<p>I'm posting for a friend, but heres the situation:</p>
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I've become quite interested in teaching (high school or college, possibly physics), and My HS teacher recommends going someplace that has good teachers as well as opportunities for tutoring and teaching. However, I also want to get some research experience, in case teaching turns out not to be for me.</p>
<p>I think the financial aid is pretty similar for either schools.</p>
<p>I'm aiming for a physics major and a music major or minor or concentration. I haven't thought much about an education degree.</p>
<p>I'm fine with the atmosphere of Claremont or Palo Alto. I'm ambivalent about academic intensity, but I'm curious what you guys have to say about it.</p>
<p>I'm fine with no education degree program, as long as I can experience excellent teaching from the teachers themselves, and possibly get opportunities to tutor or teach (like in the academic center). (I guess I'd be more likely to lead a problem-solving session or something at Stanford.)</p>
<p>I'm also wondering about about two things: the prevalence of academic nerdiness (ex: "Wow, that lecture on de Broglie was amazing", "I wonder what it implies for tachyons", "I challlenge you to can calculate the de Broglie wavelength of that tree"); and teaching opportunities (ex: teaching a problem solving session, tutoring; not so much teaching research, I think, which appears to be the focus of the School of Education)
<p>This is a tough call to make, but if the priority is teaching experience, Mudd provides quite a bit of that. Besides AE tutoring for core courses and various tutors assigned to upper level courses such as TBP tutors for engineering and grutors for CS classes, Mudd also runs an outreach science bus program for nearby elementary schools and a homework hotline for students in grades 4-12. Both the programs seem eager to recruit, so getting placement shouldn’t be a problem for a motivated student, and they’ll provide plenty of hands-on experience working with students.</p>
<p>Academic nerdiness is definitely strongly present at Mudd, though like most places you find your crowd. If you want to avoid it you can (to a degree, anyway), and if you want to throw yourself right into you can easily find a group of people willing to engage with you in the nerdiest of conversations. It’s probably easier to find here than at Stanford, but unless you really love being surrounded by that kind of atmosphere, I’m certain you could find similar groups of people at Stanford if you looked.</p>
<p>The atmosphere of Claremont is rather quiet, there’s absolutely nothing to do in the town at night. Then again, I’ve spent a summer at Stanford and Palo Alto and Palo Alto doesn’t seem to be the most exciting town in the world either. In both cases it seems the campus is the place to be; one is just considerably larger than the other. Academic intensity? While intense, Mudd is VERY collaborative, it’s expected of the students. I can’t speak confidently for Stanford.</p>
<p>Harvey Mudd has I think one music professor, and I think he focuses more on electronic music and composing? Pomona and Scripps both have excellent music programs however. If your friend wants to pursue music, Harvey Mudd requires a humanities concentration which is 4 classes. Depending on your major and schedule, you should also be able to take a couple more classes beyond that.</p>
<p>So it seems one can do a major at Mudd and minor or even double major in music at another of the Claremont colleges? My son is big into music and would probably like to minor in it but probably will major in math or physics. (Not interested in engineering, bio, CS, or chem) If he went to Mudd, would he walk to the other college (Pomona, I assume) to take his music classes? He also would want to be a part of the symphony if he got into that. </p>
<p>Stanford, I understand, has amazing music programs.</p>
<p>Major at Mudd + minor in Music seems quite feasible, as I know friends minoring in other subjects. Double majoring would be difficult, because Mudd requires quite a few technical classes, and also imposes distribution requirements on the humanities to be taken. Yes, most classes in Music would be taken off-campus at Scripps or Pomona. Orchestra and band are consortium activities, but usually held at Pomona campus.</p>
<p>As a Mudd music student, you’re actually more likely to be part of the Joint Music Program. Pomona has their own music department, but the other 4 colleges combine to make joint music (here’s info from Scripps…scroll down a little bit:[Scripps</a> College : Music Department](<a href=“http://www.scrippscollege.edu/academics/department/music/index.php]Scripps”>http://www.scrippscollege.edu/academics/department/music/index.php)). However, Mudd students are still allowed in the Pomona ensembles if they’d rather be those groups for some reason. I think most people who go to Pomona for music go there because of scheduling issues. The Joint Orchestra and Choir practices are closer, and I’m pretty sure that those ensembles are considered better than their Pomona counterparts (after all, they’re drawing from 4 schools instead of just 1). Pomona has the only Band, and it’s not very high quality (it’s the only non-audition group, as far as I’m aware), but it’s good for Mudder’s who don’t like to practice much. The other groups are pretty competitive, and to my half-trained ear, they sound amazing.</p>
<p>While the distribution requirements definitely are a limiting factor, they aren’t as bad as they used to be. The new “distribution” requirement is that students must take courses in 5 different academic subjects (out of 10 total required hums). So, 6 Music courses and 4 in some other subjects. And if you use your free electives on Music, you can fit in at least 1 more, probably 3 or so if you choose either math or physics by the end of your sophomore year and don’t take any more courses in the other subject. From there, you could overload and get the music major. It’s ridiculous and inadvisable, but not impossible (Prof. Yong did it when he was here! But Prof. Yong is also a genius…). Most people just get their music fix by playing in an ensemble or two and taking lessons (voice and piano mostly). Two of my closest friends probably spend 10 hours a week on music each, but neither will be getting any sort of official recognition. It’s about the passion, not the words on the diploma (after all, what are you going to do with a music minor???)</p>