ll try to remember to go to some games once the season starts, though!
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If soccer’s a fall sport in college like it is in high school, it’s probably over already. ^^ No problem, though.
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Oh, right, I am totally dumb. Sorry.
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Well, I sent in all my applications on October 29th.
MIT, Seattle University, Colorado School of Mines, Gonzaga University.
In order of preference.
Now just waiting, waiting, waiting… Argh!
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Got all three of my audition dates. MSU and U of M in January and DePaul not long after.
Nervous nervous nervous.
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Congrats! I know quite a few people at U of M. Having been through the audition gauntlet a few years ago (and getting ready to do it again next year), if you want any tips feel free to ask.
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Oh, by the way- I have one cousin currently at U of M and one who’s going there next year. You should meet them or something.
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I got my SAT scores today- Critical Reading was pretty okay, a 730, but I have no idea why I ended up with 670 for Writing. My essay wasn’t that bad (or so I thought!)! Math was a nightmare, but I already knew that. 630- I guess it could’ve been worse. Stupid grid-ins. Well, I suppose “cross your fingers and hope for a miracle isn’t a good prepping tip”.
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Tests aren’t perfect.
You could pretend that English is your second language. If you have an interview, speak with a slight Austrian accent. The interviewer will be charmed and impressed by your linguistic ability.
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And if I don’t get accepted: “You’re luggage!”
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Whoops, I squidded that by mistake. *curses touch screen*
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Robert you devious genius
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World Domination 101.
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Take it again! I didn’t study either time I took it and my scores went from something like 770-800-720 the first time to 770-800-800.
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O_o Those are some phenomenal scores. I thought 800-780-720 was good, so I didn’t bother retaking it.
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It is good! The first time I took it I got 800-800-700, with the 700 on math. If it had been divided up any other way, like 770-760-770 or something, I absolutely wouldn’t have retaken. In other words, I was beyond thrilled with the superscore (and the reading/writing scores, of course). But the math I knew I could do better on, so even though I didn’t really need the score boost, I took it again to see. And voila! 770 on math.
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Agreed, haha! I got a 2220 composite and did fine. Scores aren’t much to worry about.
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I got CR – 760, Math – 630 and Writing – 610, didn’t retake it and was fine.
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All you blasted geniuses.
I got critical reading 790, writing 570, and 490 on math. I got accepted, though to be fair the acceptance rate at my college is really high, and it’s a small liberal arts school.
Meh.
Robert, you really are a devious genius.
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I’d say that the math score reflects the limits of your mathematical experience and the writing score reflects the limitations of the test.
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Anyone have any questions about Beloit College?
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Why is it so far from Cleveland?
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Get a TARDIS!
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I’m really excited about my classes next semester. I just got permission to take this graduate-level music history seminar about Beethoven’s string quartets, taught by a really important musicologist, and the class sounds perfect for me. That would bring me up to 17 credits, though, with two academically-intense classes, so I think I might drop counterpoint and take it the semester after so I have time to practice and don’t go crazy. Other than that, I’m taking orchestral conducting (required to graduate, not really looking forward to it), suzuki pedagogy II, orchestra repertoire, and then lessons and orchestra and chamber music (staying with my quartet from this semester – we’re going to finish up Schubert Death and the Maiden and then I bet we have time to do another piece also).
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Literally everything on that list made me think “that’s so cool!” Good luck!
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I got accepted to Stanford! It’s my #1 choice, and I applied REA.
Just thought I’d update you guys.
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Congratulations! I’m still working on my application… got to send it in before the end of this month.
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Congratulations!
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Congratulations, Kokonilly!!! That is amazing!
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103 – CONGRATULATIONS KOKONILLY THAT IS FANTASTIC!
Officially one day and twenty hours until Brown ED results come out. I probably should not be spending this much time online reading about Brown… or watching the countdown ticker.
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103.1-103.3 – Thank you! I am SUPER excited. The Voldynet (is that the proper use of it? I’ve been gone for a long time) group is exploding with notifications and niceness and everyone seems amazing.
104 – Good luck! I hope you get in! It’s nerve-racking, I know. I was making an annoying high-pitched sound while I was waiting for the email, and I was shaking for a full half hour after reading it.
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All right: a fairly simple history final tomorrow morning and then an online Latin final on Friday morning, and then my first semester of college is officially over. *sighs with relief*
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My Spanish 331 class sounds extremely intimidating. The syllabus is fifteen pages that pretty much say, “If you blink wrong, I’m failing you.” I think that class will be as much work as all my other classes put together. My economics professor seems like Santa Claus in comparison.
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At least the professor seems halfway decent, if still intimidating. In his lecture today he talked about ancient aliens and said that Venezuela’s chief exports were petroleum and dictators.
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Finished the last of my college applications today. I’m just going to go to the Common App site and stare at all the little green triangles for a while.
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I left my email alone for 5 days, and I come back and have something along the lines of 8 college emails. What scares me is that my sister says it will only get worse – her folder for college-related emails contains over 2,000 emails…
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Yeah, I’m getting 10-15 a day on average. It gets worse.
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That’s why I refused to give them my email! I would rather have them send me stuff in the real mail.
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Cake cake cake cakity cake caaaaake cake. I filled out all the university scholarship applications a couple weeks ago, it said it was received and everything was fine. But now I checked again and it says I need two letters of recommendation delivered by February 1st, as well as a resume and a bunch of other stuff. Cake cake cake. I think I can get one, though that professor’s not going to be happy with me, but the only other faculty member that knows me well enough isn’t responding to my emails. This is bad. Like, royally bad. And it’s only people in the College of Arts and Sciences that needs all this extra stuff, too.
