Is Brown the right school for me?

modestmelody
Tue, 28 Aug 2007 15:20:46 +0000

Cooped up in the library is the choice of many Brown students, it’s not the choice of many others. I also think that if you think your other choice schools have a more “cooped up in the library” sense then I think you’re wrong.

I wouldn’t go somewhere you’re not comfortable with, and I wouldn’t even apply to go somewhere you’re not comfortable with. We offer a unique environment and community to students, and it attracts all kinds of people. There are tremendous difference between all Brown students and what unites us is our difference from one another more than any similar trend in how we act or what we do.

I can say for me, learning, growing, and maturing has been happening far faster and to a far greater extent out of the library and out of hte classroom (which by know stretch is equal to partying/drinking/doing nothing). That’s why to me, the sense that you want to be locked in a library for four years seems contradictory to exactly what education I, and my friends at other institutions, are getting and where it’s coming from.

But that’s what’s great about applying to colleges these days-- there are choices for people who want heavy handed core, for people who want know core; choices for those who want to learn from the books and those who want to learn more than just that.

I definitely agree that judging a school without having been there and feeling hte place out and simply on paper is probably a bad idea. I’d also say this-- though many student sod have a good idea of what they want from college, they find their perceptions DRASTICALLY change in just one year or semester. Brown is still the perfect place for me, but for very different reasons and in very different ways than I expected. Be sure you have options if you’re looking to go somewhere that may in some ways be restrictive to a lifestyle other than the one you’re predicting for yourself right now. If you were an 8th grader telling everyone what high school was going to be like for you… well I think you get the picture.

Brown is a great school and I think it can provide the experience your after, but you need to decide if this is the place that’s going to motivate you to pursue that experience or not.

For what it’s worth, the professor I work with went to Reed as an undergraduate and that influenced his choice as Brown for a place to settle and make his professional life.