Sun 6 Dec 2009
NYT Op-ed on the College Search
Posted by wslack under Admissions at 8:00 am
Here’s a neat op-ed from a college-searching senior. Williams gets props for not selling itself through Harry Potter.
Print • EmailIn fact, most of us have grown up adoring Harry Potter and, through J. K. Rowling’s books, we’ve escaped many times into the world she created. But what I enjoy in fiction I don’t necessarily want to find in college. And, despite any wishes to the contrary, the real-life skills I hope to gain from college do not include magic.
What really matters to me as I prepare to make my decision? Well, I loved hearing about Williams College’s two-student classes called tutorials, and how Swarthmore lets students weigh in on almost every big decision made by its administration. I was really impressed by Middlebury’s student-driven campaign to save energy on campus. (For the sake of full disclosure, I just might be applying to some of these schools.) I care about diversity and need-blind financial aid — and, of course, the social life. But I don’t care about what percentage of the student body runs around on broomsticks.
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14 Responses to “NYT Op-ed on the College Search”
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hwc says:
I hope applicants don’t watch MTV and learn that there are actually seminars on Harry Potter:
MTV article
MTV Video
God help ‘em if they find out professors at these colleges blog about Harry Potter:
Harry Potter Blog
[Frank: take your indigestion medicine!]
Dick Swart says:
May not have been necessary …
Aidan says:
I keep hoping Pottermania would simply encourage readership of real literature or even real children’s literature, like Roald Dahl. But alas.
frank uible says:
Don’t kids read Mark Twain anymore? There is something for almost everybody in Twain.
hwc says:
Twain has become somewhat controversial because the language is so racially charged. It’s often studied in the context of race now, I think.
Twain is still taught, however. Here’s a faculty lecture podcast on a Twain essay about American imperialism:
Twain faculty lecture podcast
frank uible says:
Most kids won’t be put off by the lanquage; it’s the ignorant, predisposed, tight ass adults in charge, who are – because of our dishonesty, stupidity and sometimes greed we are doomed never to get past race, despite our posturing to the contrary (if Twain were alive, he could have a field day with the modern hypocrisy of it all).
jeffz says:
Good one, Dick. In Williams lore:
Mark Hopkins = Dumbledore
Zephaniah Swift Moore = Voldemort
Tom Parker = Snape (we all know where his true allegiance lies)
Dick Farley = Hagrid
Ephblog = The Quibbler
Dick Nesbitt = The Sorting Hat
Ephraim Williams = Godric Gryffindor
Amherst = Durmstrang
Edward Dorr Griffin = Kingsley Shacklebolt
Time-Turners = something every Williams student wishes were real
And for those who were around in the 1990’s, Dox = Borgin & Burkes (more recent alums, you’ll just have to trust me)
Only time will tell if Adam Falk = Harry Potter …
jeffz says:
Although on second though, perhaps I should have made Dorr Griffin be Gryffindor. Hah.
frank uible says:
Is my delightful, almost 5 year old grandson who has an imaginary, omnipresent, omnipotent playmate called Mike less emotionally mature than the typical Williams student?
jeffz says:
Depends on whether you consider emotional maturity to require the loss of imagination, creativity, delight in the fantastical, and sense of wonder.
David says:
Potter fans will enjoy (?) our lengthy discussions of which clusters should be named after which Hogworth Houses, based on the character and history of both Williams and those Houses (here and here). Highly recommended. Summary:
Currier == Hufflepuff
Spencer == Ravenclaw
Dodd == Slytherin
Wood == Gryffindor
Also, I am Mad-Eye Moody.
frank uible says:
Imagination, creativity, fantasy and wonder don’t pay the rent and don’t put bread on the table for the kids of the vast majority of us working stiffs so that the assurance of rent and bread allow our kids, when they are five years old, to have the luxury of maximally exercising their imaginations, creativity and senses of fantasy and wonder.
eph says:
I do not have an issue in Williams renaming the residences according to the houses in HP’s school, especially since Stanford has an undergraduate dorm called (drum-roll…):
ENCHANTED BROCCOLI FOREST
http://www.stanford.edu/group/EBF/
You can make an educated guess about the etymology of the name… (hint: the dorm houses the campus undergrad hippies)
frank uible says:
Making a joke out of non-compliance with the law.