<p>Hey PowerBar. I turned down a lot of amazing schools, such as Stanford, University of Chicago, and Columbia to go to Pomona. I think your problem is not your expectations, but the fact that you have been approaching Pomona with the wrong mindset. Pomona is not as superficial as its endowment, its traditions, its location, or its weather- it is above all that.</p>
<p>The focus at Pomona, like many other top schools, is the academics. Everything else is secondary in focus. But what makes Pomona so exceptional compared to other top schools is how balanced these academic opportunities are, and the fact that the academics extend beyond the classroom. </p>
<p>The consortium is a big part of what makes Pomona unique. You’d be kidding yourself if you didn’t see that. Over 2500 small classes that are mostly offered seminar style. All with extremely accessible professors. Nowhere else in the USA offers that as conveniently as Pomona and the other consortium members do. So in a sense, you’re getting both the benefits of an elite liberal arts education and a mid-sized university. The consortium was a significant factor for me in that I’d have options available to me that a traditional liberal arts college may not be able to offer.</p>
<p>Pomona’s academics by themselves are exceptional however. The courses are rigorous, challenging, yet fulfilling. Which I’m sure applies to other schools as well. HOWEVER- The learning does not extend linearly with the professor and student. I stayed at classrooms at USC and Amherst and felt that was a big flaw of their learning. They were not encouraging student-professor interaction nearly as much as Pomona was. Questions were being tossed back and forth in the classroom, the stone-edged wording of textbooks and texts were ignored for freedom of thought and belief, and in the process, both the professors and the students were learning from each other. That WAS the factor that convinced me to choose Pomona over numerous similarly exceptional liberal arts colleges and national universities. Pomona seemed like it would facilitate an academic growth in me. It seemed like a place where I would be challenged and criticized, but cherished as well for inciting a new perspective for everyone else in the class. Even in the objective science classes, the openness of ideas was abound. The arguments emerged from seeking to find loopholes in the current system. From developing new methods and protocols. Don’t expect only learning for the sake of learning as other liberal arts colleges will give you. Expect learning for the sake of discovering yourself.</p>
<p>The academics at Pomona never stop in the classroom or when you’re doing homework. The school capitalizes on learning through many ways. The first is through the professors. Pomona professors are enthusiastic in taking students for research opportunities, internships, one-on-one tutorials, and plain “ordinary” conversations that expand the perspectives of both the student and the professor. The second is through the students. Pomona students may be one of the most academically distinguished student populations in the country, but it is not about the statistics, but rather how insightful they are. They’re complex figures that you will come to really appreciate later on in your life for their contradictions and nuances. They will make you feel stupid when you have intellectual conversations with them because you’ll realize that missing link in your perspectives. And in turn, you’ll show them what they may be missing as well. Unlike similarly intellectual schools like Swarthmore or Chicago however, this intellectual climate is not shoved down your throat. It is subtle, there for you to seek if you want it. And I really appreciate that element of balance. The third is through the events. The consortium as a whole, particularly Pomona and CMC, always brings interesting faces to give talks about all sorts of things, ranging from Islamic studies to World health to nonprofit business to judicial perspectives. It’s a way to once again see learning from several viewpoints so that you can mold your own. The last is opportunity. Pomona as you know has a massive endowment, but it’s not how big it is that matters but rather how Pomona uses it. Your ideas will be funded for you. Whether you need new lab equipment. Or a rare book that is not at the library. Or a summer program at Japan. Or the initial funds to start your own project. </p>
<p>I don’t deny that several schools may offer some of the above factors, but Pomona offers them ALL. The combination of a free learning environment, the brilliant people, the intellectual vibe, and the funding to ensure that you’re not limited in your time there is the factor that convinced me to choose Pomona over everything else, not the consortium, not the “death by chocolate”, not the beautiful campus.</p>
<p>Another significant thing that separates the climate at Pomona from other top schools is the nurturing environment. I stayed at 7 other colleges for diversity programs or admit weekends and nowhere else did I encounter that as significantly as Pomona gave me. And I needed it. I needed that support to ensure that I wouldn’t fall. I came from a homeless, troubled, low income life. Constantly on the run, constantly making mistakes due to lack of experience. I literally made best friends at Pomona on the first day. I never felt I was discriminated as a basis of my race or my income. There were no cliques at Pomona. There was definitely a community vibe everywhere I looked. Warmth emanated from the campus and I was personally greeted by strangers who talked to me about their perspectives in the school. That can’t be said about cold, desolate, thriving Columbia, where I felt lost, afraid, and judged. Stanford seemed too fast-paced for me: I had little experience with the entrepreneurial, individualistic