*rocks back and forth in corner, sobbing*
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Maybe I don’t have to do this application after all? There’s no clear information anywhere. The full ride+ scholarship I received this year says it’s renewed for up to four years as long as I meet some requirements, but it doesn’t say whether it renews itself automatically or it only renews itself if I do something or other. I’d rather not have to go grovel before two professors and make them write me letters in less than a week, but if it turns out that I do need to do this ridiculous application, I’d want to grovel as soon as humanly possible.
Gah. I hate money and forms and everything. I’m going to go build a cabin in the mountains, you all can come visit me if you want.
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*hugs*
I’ll be there waiting for you with some nice warm tea. I’d say something inspiring and helpful, but so far I’ve only managed to fill out two applications: one was rejected, the other was actually only a formality and I had 6 months to figure out how to spell my name.
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I called the scholarship office and they claim it should automatically renewed, but I never trust things like that.
Yes, I think a cabin is the right move for me. Considering I haven’t shaved in about four days, I’m already on my way to a good mountain-man beard, so I just need a rifle and a better knife and I’ll be set.
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It should be automatically renewed, that is. It would appear that planning my new life in the mountains has made me neglectful in checking for typos.
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Long story short: somehow this evening my adviser talked me into getting those two letters of recommendation after all. Please note that they are due tomorrow.
What the cake am I doing.
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Wonder of wonder! Miracle of miracles! God took a Piggy by the hand and, wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles, led him to two letters of recommendation! But I am absolutely never going to try that again.
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When Moses parted the Red Sea, that was a miracle! When Goliath David slew, that was a miracle too! But of all the miracles, big and small, the greatest one of them all: He has given the letters to you!
(I almost certainly got some of those lyrics wrong.)
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Hurrah, you did it against all odds!
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But of all God’s miracles large and small,
The most miraculous one of all
Is that out of a clever advisor’s quip,
God has made a scholarship!
Maybe I shouldn’t go into songwriting.
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I THINK YOU SHOULD!
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Today when I came home from school I thought of the scene from Harry Potter when the letters keep coming and coming in greater and greater numbers. Monday, I had maybe 2 letters from colleges, Tuesday, another 2 or 3, and today there were 6 more sitting in a neat little stack at my seat. Six letters for me! I’m half-expecting them to start shooting out of the chimney and showing up inside our eggs! It’s too bad that they’re not really letters from Hogwarts. I’m still waiting for that viewbook.
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Actually, the sheer amount of college mail does indeed rise to near- Harry Potter levels! My mom made me a folder system to store them all!
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I’ve got a box in my room, but some of the envelopes are too large to fit. *cough*like, say, your school’s*cough*
It bothers me how similar all of the letters are. Is there some company that makes them all up, with the same format and marketing techniques for each? They all have a “P.S.” with the information on what special doodad you’ll get if you contact them: T-shirts, guide pamphlets, personality quizzes, water bottle stickers, and the like.
It’s sad, because a letter that tried to stand out instead of following the same formula is a letter that I might look twice at.
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This is actually a very interesting phenomenon. Each of those letters was trying to stand out, and it was doing so in what they had determined was the optimal possible way, based on a ton of very detailed research. But it turns out that everyone else had come to the same conclusions. So each university has to take into account not only what actions would help them, but also what actions their competitors are likely to take in response–game theory, essentially. It’s like trying to win a chess game by deciding every single move you’ll make before the game even begins. You have to hypothesize what actions you’ll take and what actions your opponent will take in response to your actions.
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Do you think that colleges are actively using those lines of reasoning? I’d be interested to know if their strategies change from year to year, since I’m sure they pay attention to what everybody else is doing. Maybe there are certain “trends” that everybody tries to follow – or avoid – based on those observations. Still, there are some weird features, like the ubiquitous “P.S.”, that I can’t believe arose independently, or even from the same research conclusions…
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My brother just got one that began “Blah blah blah Macalester College, blah blah blah “Mac,” blah blah, blah, high PSAT scores, blah blah blah, great academic match for your interests, blah blah, blah, a college with a commitment to the world community, blah, blah, blah, internationalism, blah, blah, multiculturalism, blah, blah, community service, blah, blah, blah, in two of the most “liveable” metropolitan cities in the US, blah blah blah.”
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Is that the same one where “indoor plumbing” was second on the list?
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I got that same one today! For some reason the front was marked up with some weird pen drawings. Not to mention after not checking my email for a whole 2 days opened it up to see 14 college emails. It’s starting to get rather frustrating.
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Macalester is a good school, though. Being someone from Minnesota, I know many people who have found it very worthwhile. Maybe they all start sounding formulaic because they’re advertising similar things.
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I think a more likely scenario is that they’re all using branches of the same marketing firm.
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Probably true. I also noticed that all of them have the same stamp.
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Buahaha yeah I remember Uchicago’s stuff being ridiculously large! Speaking of that I really need to join the prospective student committee or whatever it’s called. I’m actually really interested in all of you guys!
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Yes, do! I’m hoping it will be one of the colleges I visit over spring break!
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Hopefully my house will be able to host prospective students! Over spring break is when most everybody comes. I’ll have to vacuum my room before then…
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UChicago?! I love UChicago as much as it is possible for an eighth grader to love a university. It looks like Hogwarts, what can I say? And their biology department has A THEME SONG. Love.
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Going to interview with a Brown alumnus later next week.
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Be familiar with the open curriculum.
I’m sure you’ll knock their socks off!
