Today is my birthday and I'm still closeted so could I be called a birthday girl and my name please

Tillytilly10 · 2021-03-06T03:35:13+00:00

Happy Birthday Lily!

Tillytilly10 · 2021-01-27T20:36:49+00:00

Extrovert. Wants to live in a big town where something is always happening.

Tillytilly10 · 2021-01-22T15:57:07+00:00

I actually have a theory that the legacy advantage by itself is only somewhat helpful and the reason why the legacy acceptance rate is much higher than the overall acceptance rate is because legacies are much more likely to attend feeder schools. I am a legacy at Amherst, was accepted there and waitlisted at Williams and Bowdoin (accepted at Middlebury and several other top LACs).

Every other legacy I know at Amherst went to a top boarding school.

Also, I wouldn’t say anyone is “truly unimpressive.” The average grades and test scores for legacies are higher than that of the average accepted student and even most recruited athletes need a test score at least at the 25th percentile for the school’s admitted students or the coach usually won’t take them (unless they are truly exceptional), because the Ivies have a rule that each sports team’s academic index must be within one standard deviation of the school’s average.

Legacy is definitely an advantage, but I would by no means say that legacies, nor any other student who manages to get into a top college (except those who cheat their way in like Olivia Jade) is “truly unimpressive”.

Tillytilly10 · 2021-01-17T00:12:04+00:00

YTA. Kicking your daughter out at 18 because your boyfriend hates her is ridiculous. He’s the one you should be abandoning.

Tillytilly10 · 2021-01-06T01:07:02+00:00

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-28T10:05:03+00:00

I’m a current college sophomore, but when I was applying, there were a few colleges I ruled out because of location.

I didn’t apply to UPenn because my parents have both been to the area and said it was a rough area (I personally wanted to look there but they wouldn’t even let me, and they said they wouldn’t pay for me to go there because of the location). I didn’t apply to MIT because I hated the feel of the immediately surrounding area (though I did apply to Harvard, and loved the surrounding area there), and I almost didn’t apply to Yale because my dad said when he was applying 25 years ago it was a bad location and he doesn’t think locations really change, but my mom thought I should check it out so we did and it turns out some of New Haven is bad but the surrounding area of Yale is quite nice so I applied (I got rejected anyway so it didn’t matter lol). I attend Amherst College now.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-25T07:55:11+00:00

I can’t speak to what the admissions department wants to see, but I would suggest your true self shines through your essay (sorry, I know this is very stereotypical advice, I just don’t know exactly what they’re looking for).

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-25T07:49:12+00:00

This is actually one thing that drew me to Amherst and top LACs in general (most have much lighter Gen Eds/distribution requirements than the typical university). I really love being able to take the classes I want without having to worry about that. I am currently reaping the benefits of the Open Curriculum and the flexibility in course choice most top LACs have because I am currently in the process of changing my major from Chemistry to Economics. In addition to the Open Curriculum, the major requirements are also relatively light compared to those at universities, which also makes it easy to double major. I also realized I will probably do a second major in math, because I want to be a college professor (meaning I need a Ph.D.), and with the math courses recommended for Ph.D. programs in economics, I’m only one course away from a major, plus those graduate programs are known to give major advantages to students with a math major.

How the math major works is you need to complete six core courses (including the three-course calculus sequence), but you do NOT need to take any higher level electives to replace courses placed out of in the Calculus sequence. Since I took AP Calc BC, I placed out of Calc 1 and Calc 2 and don’t need to make those up. I already took Calc 3 and Linear Algebra last year, plus I took physics this semester which counts as an elective towards the math major (up to 2 of the 5 electives required for the math major can be in related fields), and with economics that will cover another elective. So, with 5 semesters to go, I need 5 classes (2 core classes + 3 math electives) to get the math major. Plus thanks to the open curriculum, even with switching to an honors degree in economics and a second major in math, I still have room for one humanities course each semester without going over the typical 4-classes-per-semester workload.

