<ol>
<li>As of now, my grades are pretty decent to get into Barnard but they’re nothing special. How can I make my application stand out?
If my essay had not been what it was, I would not have gotten in. Period.</li>
</ol>
<p>What other schools did you consider when applying?
GW, Georgetown, Sarah Lawrence, NYU, Agnes Scott, Emory, and like 7 more i can’t remember. I filled out all those effing apps and then got in ED anyway. Ugh.</p>
<p>this might be a slightly off-topic/creepy question, but I noticed that your username is figureskater, which leads me to assume that you are in fact a figure skater (lol). Do you still skate, and if you do does Barnard/Columbia have a skating club? Or do you have to just join another club and skate unaffiliated with the college?
I figure skate competitively right now and would like to continue in college (but in a less intense way).
Not creepy at all 
I skate a few days a week. We do have a club, but those jerks won’t return my emails so I can’t join, and I want the 100 bucks off the freestyle passes you get from being in the club. You can join the figure skating club of ny, but I didn’t feel a need to do so (more fees? no thankyou). It is very easy to skate in college, i just plan my classes for the afternoons. </p>
<p>The dating scene…
there is no shame in a ■■■■■■■■■■■■.com account. The people on it are all college students, which is verified by their email, and I have had wonderful successes with it. All my friends are gay. Most of the people I meet are gay as a result of all my friends being gay.</p>
<p>How are the academics at Barnard? I just spent a year at a university that couldn’t care less about the development of writing skills, and I’m worried that Barnard’s workload will annihilate my GPA (I haven’t written a single essay in the past ten months–other than transfer application essays, anyway). Are the writing assignments unrelenting?</p>
<p>How much value would you say is put on the interview part of the application? I know it’s not required and that they don’t penalize you for not doing one, but I’ve read many times that you really should interview if you’re applying ED (which I will be). The idea of an interview makes me super nervous, not because I can’t talk with people but more because of the pressure involved with it being a determining factor for getting into my dream school Did you do an interview? And if so, how’d it go?</p>
<p>Re this question (since figureskater didn’t know):</p>
<p>1. How generous is the financial aid"? Do you still need t get a job?</p>
<p>Barnard has a work (self-help) expectations + loans built into the financial aid award, and NYC is a very expensive place to live, so definitely students on financial aid will need to work. My daughter worked multiple jobs, anywhere from 2-5 different part-time jobs, including work-study, every semester. (Not all jobs required her to be physically present at a work place – some were tasks that could be done on her own computer. )</p>
<p>I don’t want to scare anyone off – my daughter was often working those extra jobs to pay for extras, so she could pay for tickets to performances in NY, eat out occasionally, and fund travel. But definitely plan to work if you are on financial aid and/or if your parents aren’t able to provide a large monthly allowance.</p>
<p>justina11: I can’t really speak to math and science classes, but humanities classes do require a lot of writing. Most intro level survey classes will include at least one or two short papers (4-6 pages or so) throughout the semester. As classes get more advanced, papers get longer. Seminar classes require a seminar paper, up to 20 pages for the most part, although they don’t have final exams. (Many non-seminar classes do have both finals and final papers.)
Language classes were also a little bit different, although my 4000-level Latin classes required final papers (in English) in addition to translation-based finals and midterms.</p>
<p>and, of course, Barnard requires a thesis during your senior year.</p>
<p>I’m not saying this to scare you off - I love research and reading but I’ve never really enjoyed writing term papers, and I survived. </p>
<p>also, Barnard does have a writing center:
[Writing</a> Fellows | Writing Fellows](<a href=“http://writing.barnard.edu/]Writing”>http://writing.barnard.edu/)
You make appointments with trained students and they’ll help you as much as you’d like. I never actually used it, but one of my friends worked there and I know that it’s a very good resource.</p>
<p>@mrbc2011 thanks I love little theatre troupes especially Shakespeare! I’m excited to apply to transfer</p>
<p>Can a current student clear my doubt? If my financial aid consists of Barnard College Loan, do I need to sign in some specific loan forms other than the grant/agrrement form at the eBear? Thank you!</p>
<p>i know that, on paper, barnard seems very diverse. do people of different ethnicities tend to mingle with others, or form clique-ish groups and stick together?</p>
<p>thegirlwhowaited (nice name, btw!), that question is kind of unanswerable, I think.</p>
<p>there ARE, of course, groups for every ethnicity and religion under the sun, so if you WANT to find people similar to you, you can. but nobody is forcing you to do that, and you’re free to befriend whomever you would like.</p>
<p>I feel like you’re suggesting a scenario in which, on the first day of orientation, people immediately form circles based on ethnicity and stay that way for the rest of college. of course that isn’t true.</p>
<p>That’s a Whovian username, that is.</p>
<p>Cliques do happen. It’s unavoidable no matter where you go. In my experience at Barnard, however, only people who genuinely prefer to form those sort of social communities are really affected by it. Both of my roommates hung out with people who they shared cultural traits and values with. For them, that was just what was comfortable. </p>
<p>My most “core” friend group, I suppose you can say, consists of people from a more diverse cultural/religious/academic interest background, but we were tied together by our love for geek culture and karaoke. Diversity in political ideology is far less common at Barnard, which can be a strength and a weakness depending on how you feel.</p>
<p>okay, thanks guys! i only ask because a friend of mine goes to a school pretty similar to barnard and she said the cliques were even worse than high school ones. </p>
<p>& yes, it is a whovian username, but it also applies to CC- The Girl Who Waited… for acceptance letters. geddit? :)</p>
<p>On the clique issue. How are things with internationals?</p>
<p>Hey girls! Thanks for being so magnificent and doing this for us hopefuls!