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oops i meant to pie that well the squid i just gave agrees with you wholeheartedly and also suggests having questions prepared uhhh uhuh
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Axa, Vendy — will do, thanks for the advice
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Best of luck!! Sit with good posture but don’t be too stiff! Don’t freak out abotu what to do with your hands, it’s not weird to have them just sitting there but don’t worry if you use them when you talk either. BECAUSE MAYBE YOU ARE LIKE ME AND BECOME HYPER AWARE OF WTC YOUR FINGERS ARE DOING MIDSENTENCE
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Axa, Vendaval, Jadestone — update! The interview went really well, and he was impressed that I’d done my homework on the new curriculum, like he said.
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So the textbook I needed for a College-Now Java class I was taking was more than $100, so on the way home my brother jokingly suggested just buy a kindle and the textbook, which upon further reflection doesn’t seem like such a bad idea.
Does anyone know the availability/price of textbooks on kindles or nooks or whatever, and if anyone ever uses this strategy instead of lugging around so many textbooks?
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I haven’t actually met a single person who uses an e-reader for their textbooks. Maybe there aren’t very many textbooks available yet on e-readers. Or maybe they all like to write in their textbooks.
Either way, buying a used textbook is usually WAAAY cheaper than buying new. Lower-level textbooks are pretty easy to find on ebay, and are often sold by amazon vendors.
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I know I wouldn’t like to have a textbook on an e-reader, but that’s because I flip back and forth between pages a lot and it’d get really frustrating trying to do that without actual pages.
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This is true in theory.
In practice, I’ve taken mostly math and computer science courses, and I couldn’t find any of my fall semester textbooks online for cheaper than the bookstore had them. This semester, the difference was again pretty small, except for one book.
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I’ve used a kindle for class texts! I don’t think that they’re good for most classes though, especially low level ones. In my case I was reading a lot of selected articles because there was no good textbook, so the professor just gave us a list of excerpts and papers from journals. But if your class has a textbook you can buy cheaply online (at amazon or half, for example), then I say buy it.
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I haven’t used an e-reader for any of my classes, but last semester I did buy an online version of my textbook for Econ 101 and just read it on my computer. It worked out well, I think–it wasn’t a class that required lots of heavy reading, and since my homework was due online too it was helpful to have the textbook open in a different tab. I don’t know if it’d work out in a another class, though, and I didn’t enjoy my Econ 101 class for some entirely separate reasons.
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Re: college visiting: If you come to UChicago, be on the lookout for a guy named Christian! He’s my Doctor Who-watching buddy I’ve been raving about, and now he’s a tour guide! If you find him be sure to ask about me, haha.
Or you can just be on the lookout for me. Identifiable by: black cat hat and/or cello case with a ton of stickers on it, one of them being a Koko for President in 2008.
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So I got a call from the Maryland GED office today, apparently they’ve noticed that when I took the test (what, a year ago?) my score was over 3000, so I might be eligible for some sort of scholarship, and that I should call them back if I’m interested. I have a feeling it’ll only be for in-state places though, which won’t help me. Oh well.
In other news my friend mentioned that I was on the Dean’s list, and then had to explain what that was, since I’ve never been in an institutional setting before. >.< HURR DURR I'M SMART, APPARENTLY.
Aaaaaand this semester I'm doing not very well. Joy. I have another book test tomorrow morning (oh cake sleep, I need some) that I have a feeling I'm going to bomb. Again.
Blast it.
I read the book, I even mildly ENJOYED the book, but I feel like I'm going to do poorly on the test. Because that happened with the last one, too.
Why?
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The first college acceptance letters should be coming out soon! Right? I think most of them come out at the end of March, but WashU sent them out really early last year.
Actually, it seemed like a lot of you applied Early Action… are there any MB-ers waiting on a regular admissions letter?
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I’m waiting on at least eight letters. I won’t know until April.
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Ahg you have my sympathies I was like the last person in my friendgroup to hear back from any schools. Don’t worry though! They will come!
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the wait is long and full of terrors (wait…) but like jade said, don’t worry too much if possible! ALL WILL BE WELL IN TIME
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Because this is a lot more relevant here than the random thread, here is my post in response to someone expressing that they didn’t know what they wanted to major in.
_____
I had this problem! For quite a long time I worried about what I wanted to do with my life, and had no idea what I wanted. In general I just avoided the question and said “biology or english†when asked because they were my two favorite subjects in school, although I was (and still am!) interested in a really wide array of things.
If it helps, here is kind of how I made the decisions that I did.
Firstly, I thought a lot about all the different interests I had, and which ones were things I knew I wanted to be doing forever, not just for a few years. The things I really loved. These ended up being essentially science, reading, writing, the outdoors, and photography. Notice that they are not necessarily subjects, but categories! Science can mean many types of science, and “the outdoors†can be a part of many different subjects. These are things that I know I will continue doing no matter what becomes my main focus, things I will always enjoy and would love to spend many hours each day doing them.
This is a helpful way of narrowing down lists! For instance, I also like (the playing of) sports/physiology a lot and have a large interest in how things work. But I wouldn’t really want to spend all day being a trainer, or a physical therapist because while it’s interesting I wouldn’t like touching people all the time. I like watching clocks and gears and seeing how they all fit together, but I wouldn’t want to be a mechanic and I don’t feel like engineering is something I’d necessarily be really happy in. But deciding these aren’t what I want to have a major/potential career in doesn’t mean I lose them as interests! I can still spend a few hours one week taking apart an old clock to see what the insides look like and I am currently on a quidditch team and a hockey team.
