<p>I was wondering if I had a chance at Smith ED...I have a 1340 SAT (700 v, 640 m). I play a varsity sport and have won a few writing awards. My recs and essay will be good, but I only have a 3.25 gpa. This is from a competative private school, and I've held a b+ for the past two years. I know this will probably hurt my chances a lot....anyone know my chances? Thanks in advance.</p>
<p>Hopeful, because of the single-sex factor, Smith goes deeper into the pile than would a comparable co-ed school. Your SAT is a little above average (vs. 1260) and I think you have a good chance as long as you're in the top 25 percent of your class. Below 25 percent and it gets into the "Who knows?" range...you might, you might not.</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>Thanks. My school doesn't rank...do you think that will hurt or help me? Also would you say Smith is a match or a reach? Thanks so much for your help!</p>
<p>I would say that you are a match... I would agree that it depends on the extracurriculars, special talents, etc too... Good luck with it and I'm applying too!</p>
<p>Hmmm... I have a 28 on the ACTs(I've heard equiv to a 1260-70), 3.94 u/w GPA, 4.5 weighted, 5th out of ~350 in class... bunches of extracurriculars AND I want to be in their engineering program. What do you think my chances are?</p>
<p>I met with the Admissions Department on Monday - doing some consulting about homeschoolers for them. After two years of study by a committee consisting of the faculty and the office of institutitional research, they have received clear direction from the President to heavily de-emphasize test scores. They couldn't find any correlation between test scores and academic performance among students once they arrived, and the use of the test scores worked at cross purposes from Smith's historic commitments to economic diversity. The Admissions Director told me point blank that she can't even remember the last time test scores were used to make or break an admissions decision.</p>
<p>What they want is intellectual excitement, strong passions, proven ability to do the work, and excellent writing skills. As they say several dozen times on their website "Heady and Nervy". Prove to them that you are both, and you are in (and without them, you are in trouble, regardless of test scores.)</p>
<p>That is great to hear. I've got two <em>stellar</em> recs which both say how different I am from every other student they've taught and in my essay I explain my background which elaborates on these recs. Good luck to all applying!</p>
<p>the engineering program is exceptional, and was one of d's top reasons for choosing smith. so far in first term she loves it. she has more classroom interaction with students than she would likely experience in a traditional engineering program. her Engr100 class project team of four students have compatible strengths, get along great, and have been meeting twice a week to develop designs for an educational toy and prepare project presentations to class. lots of work, but d says it's rewarding. during a recent visit to hasbro toy factory, d became friends with several upper class engineering majors and found out she could join another student team to plan a zero-gravity experiment at NASA next spring. do you have a chance? certainly yes, just identify and clarify what it is that draws you to smith. d's experiences and those of others can illuminate factors most important to you.</p>
<p>So a Smith College admission rep came to visit my high school today, along with the President (!). Nobody else seemed to be much interested in Smith, so I got to ask a whole bunch of questions. So here goes:
The engineering program: The most interesting part is that the engineering program is problem-solving based (as opposed to rote-learning based) right from the very beginning. Also, it is based in a liberal-arts setting. All engineers have to satisfy distribution requirements from 7 different areas (ways of learning, I think it's called?). It's difficult to double-major as an engineer (but it is common with other majors), but the engineering major leaves you one credit short of a physics minor.
The distribution requirements: There are none. Smith trusts students to take the individual responsibility to be responsible for their own learning. (I thought the trusting part was pretty cool.) However, if you want to graduate with Latin Honors, you need to fulfill the same 7 requirements that engineering majors do. Opportunities in the arts are very much there, even for non-majors. The president told a story about running into a physics major in arts building and finding out that the physics major was there to take a photography course. I was definitely under the impression that stories like that were very common. Also, you can take a certain number courses pass/fail.<br>
The queer campus culture: Basically, they said, "Smith is one of the healthiest environments in terms of expressing sexual orientation that I've ever been in. Some of the older alumni are uncomfortable with this, and ask what we're going to do about the lesbian problem. And we say that we're not going to do anything about it, because it's not a 'problem'." (That's paraphrased, not verbatim.) I think they thought I was worried about the large homosexual presence of campus; I actually asked about it to see what the official perspective was. I was <em>VERY</em> impressed by their candid and forthright answer. (For the record, lesbians are terrific! Even more so when they want to date me :) )
Admissions: I asked them directly about what they look for in admission candidates. They said that the most most most important factor is a good high school record in challenging courses. After that came teacher recs and your personal statement. The SATs are required, but they seemed to have mentioned them as an afterthought. I asked them about people who graduate early/apply to Smith before they graduate from high school, too. They only receive about 10-15 such applications each year, but those applications are treated normally, maybe requiring a second read, nothing more. They also require early applicants to have an interview, but that's just to assess maturity and readiness. Also, they are DEFINITELY looking for assertive and feisty women.<br>
That just about sums up my encounter. I'd heard terrific things about Smith before, both from friends/family and my own college research, but I don't think I can express just how impressed I was or quite how excited this exchange made me. I could go on in this vein for a while, but suffice to say that if you want to spend 4 years of your life being surrounded by confident, assertive, intelligent women, Smith is an option you should definitely consider.<br>
This post is super long, so I'll stop here. Hope I helped some of you!</p>
<p>hey_la : that physics-major/photography student is my girlfriend! she's great, as is smith. Carol Christ was right....science students definitely take classes outside their areas, and so do other kids. My girlfriend is a physics major/ history minor who's only one credit shy of a studio art minor (but smith only lets you take one minor anyway). I am a government major who considered religion and statistics minors before deciding to design a Social Science Methodology minor. And one of my favorite alums was a chem major/ self designed Church-State Relations minor. Even if you don't decide to major or minor in something, you can still take classes in it. I'm trying acting next semester, just for the heck of it. </p>
<p>I hope you'll keep your enthusiasm for smith and end up attending--if you have any questions, feel free to post back and ask me.</p>
<p>Stacy: Wow, what a crazy coincidence! I guess it really <em>is</em> a small world.<br>
Thank you for your offer to answer questions...I hope you don't regret it, I have a whole bunch :). I was reading an LJ community of another women's college, and somebody commented that science majors are looked down on a bit. Is that true in any way at Smith? Also, Smith seems to have extensive internship and research opportunities for students; is it easy to take advantage of those opportunities? Do sports/music ensembles/extracurriculars eat your life, or is it possible to be involved in a variety of different activities and still get a decent amount of sleep/maintain your grades? And finally, what is the social scene like, in particular, the queer dating scene?
