<p>andi -- thank you for your feedback. how interesting. your son and i are alike in more than a few ways.. i also applied to Columbia (actually, the columbia-juilliard program). but want to hear something weird? my application got lost in the mail, and by the time i found out (after 14 days), juilliard had completely closed its admission office. the same thing happened with my university of rochester app.. it never reached them. (i had applied to URochester for the eastman-roch dual degree program)</p>
<p>interesteddad -- and thank you also for your helpful post. i haven't corresponded with any music departments, but swat, yale, and williams are willing to cover travel costs to their preview programs (and they're on different dates). so if my teachers let me, i will visit and directly talk with the piano professors/students.</p>
<p>With such a specialized interest as yours, I would definitely put together a little one paragraph introduction in an e-mail and send it to the chairman of the music department ahead of time. You could be frank in telling them the three schools you are considering and asking for a chance to meet with them (or with the appropriate person they suggest) to get a better feel about the programs they could put together for you.</p>
<p>If I were you, I would view it as a little test because, in your case, it's not so much the resources that are listed in the viewbook as much as the willingness of the professors to work out a program that fits your needs. As Mini has pointed out, a school can have all the world famous musicians in the world and it isn't going to mean a darn thing if you are never allowed to work with them.</p>
<p>I don't honestly know if Swarthmore is the right place for a conservatory-level music major or not. But, I am pretty sure that the faculty would put your interests above a "sales job" and give you an honest answer about how they would go about tailoring a piano program for you.</p>
<p>Janerdoo, congratulations on getting into Swarthmore! Thanks for your post. That's unbelievable about your app not reaching East/Roch and Jul/Col ! Must be some sort of omen. I think it pays to heed Interesteddad's advice about checking out the music opportunities as he seems to know a bit about Swarthmore. One of the reasons that S got interested in Swat was because when he was at chamber music programs in the summer he met two different people who were current/former Swat students who said that the chamber music was good there. However, they were both string players so perhaps that makes a difference.(?)
Maybe you'll both end up at Columbia! Do you ever play piano duo?
andi</p>
<p>i love all over the place.. but where is it you live? =P .. joking joking... hey you know, they only sent out 10% of the apps right? You'll receive yours a little later thats all...</p>
<p>no clue. today i got a call from a travel agent saying that he was organizing flights for kids who recently received their admissions decisions from swarthmore. he told me that i have to confirm by Monday because they are holding group rates on flight tickets and that I can choose to notify them up until March 31, 2005.</p>
<p>btw Swarthmore is picking up the tab on the flight and transportation.</p>
<p>Hmm... nothing yet... which I guess means no likely letter for sure for me. So when do the rest of us find out? Since it seems that I won't find out until towards the end of spring break, I think I now either 1) have to miss school or 2) just won't get to visit both of which would really bother me. Anyone else with a similar problem? Really wanting to not miss school but not wanting to choose a college without visiting? Or maybe they'll reject me and simplify the situation considerably.</p>
<p>marlgirl,
If you really don't want to miss school, just go ahead and visit during your break. I really think it is very unlikely that you will be rejected based on everything you've told us so far...</p>
<p>I called that the admin office and they said that the order in the admissions letters was of no consequence it was just in the order that the committee considered the applicants</p>
<p>I guess I'm a bit puzzled by how Swarthmore handles this "early write" stuff. With both Amherst and Williams, for instance, the "early write" letters explicitly stated that they were being sent out to only a small number of particularly well-qualified candidates. For those of you who have received an early regular-decision acceptance from Swarthmore, did their letter say something similar - or did it simply indicate that you'd been accepted?</p>
Normally, admissios letters are mailed in late March, but in your case, we wanted you to know early. The Admissions Committee was most impressed with your applaiction. Your strength as a student and your exceptional intellectual and personal qualities made you stand out among several thousand applicants to the college.
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</p>
<p>So there you have it, its cuz we are strong applicants that stood out.</p>
<p>nngmm, do you think it's really worth it to just go and visit colleges where I might not have been accepted? I'd feel <em>so</em> dumb if I visited and then got home to find a rejection letter. My #1 priority in visiting schools is to see Stanford (since, well, that's the only place I know for sure I got in) which starts the quarter on the 4th... so I'd go towards the end of the week (the 7-8th perhaps) which is maybe still too close to the start of the quarter to get an idea what the place is like, but oh well. Now, since I live in CA, I won't hear back from Swat until the 6th probably! Do you think I could call in on the 1st? Or should I just go and visit not knowing if I actually got in until the 6th?</p>