So my broader list of things I might want to spend my life doing was science, reading/writing, the outdoors, and photography. The second thing I looked at was, if I got went with one of these subjects, the kind of people I would be spending time around while working.
Science would mean I would be working with a lot of people who I knew would be similar to me in a lot of ways! They would value reasonable conclusions and testing/trying ideas, as well as sharing a love of learning why things do what they do and guessing what else they might do under certain conditions/situations. Before I came to college I most often related well with people in my science classes who were also interested in the material, and were people I was less likely to get into arguments with. I also found that I appreciated in-depth discussions of many topics with science-minded people more than not-sicence-minded people, as they were more likely to understand my need for proof of an idea and accepting that some things I know might not be true but they were as close as I could get to truth for the present. Although all people are different and I don’t expect to get along with everyone, the scientific community is one that I know I’ll be able to get along with in general and who share a lot of my values. Then and continuing till now has reenforced my feeling that I would be happy spending all day with people who also like science and learning! It is a community I enjoy a lot. Do I enjoy others as well? Of course. But not as consistently.
However, this does not mean go into something that you know will be filled with people you agree with! There is a lot of debate in science and not everyone has the same opinions/viewpoints, the key for me was how they are approached by sciency people.
But maybe you are the kind of person who likes having their views/way of doing things tested! You could be the kind of person who enjoys hearing other people’s methods/beliefs and reconsidering how you approach things yourself. I know that as a person I am unlikely to change many of my beliefs without substantial proof, so subjects like, say, philosophy aren’t really something I would grow much from–while I find a lot of the concepts interesting, I feel like many views are all in a part right/wrong and can tell you specifics about who I feel the world works/doesn’t, and the parts where I will just say I simply don’t know! I would learn a lot about other people’s theories but personally probably wouldn’t change much. So, not the subject for me to go into, although interesting in itself.
So after I kind of found myself leaning towards a career in the sciences, I broke that down into sections (roughly equivalent to majors). These were: Medicine, chemistry, biology, physics. There was also my huuuge interest in space, but I decided to clump that with physics or engineering, as those are most of the jobs relating to space available now. Right off I knew I wasn’t that into chemistry or physics (as much as I love space, I am just not great at understanding physics-things quickly and being able to work out problems). I liked the idea of helping people, and I’m not grossed out by sickness/injury, so I thought a lot about being a doctor/surgeon. Eventually I decided that I wouldn’t like the making-medicine side of things (a lot of chemistry and molecular biology, which I am not super strong in, and don’t enjoy as much) and while I could handle blood/guts of being a surgeon, I am not sure I would be happy under a lot of pressure and knowing how important it would be that I get everything right. I decided not to go the pre-med route, although I think that I could have been relatively happy in a career with less major outcomes that was still helping people.
So, biology. One of my favorite subjects in school and one I found interesting and easy to learn about. I had a healthy interest in most parts, with an emphasis on genetics and ecology. I put biology down on my college applications and part of how I picked schools was on whether or not they had good science courses/facilities.
Enter leaving for college! My first semester of college I took intro chemistry, intro geology, a classics course (technically a freshman year seminar–a small class of only freshman, designed in part to teach us how to transition to college-style learning and so on), and a black-and-white film photography class.
You will notice that none of these are actually biology! That is because I ended up exempting out of first semester bio from the AP test. And the first semester focussed more on areas I knew I wasn’t as interested in, cells and so on. Not necessarily something I had planned on but I liked the option of taking more things! I was in chem because you need a few chem classes for the bio major and I needed to take those early/get them out of the way. My classics class (Odysseys and Identities) was the freshman year seminar I had picked out over the summer–not my first choice, it was my third actually, but was very interesting and I am glad I took it! Geology I put down on my schedule because another class I wanted (anthropology) had filled up and I was too nervous about getting into classes/missing material to try to get into it off the waitlist. So geo was a replacement class. Photography I was SUPER lucky to get into. They hired a visiting professor over the summer, so freshman had the unlikely but extremely lucky period where we could get into it because it wasn’t full with people who had registered the previous year. I tried to get into creative writing classes as well, but they were all full. I wish I had been able to get into one since I’d considered having it as a concentration (essentially equivalent of a minor), but they filled up really fast, sadly.
How things went: I did not like chem. It was hard and I didn’t test well, though I passed. I knew I wasn’t a chem person going in, but I did learn a lot. I took it because I needed the class to be a bio major.
The classics class was fun! I learned how to write for college classes, and it was my first experience having a lot of discussions with very intelligent peers. My college is MUCH more prestigious than my high school. For the first time (offline), I was really challenged/engaged in discussions with people who had very different ways of looking at things than I did. This was super fun in a class where we read a lot of books, because people brought up interpretations I would never have thought of but ended up agreeing with entirely! Although I don’t like I would like working as a classics person I would enjoy taking more classes in it.
The geology class was an unexpectedly great one! The teacher was very funny and made things easy to understand. It also brougth out my innate love of science and the outdoors, as well as getting into how stuff works–our planet! It even has some space stuff thrown in from the formation of our planet/moon/solar system/etc. I also really liked the labs, which while it was warm out consisted of field trips to various places, and when it was colder we learned how to identify rocks based on sets of categories. It felt really awesome to be able to point out random rocks and know what they were made of and how it was formed. When I was little I always picked up rocks I liked and put them in my pockets (my mom had to empty my jacket out every week), and this brought back that interest.