- Would you recommend Barnard for a Pre-med major? (I understand it’ll be difficult, but I’m wondering if it’ll be worth it; like, are the professors/advisors knowledgeable and classes good?)
- What steps did you take before/during senior year to decide you would apply ED? (I know figureskater sat in on a class; was there anything else to help you make the decision? I ask, because I’m extremely interested, and have visited once, but I really want to get to know the school well before making such a drastic decision.)</p>
<p>@ivwannabe I know that you asked this question towards the girls who came to Barnard through ED, but I plan on applying ED, so maybe the way that I made my decision may help you. For me, it was a difficult decision because financially there’s no way I can afford even going to community college without taking out loans. I made my decision to apply ED to Barnard because they do meet full need, which is something I personally need in a school. I’ve visited Barnard many times. I went over the summer last year, during open house last year, and a few other times over the year. Sometimes I took a tour, other times I wandered through the campus while I was visiting the city. I wanted to be able to feel what it was like to be at Barnard. And, I really liked it. I liked mostly everything. I sat in on two classes, a First Year Seminar and a philosophy class. While my mind was blown the whole time during the philosophy class, I still felt the same way I did when I visited the FYS class-everyone wants everyone to succeed. I really liked the sense of community and whatnot that I felt. I was able to imagine myself sitting on the lawn, getting coffee at Liz’s Place, going to class, and so on. I only got that feeling at one other college that I’ve visited thus far, but it was not nearly as strong. I’ve done a ton of research on Barnard. I feel like it would be the best place for me to spend my four years of college at, while learning to grow and work out my life in the city. That’s my personal experience and why I’ve decided to apply ED. I’ve also talked to many, many girls on multiple social media sites and in person who have talked of their experiences at Barnard, and for the most part, it sounds like a community that I’d really like to be a part of.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice–just bought a pair of rainboots! I’m an incoming freshman this fall, and I have a question about dorms! Is it possible for you and your roommate to each have their own mini fridge? Or do we have to share one/split the cost? How did you prep for moving in? I’m not sure what to buy, and what to wait for! Thanks!</p>
<p>I applied ED having visited Columbia once (during Winter Break, when campus was dead) and Barnard once (in late June, when campus was dead.) I talked to the Barnard/Columbia rep at every college fair and I read online as much as I possibly could. Mostly, though, I wanted to be in New York and out of the New York schools, Barnard fit me best. I was also determined to major in Medieval and Renaissance Studies, which is relatively rare. Even at Columbia, it’s just a minor, not a major. So Barnard kind of checked all of my boxes. I knew that if I got into every college in the US, I’d still go there. So I applied ED.</p>
<p>Bubblefiller: I suppose you could each have your own mini-fridge, but space might be an issue. It depends how you arrange your room and what kind of configuration you end up in. My roommate and I had one, but we stored very little in there. With the unlimited meal plan, I ate almost exclusively in the dining hall. The fridge was mostly for takeout leftovers and keeping drinks cold. Honestly, I don’t know why you’d want two. Unless you plan to cook a LOT for yourself, and that would be pretty tricky.
As for how to prep, I did some research online and pulled a bunch of dorm shopping lists and worked from there. When we got to my room, my parents and I realized that I had neither a bedside table, nor a bedside lamp. Luckily, there was a vendor fair on the lawn for precisely that reason - so we ran out and bought them! I believe there are also trips to Bed Bath and Beyond, in case you need to go. (And even if you miss those trips, BB&B is very easy to get to from Barnard. The doormen there will even hail a cab for you on the way back if what you’re carrying is too clunky.) The Columbia bookstore also sells some basics, like towels and ethernet cords.
So if you forget anything, it shouldn’t be a problem.</p>
<p>What sort of activities and events can a prospective student expect - ones that are unique to Barnard? For example, Swarthmore has ‘Screw Your Roommate’ which allows you to pair your roommate with a fellow co-year in complementary costumes (eg, sine-cosine, Joan of Arc-God, etc.) Vassar has it’s own ‘Muggle Quidditch Team’. I want to know about activities that’ll draw students in. </p>
<p>What drew you to the school? </p>
<p>Also, where can I read some of the essays written by current students?</p>
<p>Hi selzilla,</p>
<p>are you asking about Barnard’s traditions? there are a few. I think the most popular would be Midnight Breakfast - the night before exams start, everybody gathers in the gym for breakfast served by the deans and members of the board of trustees. it’s a big party and it always has a fun theme.
there’s also Big Sub, which is a line of sandwiches that stretches from one end of campus to the other. it’s gone pretty quickly!
and there are other things, like Spirit Day and the Greek Games.</p>
<p>honestly, none of these things drew me to Barnard. in my post above I’ve mentioned my reasons in greater detail, but I wanted to be in New York and I wanted to study medieval history and Barnard seemed like a comfortable place to do that.</p>
<p>as for essays, do you mean application essays? I know you can find former students’ theses on department websites, but I’m not sure that you can read application essays anywhere.</p>
<p>Hey mrbc2011,
Thanks for the reply. Yeah, that pretty much covers what I was asking. As for essays, I did mean application essays. Some college websites have a page dedicated to ‘Essays that worked’ or something similar. While the Barnard website hasn’t got anything of the sort, I was wondering if there’s any site where students have posted their application essays so we can get an idea of what works and what doesn’t. Or just draw some inspiration from - I’m still clueless about what I want my CommonApp essay to be on!</p>