<p>Oh, three cheers from another Kentuckian who wants to go to Swarthmore.
For what it’s worth, I made a visit during school (like your situation, the fall breaks of my school and Swat lined up) and I thought it was definitely worth it. I was 99% sure that I would apply Early Decision, but visiting helped my Why Swat? essay immensely (sitting in on classes, meeting students, and stopping in at club meetings shows how positively thrilled everyone is about what they’re doing even more clearly than reading about it
and I got to make swords for the Pterodactyl Hunt.) I think the Phoenix idea sounds great I had been reading the colleges livejournal community (which is active and helpful The Swarthmore College Community) for several years, and that became a starting point for my essay. Also, on this tangent, if you end up visiting, the students on the lj community are involved in a wide range of activities and interests, and can let you know when different clubs meet/what classes to visit/etc. Just a thought.</p>
<p>Incidentally, you look pretty similar to me stat-wise…except that I was in no way a legacy (and my school had one person go about ten years ago.)</p>
<p>Have fun at GSP (I was at Bellarmine last year) and best of luck! (I’m not as knowledgeable as achat or interesteddad, but feel free to email me if you have any questions!)
-Elizabeth (the token, to my best knowledge, Kentucky Swattie of '09)</p>
<p>ETA: I don’t know how often Swarthmore representatives visit Kentucky…I’m in the rural western bit, but would have been willing to go to Louisville/Lexington to meet with a rep…I think there might have been a rep at Dunbar once, but the timing didn’t work for me. You could email the rep for Kentucky to ask…except looking at the admissions page, I’m not even sure who that would be this year (it was David Kaczorowski last year, who was quite nice in answering my emails.)<br>
Now off to finish my math placement exam…ergh.</p>