<p>i'm an amherst freshman, and i'm thinking of submitting a transfer app to Swarthmore out of a desire to major in linguistics and escape a social scene that i find too frat-ish. i'm a music major interested in composition, which amherst is quite strong in. how is music at swathmore? i'm as strongly attracted, though , to linguistics and would like to major in both. i was valedictorian of my high school class, have made all A's here at amherst, and have not applied to swarthmore before. is a successful transfer plausible/an intelligent thing to do?</p>
<p>What kind of music are you doing? Vocal, instrumental?</p>
<p>In general, Swarthmore is not particularly strong in music. The music department is good but not superb. And for lingustics, I think Swat is pretty strong overall as a lot of the cross-listed classes are in Swat's very strong departments (English, Classics, Chinese...etc)</p>
<p>Here are the two links concerning Swat's music department:</p>
<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=680%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=680</a>
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=25101%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=25101</a></p>
<p>And I honestly don't know much about your chance. Transfer admission is always hard to predict. Based on your stat, I would say you have a very good academic record and that fits into Swat well.</p>
<p>If you truly hate frats etc. Swat might be a very good option. Extremely intellectual environment and friendly peers.</p>
<p>just my 2 cents :)</p>
<p>i'm interested in music composition and theory. generally small lib arts colleges aren't the best for performing music, but composition, theory, and musicology are often a different story. at amherst one of the composition professors won the pulitzer prize in 2000, so it would be very hard to leave that kind of opportunity behind. that being said, i'm still not too happy here</p>
<p>DTTYA, why are you unhappy at Amherst? Just curious. My D's at Smith, didn't apply to Amherst for various reasons...I bit my lip but it was her choice but Amherst is one of the colleges I'd like to know more about.</p>
<p>Is it just the frat/alcohol scene? That's one of the things that my D would not have been happy with.</p>
<p>Are you male or female?</p>
<p>Just a bit of history of music at Swat. Quaker traditions frowned on music and dance. Thus, Swarthmore didn't have a music department until about 50 years ago. As I understand it, the first music major who graduated from Swarthmore was PDQ Bach.</p>
<p>I would contact that music department directly and ask away. I think they would be forthcoming about whether or not their programs are right for you. My hunch is that you could put together a very personalized program in music at Swat, although obviously there are certain kinds of students (e.g. Yo Yo Ma) where Swat's offerings might not be big enough. The music building, BTW, is absolutely gorgeous.</p>
<p>As for transfers, Swat takes a half dozen a year. With your academic record in high school and at Amherst, you would certainly meet the qualifications. The decision would basically boil down to how well you answer the question, "Why?"</p>
<p>As a parent who doesn't think a frat house or a temperance/teetotalers social scene is ideal, I am very impressed by what my daughter has described at Swarthmore. I think it's a healthy social scene where kids have some fun. People drink, but getting wasted is not the centerpiece of social life.</p>
<p>Swarthmore</p>
<p>I can't understand why Amherst allows all the binge drinking. It's really bad for everyone</p>
<p>"is a successful transfer plausible/an intelligent thing to do?"</p>
<p>From what I've heard, there has to be a valid reason to transfer; at least for the selective colleges and universities, this is true. If you cannot present a cogent reason to transfer, then you will not be successful. Transferring from Amherst to Swarthmore, two colleges which are very similar, would be hard for that reason, imho. If you are sure about your reasons and can present it that way, then you will succeed.</p>
<p>And if you are a music major and Amherst is strong in music, you should not transfer to Swarthmore, imho.</p>
<p>If you a female, don't like a heavy drinking scene, would enjoy a bigger music department without losing contact with Spratlin at Amherst (who is going to be retiring anyway), couldn't you do an interhouse transfer and live at Smith, or, alternatively, just transfer there? My d. is a music major at Smith, and it is much, much stronger than Swarthmore (and larger than Amherst - David Reck taught his Indian music class at Smith last year, apparently because there wasn't enough interest at Amherst to support it.)</p>
<p>(Before applying, my d. met with Spratlin and would love to have worked with him, and is still hoping to, but she couldn't put up with the Amherst drinking scene, and so didn't even apply. The Williams music department, especially in composition, is stronger than both of them, but you might dislike the campus atmosphere even worse than Amherst.)</p>
<p>mini, you haven't checked on how many X-chromosomes DTTYA has! :)
Smith might not be a possibility there.</p>
<p>I said "If you are female...."</p>
<p>as an amherst 09 ed admit, what do you dislike about it?</p>
<p>dyingtotakeyouaway,</p>
<p>when i visited swat for three days, i was struck by the profs even more than at amherst. they really know their stuff and are caring and go the extra mile, even to specs. </p>
<p>the linguistics at swat seem sooo interesting. i sat in on the Psychology of Linguistics with Prof Kako and LOVED it. it was completely fascinating. and their language department (idk if that really relates a lot) is quite good as well.</p>
<p>hey im applying to transfer TO amherst from a liberal arts college in the midwest & when i visited one of the instrumental directors told me their composition gradds go to schools like Yale, Eastman, Columbia, UCSD, Chicago, etc. And they get their pieces performed in their senior year and recorded. & they told me they had THREE comp teachers right now although one was one retired & one going away next year…seems very strong to me but I don’t think I’m going to get in since amherst tkaes almost no transfers sigh</p>
<p>Swarthmore music is strong in some areas and not so strong in others. Keep in mind that if you haven’t done any species counterpoint, the department will be reluctant to let you into second year theory. I was generally pleased with the one semester of theory that I took, though if you are a hardcore solfege/la-based minor person you might have some issues in musicianship (which is a required half-credit attachment to theory, and is numbers-based). There is a 5-semester theory sequence that is considered quite rigorous, and the music majors really bond over so many semesters of the same relatively small class being together. </p>
<p>I hear good things about composition for jazz and modern music, not sure about other areas. If you can visit, definitely try to meet with Levinson, who most often teaches Composition (which is a full credit, but not a class–you compose and meet independently with the prof one-on-one). </p>
<p>I am a Linguistics major, so I can tell you that the Ling department here is quite good–they are friendly and offer a decent selection of courses, especially for a small school. Double-majoring with music is doable, but not easy, especially as a transfer–music is a demanding major, but Linguistics actually requires fewer credits than many other majors. </p>
<p>Keep in mind that the Swarthmore music major is comprehensive: you may want to focus on theory and composition, but you’ll be doing a lot of history and performance as well (major/minor requirements here: [Sophomore</a> Paper in Music](<a href=“Music :: Swarthmore College”>Music :: Swarthmore College)). </p>
<p>Best wishes, and let me know if you have any more questions!</p>
<p>Umm, I think the OP probably graduated a long time ago. This thread is from 2005.</p>