I'm pretty young and won't be applying until next fall or possibly the fall after that, depending on how things turn out. But, I've done my fair share of college research, and from what I've read/head, Smith consistantly seems to stick out as a place where I would be happy, fit in, and learn a lot. I'm glad you're having such a terrific experience there!</p>
<p>This is going to be kind of long, but I want to answer all your questions. </p>
<p>Science majors are definitely NOT looked down on at Smith. They mix with everyone else (except they spend more time in lab and at the science library) and are part of every team and club, and live in every house. If anything, what I've found is that non-science majors have a healthy respect for the science kids...math-phobia is a bit rampant at smith (one of my biggest pet peeves about the place), so anyone who can pass courses like "Nuclear and Particle Physics" or "Mathematical Statistics" is pretty well admired.</p>
<p>As for research and internships, Smith has a program called STRIDE (Student Research in Departments) where about 5% of the entering class is given research stipends to work with professors their first and sophomore year. I worked with a sociology prof. and it was great! If you're not STRIDE, it's harder to get research jobs at the beginning of your smith career, but probably easier than at other schools. Especially in the sciences professors get to hire a lot of research assistants/ graders. Internships are good too--we have a strong alumnae network and while I've heard the Career Development Office is stronger with business/humanities stuff than sciences, they know about a lot of different opportunities. They'll help you polish your resume, do mock interviews, etc. Most science students I know do research for at least one summer, either at smith or through a National Science Foundation-funded program (REUs). Smith also has the Praxis program, which gives each student a one-time $2000 stipend to do an unpaid summer internship (that's an overview--I can tell you more praxis details if you want, because i'm figuring out where I want to go with it next summer).</p>
<p>Smithies are busy, no doubt about it, and if you're a science student your time will be more regimented just because you're in class and lab more hours than a humanities student would be. But there are scientists on sports teams, music ensembles, all the clubs, etc. One of my friends is a biochem major who plays in the orchestra and leads Smith's community service group. Another is a math major who also captains the swim team. Their grades are both amazing. My suggestion is to sign up for everything that interests you right away, and drop what you can't handle later on. </p>
<p>The queer dating scene at Smith is probably better than nearly any other college's. There are tons of people to date and no one's going to say anything if you want to hold your girlfriend's hand. "Speed dating" and "date auctions" run by different orgs always have both straight and queer parts, and I've never felt odd bringing a female date to a party. If anything, I think the straight people at smith have it harder, because they have to look more off-campus for guys. The one slightly negative thing about smith in the dating respect is its size. It's a fairly insular community, and chances are by your senior year you'll have class with/ live in the same house as either an ex, or a friend's ex, or an ex's friend, etc....</p>
<p>Wow, most of it sounds terrific, especially the examples you cited of well-rounded Smithies. It's great that there are so many non-academic things to participate in, and even more better that the women at Smith are the kind of people who take advantage of those opportunities. Smith sounds exciting! The math phobia observation is kind of...interesting, but I guess it's to be expected at most non-tech schools.<br>
Just one last question-- what are your other pet peeves about Smith? (And if there are any parents out there who could answer that question from their daughters' experiences, that would be kinda nice, too!)
Thank you again for your very, very thorough answer! It was very much appreciated.</p>
<p>good question about the pet peeves! here are a few, with the disclaimer that despite them, I think the good things at smith well outweigh the bad.</p>
<p>*the weather. I come from 200 miles south of Smith, and never thought the winters would be so much worse. </p>
<p>*the complaining. i don't mind activism (in fact i support it!) but whining about dinner all the time is just babyish, and some smithies do it.</p>
<p>*cliquishness, especially along racial lines. while smithies SAY they're open to people of all races, most don't have truly mixed friendship groups.</p>
<p>*compared to other schools, a lack of what my mom called "diversity of thought" among the students AND faculty. Nearly everyone is liberal. They won't hate you if you're not, but you will be outnumbered.</p>
<p>Hi! I'm also an another Smith student. A first year, actually. I think stacy said a lot of things already... But if you want to try to get a first year's perspective, just e-mail me (by clicking on my profile). I will be glad to answer any questions for you but try to keep in mind that you're only hearing from a first year who is... still settling in in her first semester. But I really have learned A LOT in the past three months! Again, just drop me a line, even if it's the stupidest question EVER.</p>
<p>hey my stats are like yours except my gpa is a bit lower and sat score a bit higher (3.2 or a bit lower, 1410) and good ecs (no sports, but i dance.) good luck to us both!</p>
<p>i know a girl who got into Smith with below a 1000.</p>