<p>Any advice for getting in off of it?</p>
<p>I’m in the same boat! Send in supplemental materials, I guess?</p>
<p>I was waitlisted too! No advice though. I’m not planning to stay on it (even though I love Oberlin) if that’s any help…at least it lessens the competition 
Best of luck!</p>
<p>Waitlist party! Sorry, I have no advice either. I just thought I’d join the fun. I’m taking my name off the list, so that’s one less person you have to compete with! :)</p>
<p>In case you missed it, Elizabeth Houston wrote a post about this year’s waitlist:</p>
<p>[Oberlin</a> Blogs | Blog Entry: “A Word to the Waitlisted”](<a href=“http://blogs.oberlin.edu/applying/applying/a_word_to_the_w.shtml]Oberlin”>http://blogs.oberlin.edu/applying/applying/a_word_to_the_w.shtml)</p>
<p>Oberlin left a message for my S at the end of the day today, saying they had some “news” and to call tomorrow. Sounds like–could it be–the waitlist decisions have begun? S was denied at Wesleyan, Vassar and Carleton, but Oberlin was in his top 4! He was accepted at Occidental and waitlisted at Macalester and Colorado College as well. He is going to be thrilled if he gets off the waitlist, although we have grown very fond of Oxy, the only school that accepted him, and offered him full tuition scholarship as well! I hope Oberlin can match that!
S sent in a statement to Oberlin last week, with some updates, saying why Oberlin was his first choice.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Is that true? It doesn’t sound like Oberlin really was his first choice, that it was only in his “top 4.” </p>
<p>In any event, good luck to your son.</p>
<p>Yes, Oberlin is his top choice now. The wait list statement is supposed to reflect current choices, not all the schools that denied him!</p>
<p>Just got off Oberlin waitlist!</p>
<p>Congrats, imak – and good luck to your son, domi555! Hope you get some good news!</p>
<p>My son got off the waitlist today too! Exciting, though we had gotten used to the idea of him going to Oxy, where the weather is much better:) He has until Monday to make a final decision. Anybody have any thoughts about Oberlin compared to Occidental? We are from the East Coast (Cambridge, MA).</p>
<p>I got off the waitlist Wednesday. I’m soo excited about it too, I wasn’t super jazzed about the place I had my deposit.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Oberlin has a lot of kids from Massachusetts and other parts of New England. I don’t know if the same applies to Occidental. As far as advantages and disadvantages, well, your son will be so busy studying he won’t have much time to venture into the big city (Los Angeles or Cleveland) so I don’t see much point in comparing the closest urban centers. For Occidental, think of the four other LACs in close proximity as an advantage, whereas Oberlin is basically all alone. For Oberlin, think of the world class Oberlin Conservatory a new multi-million dollar Jazz Conservatory and a campus alive with music. :)</p>
<p>Thanks, Plainsman.</p>
<p>Can anyone comment on the persevering perception of Oberlin as a school with a high “freak” factor? I have read so many comments re students being narcissistic and diva-ish. </p>
<p>Obviously a huge generalization, but just trying to figure out the mix and the predominant vibe, if there is one. I have read on various college review sites: “Everyone who did not fit in in High School ends up at Oberlin”. When we visited (twice), I was impressed with the smarts of the kids I talked to, but there was definitely a cultivated “look how different I am” quota. And how does the isolated “bubble” factor play into that?</p>
<p>Oxy does have an identifiable “bro” vibe, which my son is not crazy about, but has a redeeming lack of pretentiousness and a lot of socioeconomic diversity. Kids there seem to be going about pursuing their education with less irony perhaps, but more sincerity…they don’t seem to take themselves quite as seriously.</p>
<p>Thoughts, anybody?</p>
<p>I just got off the waitlist today! We’re flying to Oberlin tomorrow afternoon, and I have to decide by closing time on Monday. This rush is nerve-wracking, but I’m incredibly excited.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>domi555, that one is totally inaccurate. It’s a little bit hipster, a little bit hippie, a lot intellectual, and a lot musical. It’s been skewered by GQ Magazine as one of the “limousine liberal” schools, along with Brown U, Wesleyan, and others, but there is quite a bit of socioeconomic diversity. But there is a key difference between Oberlin and those east coast colleges. Oberlin is not on the east coast. It has a friendlier, less-pretentious midwestern vibe that shot it to the top of my D2’s list. She turned down an Ivy to go to Oberlin, in part because of what she felt was a difference between midwest and east coast in general tone and campus culture. My D was born and raised in the upper midwest but went to high school in the east, so she had a valid basis of comparison. After four years of high school on the east coast, I guess she’d had enough. Ohio isn’t exactly “upper” midwest but it’s midwest enough, I guess.</p>
<p>Here’s a link to a thread posted here two years ago with a similar question that included the word “freak.” I don’t take your inquiry in the same way the question was posed two years ago. Not at all. Still, you may find the reactions of posters on this board to that earlier question enlightening about Oberlin. As a somewhat conservative parent who has visited many times in the last two years, the “freak” rumor is utter nonsense. <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/oberlin-college/798296-letting-freak-flag-fly-going-too-far.html?highlight=letting+the+freak+flag+fly[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/oberlin-college/798296-letting-freak-flag-fly-going-too-far.html?highlight=letting+the+freak+flag+fly</a></p>