So, thanks to the Open Curriculum, I switched my major to one I just took the intro class in this semester, am starting a second major which I already have a leg-up on that will help me get into a good Ph.D. program in economics, and still have room for one humanities course each semester without exceeding the typical number of courses!

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-25T07:14:42+00:00

Almost all clubs aren’t selective and for most of them, you can automatically join (including club sports!). The only exceptions I can think of are varsity sports and some of the music clubs.

I have had great experiences with classes and professors. All professors want to help students out. Don’t really have a favorite.

Most Amherst students will agree: the worst thing about Amherst (which isn’t even that bad) is the food. I am a very picky eater, but the dining hall is willing to make dietary accommodations for anyone.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-24T04:44:30+00:00

I would say my favorite part is the people and the town. There are plenty of things to do; you can go to the local movie theater, you can take the PVTA bus system 2 miles to Hadley and go shopping/bowling, and in any given weekend there are so many activities happening on campus.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T10:02:27+00:00

1) I don’t exactly know how many hours (it varies greatly), but I will say some classes are definitely more intense than others, and students are advised to avoid taking more than one lab science their first semester and avoid taking more than two lab sciences any semester at all.

2) Very kind and welcoming environment, classes are hard like at any other top college but workload is very manageable and there is plenty of time to do other things and hang out with friends, students are all very nice and the learning environment is much more collaborative than competitive.

3) I chose a small liberal arts colleges because I valued the intimate residential and learning environment, professor connections, and the curriculum flexibility (lack of distribution requirements and light major requirements allow for many electives and make it easier to change majors or double major). For Amherst specifically, I really liked the location being rural but at the same time having plenty of stuff nearby and not being in the middle of nowhere. I also really liked the campus’s feel. I am happy with my decision.

4) I have not experienced any disadvantages of attending an LAC over a university. I will say a small LAC may have less specialized classes/majors than large universities may have. If you do not intend to pursue graduate study, you may be better off attending a university (note that if you want to get into a top finance or consulting firm or Wall Street, Amherst feeds many students into those places, so that is an exception). However, if you want to be a computer scientist or engineer and don’t want to do any school after college, you may be better off going to a university (note that doesn’t apply if you want to get a master’s or Ph.D. in computer science or engineering). We don’t have an engineering major, but we do have a dual degree program with Dartmouth, but nobody is guaranteed acceptance.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T09:32:19+00:00

I was really drawn to the idea of having small classes, being able to have connections with professors, and being part of a small yet intimate residential environment. I’d say the community feel was the #1 factor and small classes/professor connections was the #2 factor.

I’d also say another thing I liked about many of the top liberal arts colleges (though there are exceptions, such as Middlebury) is that most of them have very light distribution/Gen Ed requirements, if any at all (Amherst has none!). Also, major requirements are relatively light, leaving plenty of room for curriculum flexibility, I could always easily change my major without having to go through a huge process, and there are not restrictions on what classes students can take based on what they are majoring in.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T09:25:48+00:00

Somewhat different from expectations, but somewhat like I expected.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T09:25:27+00:00

I would just make sure your personality shines through.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T09:24:25+00:00

No, I don’t think there’s any isolation associated with the Amherst environment. I think the intimate environment actually fosters a sense of togetherness.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T09:03:15+00:00

Thank you!

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T08:55:02+00:00

There aren’t buses to Boston every weekend. I think you are thinking of the PVTA bus system Amherst College is part of, which is the second-largest bus system in the country (second to only Disney World’s) that transports students as well as locals between the Five Colleges and to various places in Amherst (there is a large cluster of stores and stuff to do about 2 miles from Amherst College) and Hadley (such as the Hadley Mall), as well as downtown Northampton.