Photography was amazing. I fell in love with the darkroom, and seeing my pictures go through the film processing room, then into the darkroom where you literally turn light into shapes and shades. It was the closest I’ve every gotten to magic in real life, even knowing how the chemicals work. Seeing the transition of your ideas to paper in that way is like nothing else (digital just cannot compare, although I love it as well). Even thought it was only 6 hours a week in class (tuesday/thursday lab periods, 3 hours each), I easily spent anywhere from 10-20 hours outside of class working for it. Taking pictures took time and effort (esspecially some of the more complex shoots I did! For my final project I probably spent 8-10 hours preparing the scene and taking pictures alone, not to mention processing), and then film processing had to be done SUPER EXACTLY to make sure they came out right. Scary at first, but getting the hang of it wasn’t bad. Then there were the endless hours in the darkroom itself–testing exposure times, lengths in developer, contrasts, etc. Making one picture go from film to paper took at least an hour of attempts, and we made a lot of pictures to figure out which ones we wanted to display for our assignments/projects. It was decidedly my favorite class, and I seriously considered adding a visual arts minor to my intended bio major because I wanted to take more of it. I eventually decided not to, but if I get the chance I will take as MANY more photography classes as I can.
Goodness this is getting longer than expected. The parts about all my classes don’t necessarily tell you specifics on how to choose what to do but maybe they will spark common interests in others so I will leave them there.
Anyway. Second semester I took the next part of chem, the second half of bio (I decided to go into it even though I could still have exempted out–it was focussed on what I was more interested in (genetics and ecology!) and I didn’t feel like my AP class had covered it very well), intro psychology, into cultural anthroplogy, and a half-semester little physics class on quantum mechanics for fun. I also took excos (basically student-led classes once or twice a week, can be taken for credit but I took them just for fun) in herpetology, poi (:D), and traditional irish music.
I again didn’t really enjoy chem. Pysch was fairly interesting. I didn’t end up liking anthro very much (mostly due to the teacher and not finding discussions with the other students as engaging). Bio went all right, I liked one of the teachers a lot more than the others and realized I liked the ecology aspect a lot more than the genetics side. Basically anything molecular I didn’t understand as well/easily and didn’t interest me as much. The physics class was fun, no real work to do, but led to many interesting thoughts.
So around the end of the year I’d figured out mostly what I wanted to do. I still liked/enjoyed bio, and so wanted to take more classes on the ecology/larger side of that. I’d found I’d really liked my geology class and the geo department here is fabulous, so I wanted to take some more classes there as well. I was still unable to get into any creative writing classes, sadly. Probably my biggest class-related disappointment overall.
First semester of sophomore year I was unfortunately locked out of all bio classes. It was a big deal because a lot of rising first years didn’t get into any of them (the bio department is growing, but the number of classes hasn’t changed and it’s hard to increase the class size for most of them). This was really frustrating as it meant I by the middle of my second year I would only have taken one class in the subject of my major, but there wasn’t a lot I could do about it. So I took Organic Chem (which I KNEW would be super hard for me but needed for the bio major), intro to computer science (good to know in general, plus one of my roommates was the lab helper and a comp sci major (she is a senior)), and Earth Surface Processes (geology). I enjoyed comp sci, hated orgo but finally passed it (with difficulty, but that means NO MORE CHEM WOO), and loved my geo course.
That brings us to this semester! I have basically decided on being a biology/geology double major. I am in another bio class (Vascular Plant Systematics–quite fun! We have gone to the greenhouse every lab period (twice a week) but one), two geology (Evolution of the Earth, and Earth’s Interior), and another anthropology that is more science-based than the one I didn’t like (Human Origins Anthropology. Human evolution! Very cool).
Anyway, that is how I decided on what I want to major in. It’s not necessarily set in stone and can be changed if I decide I don’t want one or the other anymore. But they are both subjects I have found I really like learning about and can lead to fun careers! Geology, although it wasn’t something I saw myself doing coming into college, is much more than a “rocks for jocks†subject some people think it is. Last semester in Earth Surface Processes we went out for lab every friday and measured rivers by wading out into them and using cool equipment and touching things. Geology is big on hands-on and feeling things (and even tasting in the case of some minerals) and everyone in the department here is super nice and outdoorsy. Unlike the bio department which locked a lot of students out of classes, the geo department actually opened up space in everything to make sure everyone who wanted to take classes could. It’s been helpful because I feel like I’m getting stuff done towards a geo major while part of me feels like I’m treading water in my bio major because at this point I’ve only taken TWO classes in it, though also a lot of prerequisites that I have been working through.
The bio/geo combo is also exciting when I think about what I could get as careers. Did you know there’s such a thing as paleoecology? Or paleoclimatology? Even if I decide I want to spend a few years just working in a national park instead of doing research (or while!) the bio/geo combo is excellent for my top choice, Yellowstone. Not to mention there’s also things in the fields on their own as well!
Anyway. This turned into a monster. But here is how I decided on what I probably want to do with my life.
_____
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So now I’m trying to decide between whether I want to go to library school for grad school or to try to find a building/architectural archaeology program at a school that has a museum focus. I like buildings and houses, particularly old ones. I also like museums. Another option on the museum front is perhaps public history grad school programs. Does anyone have any advice on this? It is hard to decide and it isn’t quite like Jadestone’s method for picking a major since all of them are focused on some pretty similar topics.
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Does cost matter?
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Probably. I haven’t looked into that, though.
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Well, that would be an obvious thing to consider when trying to make a decision.
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A decision in which schools, not in this. I am trying to decide what kinds of programs to look for, not between schools with those kinds of programs.
Any advice on deciding between library school, public history school, or archaeology school would still be much appreciated.
