<p>I don’t want to scare anyone, because my case is certainly not that of the majority of the students, and I have other reasons why I’m not liking Mudd as much, but I guess I’m probably one of those students with a more “Caltech-ish” attitude… although I’d say it’s more of a “defeated” thing than “depressed”. I’m working on it, though… Mudd isn’t really the place to finially realize that you have ADD, so hopefully things will get better as I get that figured out. </p>
<p>Mudd’s best asset? From talking to my friends at the big name universities, I’ve gained a little more perspective, and I’d have to say that Mudd’s best assest is how small it is (thought it does sometimes feel too small), because it means you actually have a chance to get to know ALL of your profs, to the point where they walk by you and say hello to you by name, and it’s not ultra-competitive like some schools (UCs come to mind) – they’re not out to fail half of the people in a class. On the contrary, they want you to do well and succeed. If a prof is concerned about your progress (or as I learned from personal experience, attitude as well) in a class, he or she will often approach you and try to work with you to make things better. What big time university prof is gonna do that for you?</p>
<p>I applied early decision, so I didn’t really consider any other schools. This is BAD. Not saying applying ED is bad, just make sure you do your research. I think if I had thoroughly understood what it’s like to be at Mudd, I might have made a different choice. Or maybe not. It might just be something I had to experience. </p>
<p>To fill you in… I’m currently considering transferring, for a few reasons. One is that Mudd’s academics are a little harsher than I was expecting. High school didn’t prepare me at all, pass/fail made me think it would be easy, and then grades have smacked in the face for the last two semesters. I’m gonna work really hard to buckle down and focus for this next semester, because regardless of whether or not I stay, I’m gonna need a bit better GPA. I’m also thinking about transferring because I realized that Mudd’s small selection of majors isn’t as appealing as I once thought. After getting a thoroughly rounded look at all the science disciplines, I realized I wanted something more interdisciplinary than Mudd can offer, and currently I’m leaning toward neuroscience. It’s very likely that I’ll just do an off-campus major, which means I’ll take the courses to fulfill a major at one of the other 5C’s, as well as a few at Mudd to fulfill a minor in one of their technical degree programs (and of course I still have to finish the humanities and technical core). However, I’m also looking at some other schools now. I think it’s a hard decision to make as a high school senior, and most people, I would say, don’t really know enough about themselves to know which school and which major is going to be best for them at that point, and it often comes down to how resilient you are. I thought I was really set on biochemistry, but I still had that lingering “well maybe something else will be better…” thought, and I should have realized that was a clue to me that perhaps somewhere a little less intensely focused on the sciences would have been a better fit. We shall see!</p>
<p>This has gotten much longer and taken much more time than I was anticipating, so I’m cutting myself off, now. Hope I didn’t scare anyone away… I’ve been hesitant to post on here lately, because while I think all views should be represented, we’re a little light on members of the student body than want to post here (or even know about it), so I feel like some of my negative opinions may be a bit over-represented. So don’t let me scare you away! If what I’ve said matches some of your concerns, though, maybe you should start really looking at other places…</p>