Actual Final Visit

Remember how I said I had finished the college visit circuit? I lied.

Yesterday my dad and I drove into the City (which is to say New York City) for an info session and tour of Columbia University.  Now I know Columbia is a good school.  That's just a fact.  But it's also not for me which is kind of unfortunate since I know some really cool people who go to Columbia or who are starting there this year.  Que será, será I suppose.

I am relatively confident I have not met "the one" quite yet, which is to say that I have no idea if and where I might apply Early Decision.  Early Decision is kind of scary because it's legally binding.  My college counselor told me that, as the weeks progress here in September and the beginning of October, some schools are going to re-rank themselves as I figure out what I really want out of a school.  After my Columbia visit, I know there's one major thing that would make me simply say no to a school: academic rigidity.  I know that, at the very least, I want to study Religion and Astronomy.  I can't go to a school that's going to lock me out of certain classes.  The way Columbia's core curriculum works, Columbia prescribes about 6 classes that you will take at certain times.  I am not willing to sign up for that.  On a semester system in which an average student takes 4-6 classes, I am not willing to blindly give up one of my classes to the core.  Don't get me wrong, I like distribution requirements.  I also probably wouldn't function well at a school like Brown where there are no Distribution requirements whatsoever.  But I know I don't want to be told what classes to take when; that reminds me too much of my high school experience.
There is, however, one requirement at Columbia that I think is pretty cool: swimming.  Back in Alexander Hamilton's time (he's an alum of Kings College, which became Columbia), there was a minor concern floating around that the British might invade.  Completely unfounded, right?  Anyway, the college decided to add a swimming requirement to their core curriculum that would mimic the distance across the Hudson River to New Jersey.  If the British did in fact invade, Columbia students would have to be able to swim to safety.  More recently, the students of the Engineering college pointed out that they wouldn't have to swim because they would build a boat or a bridge or a catapult or something in real time so the engineering students don't actually have to pass the swimming requirement.  Personally, I think they should have to pass a time trial for catapult design to prove that they wouldn't need to swim, but that's neither here nor there.

Today I'm gearing up to take the next step in a college courtship: interviewing. I'll be heading into the City later on to meet with Crockett Marrow, the assistant dean of admissions at Reed College.  This is the one school I haven't actually visited in person, simply because of distance, so I have a lot of questions prepared for Crockett (I don't actually plan to call him by his first name; I just think it's hilarious that he's named Crockett).  We'll see how it goes...