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Career-wise, what is the (specific) likeliest thing you would find yourself doing with each degree?
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That doesn’t affect this; it is the same in all of them. Working at a museum or a library.
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I’ve gotten at least three emails from all-male, religious universities (Yeshiva University, St. Joseph’s Seminary, and Divine World College), as well as a few others. This is somewhat odd, because I’m 1) a high school freshman, and 2) didn’t give this email when I signed up for the ACT. How do I make them stop?
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Troll ’em.
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Threaten to visit and be kissed by all their students.
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I wouldn’t worry, unless the messages begin “Dear Mr. Orange: …”
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Tell your account to stick them in the Spam Bin. It’ll view their kind as spam in the future, and you won’t see them in your inbox any more.
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Seattle U 2016. Almost official!
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Well, since I last posted here in January 2011, things have changed on the College front.
To begin with, I am now heading for Stern College at Yeshiva University next year. I just had a meeting last night with the heads of the Financial Aid Office because, as we all know, private college tuition is MAJORLY expensive. Plus I’m out of state anyway. Thank G-d, it looks like I’m getting a good scholarship, since my twin brother also wants to go to YU, so that’s a double whammy on the financial end. Good thing YU is great about scholarships.
The only major downside to this decision is that I will be living in Manhattan and I can’t stand cities. Too many cars, too much pollution, etc. But I’ll do it for the education.
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I need advice regarding classes for next year! The fall course catalog just came out, and it’s honestly a little overwhelming. The recommended courseload is four classes, and it seems impossible to choose!
I know I want to take a French class, and from the little bit of research I’ve done it looks like I’d place into French 0600 or higher (I had a 5 and an 800 on the AP exam and subject tests, but I’ve now had a year without the language, so that makes me a little nervous). I could choose between a course with more of a focus on speaking and writing or one with more of a focus on literature. I’m leaning towards the former, since I could take French lit classes in later semesters and speaking/writing seems a little more practical when I’ve gone a year without speaking at all.
My main interests for a major right now is Cognitive Science or Linguistics. Both intro courses are offered this fall and don’t appear to be offered this spring (although intro to Cog Neuroscience is, which is also a requirement for a CogSci major). They don’t conflict with each other and I know I want to take both eventually, and ideally sooner rather than later. Would it be a bad plan to take both my first semester? They’re in the same general department (Brown had separate psych/cogsci/linguistics majors but the department is combined), but they’d probably both be really interesting…
There’s also a first-year seminar in the anthropology department called “Who Owns The Past” which looks really interesting.
That’s four courses right there, but two of them are so close in subject matter. They’re also all liberal-arts-y, which… is that okay? I have no idea. I’ve been fairly math/science-y in high school, but I’m positive I don’t want to go into the hard sciences.
Basically, I don’t have the slightest idea what I’m doing and would appreciate any advice!
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What are your distribution requirements like? If you take those courses now, will you end up having to take 3 science courses at the same time in a future semester?
Other than that, it sounds good! I don’t think taking multiple classes in the same department would be a problem. You should also have an adviser you can talk to who can give you specific information (hopefully).
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There are no distribution requirements, which actually makes me a bit more nervous. I have this nagging feeling that I’m supposed to be taking Calc 3 or a lab science, and I can’t tell if that “supposed to” feeling is just a carryover from high school that I’ll learn to shake off or if it’s something I really ought to be listening to.
Thanks for the response!
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If you are not sure what all you have to take it is good to ask!! Take this from someone who’s advisor was Wrong.
My school doesn’t have class requirements either, but it does have what it calls the “9-9-9,” where we need 9 arts & humanities, 9 social science, and 9 hard sciences to graduate. We also need 9 credits in any class with the subcategory of “cultural diversity,” 1 quantitative proficiency, and 1 writing proficiency. These can be from whatever departments or subjects we want.
It’s also maybe good to think about things you might want to major in! If you’re thinking cog sci or linguistics check out their intro courses. I would say go ahead and ask your advisor what he/she thinks about the workload for each. On the other hand, my advisor told me not to take 4 labs a week this semester but I went and did it anyway.
It sounds like right now you’re thinking about Intro Cog Sci, intro Linguistics, French, and Anthro seminar. One thing I would also consider with this schedule is how you will be graded. Hard sciences are mostly test-based while a lot of other stuff is paper based, but there are always exceptions. In general it’s reccomended to take a mix of test/paper classes so you never have 4 papers all due the same day or 4 tests in one 2-day span. It’s not the end of the world if this happens, you just have to plan ahead more/be diligent about handling it.
Anyway I am not sure I am making much sense right now! Have you said where you’re going? If you want to not mention it on blog that’s fine I just wondered.
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I think I posted about it back when ED results came out. I’ll be at Brown next year!
Thanks for this, these are all great things to consider.
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UC Davis offered me a really nice scholarship and I just got into Lewis & Clark College. This has been a good week.
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Congratulations on getting into both of those schools. From a completely self-interested perspective, I think you should go to Lewis & Clark because I could Kokon with you and Alice!
Besides that compelling rationale, where are you thinking you would like to go?
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And meeeeeee!
Compelling, I know.
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From a similarly self-interested perspective, Cat’s Eye, Cskia, sometimes Randomosity, next year Kokonilly, and myself are all only about a two-hour train ride from UC Davis! Give or take several hours’ worth of extra transit time.
On a not-entirely-self-interested note: Davis is a really nice city. It’s really bicycle-friendly- I mean, they basically take precedence over cars- and the food is pretty great. It’s also nice and close to Sacramento, which is a fun city aside from the politics.