<p>domi555, I didn’t look closely at Occidental (too far from home!), so I can’t really help you compare. But I was thinking about your question while I was hanging out with my friends this evening…</p>
<p>Oberlin is, in many ways, a place where folks who didn’t fit in in high school can find an accepting crowd, and that was one of the thing that really drew me here. (Though of course there are plenty of students who were perfectly happy in high school, and by and large they do just fine here as well.) There’s not really a “mainstream” at Oberlin; there’s a huge range of socially acceptable dress, behavior, interests, etc. There are constant opportunities to try new and different things, and get to know new and different people – and that’s something we embrace. We’re curious about each other. We’re not frightened by our differences; we’re interested in exploring them.</p>
<p>I think that a lot of kids who are socially marginalized in high school feel the need to cultivate a style that’s deliberately different, as a way of asserting themselves and showing pride and strength in their difference. Some carry that to Oberlin with them. Over time, most ultimately figure out that there’s not really a need for it; the social norms and judgements that divide people in high school just aren’t a big deal here.</p>
<p>Many of my friends here were “freaks” in high school, for a lot of reasons – some relatively trivial (wrote poetry in Latin! skipped prom for a rally! never missed an episode of Doctor Who!), some less so (the only queer student). As students at Oberlin (or, in some cases, recent grads), they still have the traits that marked them as “different” in high school, but they don’t need to defend themselves anymore. They’re mature, balanced, confident and strong in their difference.</p>
<p>For the record, “lack of pretentiousness”, “pursuing their education with sincerity”, “don’t seem to take themselves seriously”… this describes my friends at Oberlin to a T, and it’s one of the reasons I chose Oberlin over the other schools I was considering. When I visited, I got the impression that the students I met were deeply passionate about their studies and willing to work hard to do well … but they were also way more interested in cooperating than competing, and they had a sense of perspective: classes are important, but at the end of the day, they’re not the only thing that matters. That attitude seemed much healthier than some of the other schools I visited, where there was a lot of internal and external pressure to excel at all costs. After three years at Oberlin, that initial impression has been confirmed over and over.</p>
<p>(Another thing that amazes me is that Oberlin students are so much more than just students – it seems like everyone has a hidden passion that they’re secretly brilliant at. I am constantly discovering that someone bakes incredible bread, or makes their own guitars, or performed with a professional circus troupe for five years. It blows my mind.)</p>
<p>Does that help?</p>
<p>Thanks so much you guys, for your input. Its really appreciated as we race towards a final decision tomorrow (Monday)! As my son is a musician, I think that might be the deciding factor, though I have to say, given Oberlin’s amazing music culture, I don’t know why he hasn’t already decided! It may be that its because Oxy in fact accepted him (full scholarship to boot) and he had accepted a place, so the Oberlin acceptance off the waitlist is all new and needs to be processed (soon:)
Stay tuned!</p>
<p>How academically serious are Oberlin students?I keep hearing this “we don’t compete” and “Oberlin students value learning for it’s own sake” What EXACTLY does this mean?I can’t help but get the vibe that kids there are rather complacent academically.I hope I’m wrong.</p>
<p>Last year I took an advanced Ancient Greek course. There were a half-dozen students. We studied together for every test. Sometimes we met at 11 PM, because that was the only time everyone could make it, and kept going until we were falling asleep. (Usually someone brought tea and cookies :)) After exams we’d share our translations and go over the spots where we’d gotten stuck. No one ever asked, “So, how did you do?” – they asked, “Did you figure out the irregular aorist in the sight-reading passage?”, or “How did you translate that weird genitive absolute?”</p>
<p>That same semester I also took organic chem – big class, lots of students from outside the chem program (neuro majors, bio majors, premeds from other departments) who didn’t know each other. It could have easily been an anonymous lecture: show up and leave without talking to the other students, cram by yourself, desperately trying to stay on top of the grade curve. Instead, the same thing happened: people split into groups, studied together, asked questions that went far beyond what we needed to know – because they actually cared about more than the test.</p>
<p>This is what I mean when I say that we don’t compete, and that we care about learning for learning’s sake. People are committed to their classes, but they recognize that skating through with the best grade for the least effort is not the ultimate goal; they would rather make sure that they actually understand – and help the other students in the course understand. And their interest doesn’t stop after they get their grade: they want to figure out the things they got wrong, and keep a fresh understanding of the material so they can connect it to their other classes.</p>
<p>I haven’t met anyone here that I’d describe as “complacent” about academics-- maybe that says something about the crowd I hang out with, but I also suspect a complacent student wouldn’t last long in most departments…</p>