Princeton FAQ: Get your questions answered by current students

<p>if you guys want chances, please make a chance thread, not in here.</p>

<p>Assuming that since you applied to Princeton, you must have applied to several other Ivies:</p>

<p>What made Princeton stand out from the other Ivies to you?</p>

<p>I know a portion of your answer could probably be found on the website, especially in the student profiles, but that’s just the website and student profiles, the latter of which to me, doesn’t explain why they love Princeton so much (they could explain their love a bit more). I’d like to get more personal answers.</p>

<p>Ha, sorry if that last part sounded a bit bratty
</p>

<p>But thank you very much for taking the time to answer my question! :)</p>

<p>@thisismymingzi: I applied to Princeton, Columbia, and Brown. Princeton’s financial aid stood head and shoulders above all of the schools I applied to, although I’ve heard that Stanford, Yale, and Harvard offer comparable aid. I was waitlisted at Columbia and accepted at Brown, which offered me no financial aid whatsoever. Compare that with over $20K worth of aid at Princeton, and you’ll see why my decision was made for me!</p>

<p>Apart from the financial aid factor, individual attention and close interaction with professors was one of the main things that made Princeton stand out, at least to me. From what I can tell, Princeton and Dartmouth emphasize this far more than Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Penn. (I just haven’t heard much about Cornell or Brown.) Of course, grade deflation is a pain in the rear end but if you want the education without going broke, Princeton is the way to go.</p>

<p>Hi everyone! Really looking forward to starting Princeton next month. The Freshman Seminar application is due in a day or two and I have a quick question. On the website, it states that whether or not we get into the course(s) is largely based upon luck. What other factors are there? I’m extremely interested in one seminar in particular. Do you think I have a better chance of getting it if I don’t pick a second or third choice?</p>

<p>Sometimes the professors look for certain qualities in their students. For instance, Pres. Tilghman’s FRS last year was based on biology, so everyone she admitted had plenty of biology experience. In my FRS, which was a humanities course, the professor actively sought prospective majors in all fields in order to bring a variety of perspectives to the class. So oftentimes the class is selected at the professor’s discretion, but it is largely unknown what criteria each professor uses. I don’t think there are any real hard data to suggest anything about the odds of getting one’s first-choice FRS based on whether or not one applies to other FRS courses as well. All I know is that of the four people in my quad last year, three got our first choices for spring FRS (none of us took them in the fall), and the fourth got his second choice (his first choice was the extremely popular Cornel West seminar). I only applied to one, and my three roommates all applied to three.</p>

<p>Alright, thanks for the information. I’m going to just apply to one, and if I don’t get in, I’ll apply for it again in the Spring.</p>

<p>OA dorm check-in starts at 8am. What time should we arrive on campus? Better to get there before 8am or wait an hour or so? We arrive the day before so we can get to campus at any time that day. Any other move-in tips would be appreciated.</p>

<p>You’ll want to have enough time to move in and be done by 3 pm. I don’t think it makes sense to get there before 8am, as you won’t be able to do anything until then. If your s/d has a single or their roommates are also doing OA, getting there at 8 AM would give you the most possible time to get everything set up. However, if your s/d’s roommates won’t be there yet, you probably won’t be able to do all that much in terms up set up, so you won’t need quite as much time. </p>

<p>If they have a suite, I really recommend talking to roommates ahead of time and deciding who’s living in what room (you can get floorplans online to help with that). </p>

<p>Also, remember that there will be plenty of time the Saturday after they get back to get completely set up. </p>

<p>If you have any more questions about move in, I’d be happy to answer.</p>

<p>Hi I’m an incoming freshman and I have a question about buying a laptop and support services. Right now I am thinking that I want to get a Macbook Air, but that’s not available through the SCI. How helpful/important is it to get a computer through the SCI? If something happens to my computer and I didn’t buy it through them, how easy is it to get it fixed (assuming it is under warranty)? Also, is it easy to get software for a non-SCI computer?</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

<p>If it’s under warranty, you can get it fixed on campus really easily. Even if it’s not under warranty or is something that the warranty doesn’t cover, you can still get it fixed, but it won’t be free if it involves hardware. (this happened to me, and they did the repairs and got my computer back to me within a few days)</p>

<p>It seems like if you bought a computer with a warranty and that had microsoft office on it (most of the other software you’d want is either free or you can get it for free from Princeton), it would be comparable. It just would require a little bit more set up time.</p>

<p>Can anyone tell me how difficult to change major in Princeton? Thanks.</p>

<p>not hard at all. AB majors have until end of sophomore year to declare, while BSE engineering majors usually declare at the end of freshman year (but doesn’t mean that you still can’t switch majors, but will just be more difficult).</p>

<p>Changing your major is easy as long as you’ve on schedule with completing the requirements of the major you’re switching into. Some majors (particularly science and engineering ones) are hard to complete if you don’t start on the pre-requites during your freshmen year.</p>

<p>Can anyone comment on their engineering or pre-med experience at Princeton? thanks</p>

<p>What is the foreign language requirement for a non-engineering student?</p>

<p>One way to fulfill the language requirement is to get a 5 on the AP test or a really good score (not sure exactly, but in the high 700s) on the SAT II. If those things don’t apply but you’ve taken a language in high school, you can take a placement test. Depending on how you do, you can have an interview with someone in that department to get out of the requirement, or you’ll get placed into one of the 100 level classes. If you’re starting a language you haven’t studied before, you’ll generally have to take 3 semesters of classes.</p>

<p>For Spanish, you need a 760 on SAT Subject Test.</p>

<p>Does Princeton KNOW if you apply EA to another school? Do other schools “know” if you apply SCEA to Princeton?</p>

<p>Schools will tell you they do not “know” if you apply EA/ED at other schools, but after I was accepted ED to Princeton, Harvard contacted me; they’d “heard” that I’d been accepted to an early-decision program, and in accordance with the rules of Early Decision, were instructing me to withdraw my application from Harvard.</p>

<p>ray121988, Princeton does not do ED. Did you mean EA?</p>