nature that the vast majority of the students seemed to encompass, and despite its laidback friendliness, Stanford didn’t seem like a place that would take care of you. Pomona seemed like a great fit for me because it would challenge me yet ensure that I always had someone making sure I wasn’t falling behind. I felt that I needed that transition from teenage years to adulthood before going into a community as rapidly different as several top national universities, and Pomona seemed like that place for me. Looking at your responses, you seem to feel that this causes the students to become too sheltered. I disagree with your evaluation and feel it’s a lot more complex. You clearly have to put in some effort yourself to get what you want. Pomona provides you the opportunities and you take advantage of them. If you don’t put in this initial effort, you will not receive any feedback. And plus, with a community as integrated, tightly-knit as it, you not only are given meaning, but you give meaning to the multifaceted face of Pomona. It’s a much more dimensional community than it seems to be on paper. </p>
<p>You think that by granting us all these features that Pomona is spoiling us. It might be, but it’s not as straightforward as that. Pomona is like other elite universities a tough, rigorous place. The shift can be quite drastic from laughable high school courses to advanced, multidimensional college courses, but Pomona ensures that its students can thrive by ensuring a low stress, high opportunity setting. The traditions it offers are not to spoil the students but to give the school a distinct culture from other schools- you’d be kidding yourself if you think that the only things these traditions do is to spoil the students. No, they are to build lasting friendships, memories, and recollections of times that you will deeply miss after your four years at Pomona. They are to provide an experience beyond the academic realm. It’s one of the things I love about the school- how deep it goes, both academically and extracurricularly. You do not go to International Festival at CMC to be spoiled but to learn about cultures that are not your own, to share in the joy of representing such a diverse community. You do not go to the Draper Center’s subsidized 47 Trips solely for a leisurely experience but to try out things you may not have done before. College is a unique time in your life to enhance your perspectives, winnow down what your true passions are, and make memories that you will reminiscence for a life time. Pomona does not spoil us but rather gives us countless opportunities to make the most of our time there. The puppies or the massages are only one tiny smidge of life at Pomona- you shouldn’t be considering it if you feel that is all what the school comes to represent.</p>
<p>Statistics are not what differentiate Pomona from other top schools. The various luxuries that you may think differentiate us are not the reason we ultimately choose Pomona. Yes, we appreciate the beautiful campus, the amazing weather, the astounding profile of our incoming class, the balanced social life, the countless things to do on campus, the mammoth endowment, the quirky traditions, the good food, the spacious dorms, and the world class facilities, but we ultimately turn down every Ivy League, countless other liberal arts colleges, and other highly regarded universities such as Stanford, Duke, MiT, and Northwestern for the openness of Pomona’s environment, the nurturing community, the amazing people, the fulfilling academics, and that vibe that the school is truly your best fit. My account of Pomona is only one of the several ways you can look at Pomona, and I think that is a wonderful thing. Pomona is such a complex institution that you can look at it from angle and compare it with the next and see something new. The element of balance that the school has, which means that there is something here for everyone, and the fact that the school manages to synthesize this diversity into a reflection of one of the best schools in the country is truly amazing. As Collegebuff says- a symbiotic relationship between the school and its students is what truly comes to represent Pomona. </p>
<p>I urge you to visit the campus, get detailed perspectives from current students and alumni, and explore the massive website to see for yourself what Pomona is, and in particular, for you. Statistics and numbers do not tell the tale. </p>
<p>As for your proposition of the Ivy League of the West, we all feel it is a stupid phrase. We turned down Pomona because it is distinctly wonderful from other elite universities. We chose the “less” prestigious option because we truly wanted to be here, not because we want to tell other people we went here. After all, it’s not what the school makes for you but what you make of the school, and we feel we’d thrive at a place that would be the best fit for us. Do we care that we’re not given the same publicity as Brown, or Stanford, or Dartmouth? No, we don’t. We’re not as superficial as rankings as you think we may be. You may feel Pomona is always secondly compared to other schools, but we don’t. We hold a lot of respect and pride for our school because we know that it maintains its own, unique place among the best schools in the country. There’s a reason nearly 100% of us return the next year instead of transferring to seemingly more prestigious institutions, and we get transfers from several of these schools. It’s not to affirm that Pomona is a better school, but rather a better school FOR US. And knowing that Pomona has some of the highest medical school rates in the country, amazing PhD production, high representation in the nation’s best graduate programs, and recruiting by some of the nation’s most respected companies, we don’t regret our decision, for we know it will benefit us in the future as well.</p>