<p>Hey guys I figure we should start a thread for those of us who have been admitted already. Ok basic structure is are you going? How sure are you? Any actitvities you plan on doing at Tech? Anything to tell those who are applying RD that will help their app?</p>
<p>Ok, I'm 99% sure I'm going seen the campus loved it. I'm only applying to 1 other school U. Chicago(MIT Princeton Yale and Cornell hit the garbage today )</p>
<p>At Caltech I want to run Cross Country and Track </p>
<p>For anyone still working on an RD app make absolutely sure your love for science is shown. DO EVERYTHING YOU CAN TO SHOW YOU LIKE SCIENCE ALOT.</p>
<p>Well good luck to everyone I'm so excited right now</p>
<p>Here :) - I'm thinking of setting up a mailing list or forum for admitees if Caltech doesn't provide one for us - let me know if you're willing to bite. I'll also try to make an instant messenger database if people aren't willing to go for the former.</p>
<p>Elizabeththegrey -- Caltech won't provide a forum or mailing list for you. Traditionally, someone from the admitted class has set up a mailing list (it's been on Yahoo Groups the past couple years) and invites everyone in the new class (you'll get a full list sometime in the middle of the summer). If you want to be the one to set it up, you could probably ask the students who set it up in the past if you want advice. Last year's group was caltech2008 the year before it was Caltech-2007.</p>
<p>Excellent. I'm a phpBB guru, so forums it is. <a href="http://caltech2009.ctyalcove.org%5B/url%5D">http://caltech2009.ctyalcove.org</a> will be up by the end of this weekend. The registration form will ask you for the 10th word of the last paragraph of the acceptance letter. If someone wants to fork over $10, we could have a domain name, but I'm short on cash at the moment, and I don't see any reason to pay for something that'll only be used about 9 months.</p>
<p>Status:
[done] hostname
[in progress] clear my plate of the piles of homework I've managed to accumulate
[] phpBB install
[] tweaking
[] ready for public consumption</p>
<p>Anyway, I'm going with 85% certainty (assuming there is a 15% chance of MIT admitting me after the deferral.) Activities... hm, hopefully I'll play clarinet in the orchestra. I might run cross country. Going to major in CS.</p>
<p>Advice for RD's? Well, sort of what Born2run said, but also show your love for nerd culture. I think that helped me.</p>
<p>Regarding MIT, I was in a similar position last year. Unless things have changed, MIT (and Harvard) like to use polite deferrals (eg. H rejected only 135 for the early pool this year)--so if you're deferred and really want to go to MIT, you should compete pretty fiercely (and hopefully you downplayed the nerd factor for MIT already).</p>
<p>But really, if you like the nerd culture, I think you'll find a whole slew of advantages that Caltech provides. I'm going to see if I can get our most recent Rhodes scholar to help out (he's an amazing Caltech troll!).</p>
<p>Yes, I agree that Caltech would probably be better for me in many respects. However, one of my main interests is linguistics. I looked through the Caltech course catalog and didn't see a single linguistics class. That's my main reason for wanting to go to MIT.</p>
<p>Yeah, my reason to choose MIT over Caltech is that some of my best friends are going to Boston area (Harvard, MIT, Tufts, BU, etc.)
And I really want to see something different, as I currently live about 30 miles away from Pasadena.</p>
<p>That's pathetic - it won't let me edit my previous post.</p>
<p>Status:
I've done a clean phpBB install, and the hostname and such are all set up. I need to do some tweaking on it - it'll be ready some time tomorrow.</p>
<p>Almost ready for public consumption. Adding some authentication to make sure that only admittees are able to register, then I'll open the doors.</p>
<p>platypeanArchcow - As much as I hate to discourage anyone from coming to Caltech and majoring in CS, I want to make sure you come here with your eyes wide open. CS is a very new major (last year was the first year it was offered as an option) and has a very small department. Most major classes are only offered every other year, and sometimes only the first term of the three term sequence is offered. That said, it is getting phenomenally better every year (hey, two years ago there was no major) and we're working on all these problems. (I'm on the student-faculty committee to advise about changes that need to be made in the CS option.) If you'd like, feel free to message me personally on the board, or on AIM (alleya17) with what area you're interested in and I can go into more detail about the availability of courses in that area.</p>
<p>Okay, I'm Sherwin from Mission Viejo, California (about 55mi. from Caltech). If I get into MIT there's a great chance I'm going there (I was deferred), if I don't then there's a great chance I'm going to CIT.</p>
<p>What do I want to do at Caltech? Not sure, make some awesome new friends I suppose.</p>
<p>Advice... Everything borntorun said is pretty accurate (about showing your passion for science), but I didn't really do much of that, in fact I got a 680 in Physics (I got a 740 in Chem afterward, but I don't think Caltech ever got that score), which is probably extremely weak by CIT standards, instead I showed a love for math, and for the little rectangle thing give them something funny (I think that might help), don't worry about whether it'll help you, just try to give them something that'll make the admissions officers have an entertaining minute or two. But again on the passion thing, show a love for science, math, or engineering, but the latter is something that most of us don't have a direct experience with (most community college transfers who want to transfer into engineering haven't taken engineering courses either). Oh and if there's something specific you like (applying mathematics to orbital theory in chem/physics, biology on the nano-level, a specific branch of experimental economics, application of integral transforms, or whatever), whether it's purely academic, or an area where research is currently being conducted in, go ahead, that way you can show more, rather than just rambling on how science in general is interesting (which can also work if done cleverly).</p>
<p>This probably goes without saying, but make sure you've done your research on Caltech so you can really show that you're not just a joke applicant, an "on-a-whim" applicant, or someone who's just applying to Caltech based on the name, one of the essays will really help you express your passion for the campus, it's people, and whatnot.</p>