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More kokon possibilities arise! I’m with Cat’s Meow and Alice as part of the Oregon crew so you should go to Lewis & Clark!
But my aunt works at UC Davis so when I visit her I’m really close to there, too! So either one fulfills my kokon self-interests!
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NO OBERLIN?
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To all the replies — Thank you, and I haven’t a clue, I’m still waiting on six more schools! But most of them are near one MBer or another.
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Which schools are you waiting on?
(I think U of R mailed me my acceptance around the 14th-18th, and I heard they have early action now anyway, so probably not here, but potential three years of kokon? count me in!)
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Dodeca — Well, not Pomona anymore, they just sent me the thin envelope. I’m waiting on UC Berkeley, Stanford, Brown, Yale & Princeton.
Jadestone — I’M SORRY
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My dad and I are visiting East Coast colleges over Spring Break next week. (Unfortunately, I don’t think any of them are schools that MuseBloggers currently attend.) Do any of you have advice about getting the most out of such visits?
Additionally, we’ll be doing one school per day, so I’m thinking about sitting in on a class at each. How should I choose which class? One option would be to pick a biology class at each school, since that subject currently interests me most, I have prior experience in it, and I could roughly compare across schools. Similarly, I could also look at English- and philosophy-type classes at each. Or, I could mix-and-match between schools and take whatever seems most interesting from the class title and description. Any suggestions?
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Although they are kind of harder to sit in on, if you can, I’d say pick a discussion or smaller class. Huge lectures will all probably be pretty similar between schools, with the main differences being just the individual teacher. If you can sit in on a class where the students are also participating in some way it would give you a better feel for the school/student body.
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2400 on my SAT!!!
I guess I’m done with that test forever!
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Wow! Congratulations, Meow!
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Don’t retire just yet. The Kokonspiracy still needs you.
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Is conquering standardized tests part of the Kokonspiracy? Or more like a means to an end?
Everyone else: Thank you!
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When we take over the world, we MUST abolish the SAT.
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Great job!
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That is mind-boggling . *noisemakers*
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That’s AMAZING but certainly well deserved! Congratulations!! 
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I got accepted at UC Berkeley and wait-listed at Brown University.
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Awesome!!
The sibling just got waitlisted at Brown and is waiting to hear back from a few other places. She got into Yale a little while ago (Violetfire, for those who remember her)
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I’m not sure which blows my mind more: that Violetfire is your sibling, or that she got accepted at Yale. Wow!
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Ohh you didn’t know that? I guess once she stopped posting it stopped being obvious. Anyway yeah, she did pretty well on her ACT and SAT’s. But yeah, dunno if she’s gonna go there, she hasn’t even visited it ever.
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What’s her first choice?
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I’m going to be visiting the Lewis & Clark campus next week
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Actually, I might not. It depends on the offer that comes in, but I’m thinking that Berkeley is my first choice now.
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Soooo internship stuff is a part of higher education!
Anyway I JUST submitted my first internship application. NERVOUS. It was for Shrubland Bird Ecology Field Technician, and a place within driving distance of my house. Going to take an internet tv break, pack a bit, then look up more stuff. April is the month of Things Being Due. Need to find everything before they are all gone D:
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I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to UC Berkeley
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COME TO US COME TO US COME TO US
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YES.
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PARTY IN THE BAY AREA
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WE CAN BAKE A CAKE
IN STANFORD WITH ROSANNE
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Pie!
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I just got back from my meeting with my academic adviser. He’s pretty awful as a professor, but he’s so much fun to talk to. Every time we have a meeting it goes way over time and we end up waving our hands around and talking excitedly about life the universe and everything.
I showed him the schedule I drew up yesterday of the courses I really want to take next semester and he told me to not take 18 credits because it’s crazy, but then again, it’s me, so go for it if that’s what I want because I have a relatively good idea of what I want to do and I’m keeping my options open while doing things that are interesting and covering my bases. I’ve got gen eds and at least one course each for my minor and two possible majors, depending on which I eventually settle for. I’m still leaning towards history and just taking as many anthropology as I can cram into my schedule. But it’s probably wise to keep it open so I could change my major if I wanted to.
So if I somehow manage to get into all the classes I want then I’ll be taking
-History of Modern Sexuality (a 300 level history course, which I’m sure will be madness, but it sounds super interesting and thought-provoking)
-Geology (yay for rocks!)
-Documentary Photography (yay pictures!)
-Applied Music Theory for Traditional Musicians (yesyesyesyesyesyes)
-Introduction to Archeological Field Methods (eeeee!!!!!)
And again I’m at that point where I know for my sanity it would probably behoove me to not take one of them, but WHICH ONE? Because they ALL look so INTERESTING.
*sigh*
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Looks like your classes will be quite varied in terms of activities, which helps. That’s easier to manage than a course load that is heavily weighted with reading material and paper-writing. At least that was the case for me.
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I was in a similar position last semester, and ended up getting sick and having to drop one of the courses regardless. So based on my experiences I’d recommend not planning to take 18 credits. Go to the classes, decide which one you like least, drop that one. (if it were me I’d drop either photography or geology, but we are very different people with respect to interests)
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Course registration for next semester is Wednesday!
I am planning on taking:
-MTH164 multivariate calculus with my favorite math teacher ever
-CSC173 computation and formal systems, a major requirement
-MUR125 history of rock music
-MUR157 jazz ensemble
-MUR170 brass choir
for a grand total of 14 credits.
alternate courses if I can’t get into one of the above:
LIN110 introduction to linguistics
CSC212 human-computer interaction
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My schedule for next semester, unless I change my mind about anything:
-GREK 101, Elementary Greek I (Should be more or less a cakewalk, and it’s with a professor I know well and like.)