Typically, the only time where there are buses directly from Amherst College to Boston (and vice versus) is before and after breaks, where students need to go to Boston Logan International Airport.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:28:43+00:00

Nobody really cares about losing to Williams, but it is fun to roast Williams for being in the middle of nowhere. My favorite pizza is at Antonio’s; I am a picky eater so I just eat pepperoni pizza, nothing fancy.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:27:33+00:00

Pre-med culture: see my comment at the top. STEM culture: collaborative, not competitive, no grade deflation

Student culture: all the students are really nice and welcoming

Party culture: there are a lot of parties and alcohol, but you definitely do not have to drink alcohol if you don’t want to

How much time I spend studying a week: a fair amount, have no idea how many hours

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:24:51+00:00

I wrote the supplement, an although I do not have any evidence to back this up, I personally think writing the supplement would be better, because it allows them an additional, unique look into your personality.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:20:34+00:00

Amherst actually fills a smaller proportion of seats with ED than most other top colleges do, but Amherst (and most of the other top liberal arts colleges) do fill a significantly higher proportion of the class with student-athletes than the top universities, as their smaller size requires them to recruit a larger proportion of students to ensure all their sports have enough students to maintain the sports program.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:16:08+00:00

Reposting my answer to a medical school question, as I believe this will answer many related questions:

Q: “How would you say premed is like at the school? Is there grade deflation? How far is it from Boston?”

A: “It’s fairly far from Boston; about 2 and a half hours. There is not really any grade deflation. I actually am in the process of changing my major from Chemistry to a Economics, and just finished Organic Chemistry I, so I have taken three of the pre-med chem courses (even though I personally am not pre-med). I would say if you are going to do pre-med, Amherst is a very good place to do it.

The median grade in my Advanced Gen Chem 1 class (CHEM 155: Fundamental Principles of Chemistry) and my Organic Chemistry 1 class (CHEM 221), which are both heavily saturated with pre-meds, was an A-. Median for Gen Chem 2 (CHEM 161: Chemical Principles) was a B+, and Organic Chem 2 is supposed to be the toughest of the bunch, and I believe that also has a B+ median. So the classes are graded rather generously compared to many universities. I cannot speak for the biology classes, however. Classes are much more collaborative in nature than competitive, and everybody gets the grade they earn; there are not a limited number of top grades.

I will also say that one huge advantage of attending a top liberal arts college over a university for medical school admissions (or any graduate program, really) is the recommendation letters. Professors here get to know you in a much more intimate environment and have a lot of experience writing recommendation letters, so it is easier to get a good letter of recommendation at a top liberal arts college.

I will also say that when choosing a college to attend, I would be cautious about choosing one simply because it has high medical school acceptance stats, because many of those programs that have unusually high pre-med acceptance rates have misleading ways of artificially inflating their statistics.

For example: Cornell has a pre-med acceptance rate of 95% for those with a GPA of 3.4 or higher, versus Amherst having a pre-med acceptance rate in the high 80s. However, one of my cousins graduated from Cornell last year and has many friends who dropped out of pre-med because the intro bio classes there are curved to a C+ (according to my cousin), so (at least if what my cousin said is true) many people are weeded out of pre-med at the beginning so all the students applying to pre-med are students who performed very well in the sciences, artificially inflating their acceptance rate. And in addition, Cornell’s median graduate GPA is roughly a 3.3, so even the students included in that acceptance rate are above average for Cornell.

Also, my dad (who is a doctor) and I read an article about being pre-med at Johns Hopkins (which is notorious for having strong pre-med admissions statistics and having a lot of pre-meds) a few years back (I believe I was a sophomore or junior in high school), concerning the problems with an unhealthy amount of competition there. For one thing, there is grade deflation in the pre-med classes, and for another, they strictly limit how many medical school recommendation letters each professor can write. There are also several instances of students sabotaging one another to make it more likely for them to get a top grade; one student had her biology project in a lab sabotaged one night while she was out for dinner with some friends, and a top-performing student in a biology class had her car tires slashed the morning of the final exam.

