<p>What's it like? How are the coaches? Being on the team? Facilities? Schedule? Is the team competitive within the league? How does it integrate with student life, studies, etc.? All you can tell re swimming at Vassar and academics and student life there in general, please!</p>
<p>Swimming at Vassar is intense yet relaxed. How can this be? Well the team is serious about their training but still enjoys the process. We know several seniors who do not have the strongest times yet have swam all four years because they love it. One that we know well is trying to find a way to keep swimming in his life after graduation. The team is very supportive of each other and will attend each other’s concerts, plays , exhibits etc. The team has a few out of league meets to swim against teams of varying levels. So those meets actually become a learning experience and not ‘just the same league meets’ all the time. Overall the team has been getting stronger despite the lure of all the opportunities that Vassar has to offer.</p>
<p>I am currently on the swim team and I love it. I went into college thinking that I would never ever do athletics after high school; I never even signed the recruitment form. However, when I visited, I met members of the team and they were exceptionally friendly and welcoming–they were a big part of my decision to join the team in the end. My visit was very representative of what the team was/is like. The swim team at Vassar is incredibly friendly and a better term would be that they’re a family. As the above poster mentioned, we support each other even outside swimming including music concerts, plays, and everything else. The coaches are very dedicated and passionate as well and often want to know what we do outside of swimming. They understand our busy schedules and will try to accommodate different practice schedules so that people won’t miss practice. That being said, swimmers at Vassar can really balance school, swimming, and other extracurriculars. The coaches understand that our priority at Vassar is our academics and that swimmers join on the side, whatever the level. We have new swimmers to extremely competitive swimmers. While the men’s team lacked members last year, this year was a huge jump and we’ve really made our presence known in our league and against our competitors. As for the pool, we have a really nice pool (although I’m from the west coast where pool are so much more amazing) and our pool is definitely nicer than many of the schools we swim against. The meet schedule is great; almost all the meets, with a couple of exceptions, are on saturdays so that they don’t conflict with class schedules. If you have any more questions about the program, definitely contact the coaches; they are super duper excited to talk to interested prospective students and their families.</p>