-SPAN 305, Literary Analysis in Spanish (Very, very required for any Spanish major or minor. Unfortunately, the only section I could take is a two-and-a-half hour chunk late Friday afternoon. That’s going to be painful.)
-SPAN 311, Representative Spanish-American Authors I (With my current Spanish professor whom I greatly enjoy. The undergrad bulletin says that SPAN 305 is a prerequisite, but I was able to register for it without any problems, so I’m just crossing my fingers and hoping they’ll let me take it.)
-CLAS 401/LATN 491, Research Seminar/Topics in Latin Prose (They invented Classics 401 just to let classics majors get a certain hard-to-fulfill gen ed requirement, and it’s the same class as Latin 491. I don’t know what author we’ll be doing yet.)
-CSCE 101, Fundamentals of Computer Science (Quite a bit should be review from the programming classes I took in high school, and I think it’ll be better than taking a math class or a basic philosophy course, which are really the only other options for this gen ed requirement.)
17 hours. I was going to take Drawing 101 as well, but I decided that it wasn’t really necessary to take it next semester, and 17 hours seemed better than 20 hours, so I’ll take it in the spring or something instead. At the rate I’m going, I could conceivably graduate in three years, but I’d like to study abroad at some point, which would most likely push me to four years, which is fine.
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Curse this honors seminar. It’s causing me to reconsider my major/minor choices. One of the speakers this evening was one of the piano professors, whom I’ve worked with several times before, and now I’m reconsidering doing a music minor. 11 hours of core curriculum, 4 consecutive semesters of private lessons, 4 consecutive semesters of ensemble, plus a recital at the end. For the core curriculum, taking AP Music Theory in high school has given me six hours of it already, although for some reason it didn’t give me credit for the lab for one of the courses, so I’d probably have to retake it anyway. I’d probably go for organ, since I don’t really feel the need to have a lot of competition. The bit that bothers me most is the ensemble–there’s not really much ensemble work that an organist can do, so I’d probably have to do some sort of choral work, and I can’t sing. I’d also probably have to switch my Spanish major to a minor, which would be fine with me. The only thing I’m not sure about is gen ed requirements. Since music is in a different college from Classical Languages and Spanish, I don’t know whether I’d have to fulfill the performing arts college’s requirements in addition to the arts & sciences college’s requirements. If I did a music major I definitely would have to do both sets of gen eds, but since it’d be just a minor, I’m not sure?
Bleh. I don’t know. I need to talk to an adviser (though I have no idea who) and my mother about this. And maybe the pianist that sparked this whole debate in the first place. He did say that I was welcome to a practice room anytime, though, so I’ll definitely take advantage of that.
I mean, just going into the program I’d probably already be one of the more advanced organists, and I know they’re somewhat desperate for students (they were just barely able to keep the program open this year). I think I’d have to do some sort of audition–the website says just two or three pieces (a Bach piece and a romantic piece, and at least one piece has to be manuals and pedals), but I don’t know whether that’s for the major or the minor.
In any case, I do need to figure this out soon so that if I do decide to do this I can register for some classes next semester, and so I can get the paperwork shifted over.
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My quarter is going very well so far. Now that I don’t have a philosophy class, I don’t have essays looming over my head, and I’m much more relaxed. Sure, the weekly workload is more than it was last quarter, but now I have a bunch weekly 1-page write-ups instead of a 4-page essay every two weeks!
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ejfhdksal
so
I’d been planning on taking Paleontology next semester. Bio/geo course, counts towards both majors, really cool class. Lots of fieldworking stuff and areas that I’ll probably want to go into as a career if possible.
Then it was full (though I’d already asked to be put on the waitlist, and get super priority because I’m a major), but when I was just registering they *just* added an freshwater invertebrates class and oh my god I got in. There’s only 10 spots and it was by sheer luck it was put up right at my registration time. They haven’t ever offered this class before and who knows if they’ll offer it again.
So now I’m really torn between the two classes and I don’t know what I want! I’ve been planning on Paleo this coming fall for so long since I have to have my schedule worked out so far in advance to make sure I get everything required for both majors. But it’s conceivable I could take it in the fall of senior year, if they don’t change the time it’s offered at. Or the times of the other things I need to take. That would mean taking 3 geo classes my senior year, 2 one semester and 1 the other, when I’d been just planning to do two next semester. I already know that first semester senior year I need to take Cell & Molecular bio and one other bio class. And Cell&Molec is an exceedingly hard class, and I know I’m going to really struggle in it.
Second semester senior year I need to take GIS, and I really want to take Ornithology/behavioral ecology (whichever is offered, hopefully/probably ornithology). I also need to fit statistics and one other class in to get my distribution.
I thought senior year was supposed to be the easier one >.< How do all my senior friends have so little left that they need to graduate?? I guess maybe they weren’t locked out of all classes pertaining to their major one semester/going abroad for a semester… but still. Oof. I hope I can make this. I’m in 4 sciences next fall so I guess we’ll see how well I hold up.
Anyway so next fall I’ll be in:
Organismal Biology + Lab (Bio 100, the class my advisor told me I exempted out of but I didn’t and I am still so angry about this)
Optic Mineralogy and Crystallography (hard class is hard but required and useful)
Evolution
Freshwater Invertebrate Biology or Paleontology
Also… Time for new thread? Near year, new batch of college-bound musers, etc?
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