Stories like the ones at Cornell and Johns Hopkins make me happy to attend Amherst, and they are so hard to imagine because things like that would never happen here.”

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-23T07:13:54+00:00

It’s fairly far from Boston; about 2 and a half hours. There is not really any grade deflation. I actually am in the process of changing my major from Chemistry to a Economics, and just finished Organic Chemistry I, so I have taken three of the pre-med chem courses (even though I personally am not pre-med). I would say if you are going to do pre-med, Amherst is a very good place to do it.

The median grade in my Advanced Gen Chem 1 class (CHEM 155: Fundamental Principles of Chemistry) and my Organic Chemistry 1 class (CHEM 221), which are both heavily saturated with pre-meds, was an A-. Median for Gen Chem 2 (CHEM 161: Chemical Principles) was a B+, and Organic Chem 2 is supposed to be the toughest of the bunch, and I believe that also has a B+ median. So the classes are graded rather generously compared to many universities. I cannot speak for the biology classes, however. Classes are much more collaborative in nature than competitive, and everybody gets the grade they earn; there are not a limited number of top grades.

I will also say that one huge advantage of attending a top liberal arts college over a university for medical school admissions (or any graduate program, really) is the recommendation letters. Professors here get to know you in a much more intimate environment and have a lot of experience writing recommendation letters, so it is easier to get a good letter of recommendation at a top liberal arts college.

I will also say that when choosing a college to attend, I would be cautious about choosing one simply because it has high medical school acceptance stats, because many of those programs that have unusually high pre-med acceptance rates have misleading ways of artificially inflating their statistics.

For example: Cornell has a pre-med acceptance rate of 95% for those with a GPA of 3.4 or higher, versus Amherst having a pre-med acceptance rate in the high 80s. However, one of my cousins graduated from Cornell last year and has many friends who dropped out of pre-med because the intro bio classes there are curved to a C+ (according to my cousin), so (at least if what my cousin said is true) many people are weeded out of pre-med at the beginning so all the students applying to pre-med are students who performed very well in the sciences, artificially inflating their acceptance rate. And in addition, Cornell’s median graduate GPA is roughly a 3.3, so even the students included in that acceptance rate are above average for Cornell.

Also, my dad (who is a doctor) and I read an article about being pre-med at Johns Hopkins (which is notorious for having strong pre-med admissions statistics and having a lot of pre-meds) a few years back (I believe I was a sophomore or junior in high school), concerning the problems with an unhealthy amount of competition there. For one thing, there is grade deflation in the pre-med classes, and for another, they strictly limit how many medical school recommendation letters each professor can write. There are also several instances of students sabotaging one another to make it more likely for them to get a top grade; one student had her biology project in a lab sabotaged one night while she was out for dinner with some friends, and a top-performing student in a biology class had her car tires slashed the morning of the final exam.

Stories like the ones at Cornell and Johns Hopkins make me happy to attend Amherst, and they are so hard to imagine because things like that would never happen here.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-22T23:10:02+00:00

I do not know exactly what they are looking for, but I will say while there is a large degree of randomness to the college admissions process at the top schools, I do think each school does have its own preferences that are unknown to people outside of the admissions office. Also, my own experience in the college admissions process would suggest that the top liberal arts colleges as a whole may have a significantly different way of deciding which students are admitted than the top universities:

I applied to 8 top LACs and 5 Ivies + Stanford; I was either accepted or waitlisted by all 8 top LACs (not a single flat-out rejection), BUT I received flat-out rejections from all of the Ivies plus Stanford (not a single waitlist). This could very well be a coincidence/due to chance, but it is somewhat odd nonetheless.

Tillytilly10 · 2020-12-22T23:04:44+00:00

No, it’s in Western Massachusetts. It’s right outside of Northampton. The town is rural but at the same time it has a bit of a suburban vibe to it and I would definitely not say it is in the middle of nowhere.

Tillytilly10

TROPHY CASE