1. Friends 2. Professors—inspirers, teachers, mentors, supporters 3. Cross-courtyard hellos 4. Social gatherings 5. Barefeet and RayBans 6. Longboards 7. Frary frozen yogurt 8. Saturday picnics 9. Sunday barbeques 10. Grants and stipends 11. Class options 12. Office hours 13. Sunshine 14. Grassy fields 15. Waterpolo games 16. Baseball games 17. Proximity to skiing...
Read More
Pomona Traditions
Anatomy of a Sponsor Group
Decision day has come and gone, and now that colleges across the nation have chosen their admitted students, it's time for the critical second round of decisions to be made by the students themselves.
Last February, when I was added to the class of 2017 Facebook group, none of the admitted students who would become this year's Pomona freshmen had any decisions to make. We we...
Read More
Considering the Spogro Pt. II
Happy New Year (again)! This is a continuation of the previous post.
My spogro is a strange bunch of people. On the surface we don't seem like a great match for each other – we're a pretty eclectic mismash of personalities, backgrounds, and plans – but in fact, most of my closest friends are in my sponsor group.
One very valuable (and fun!) function of the sponsor gro...
Read More
Considering the Spogro Pt. I
Happy New Year!
As the holidays come to a close, I've been contemplating my first semester at Pomona and more specifically, inspired by my biological family, my adopted Pomona family. For the most part, at least for me, this boils down to the sponsor group.
Before I came to Pomona, I didn't even realize sponsor groups were a thing. Don't ask me how, in all the resear...
Read More
Giving Thanks: Prospies, and 3 Awesome things about Pomona
pros•pie |ˈprôspē| *
noun
a high school student visiting a college campus in order to gain additional knowledge and experience regarding the school, often staying overnight to really get the best sense of the whole "college experience" and most comprehensively assess as many aspects of the college or university as possible : the prospie feigned satisfaction with the skimp...
Read More
How to Have a Thanksgiving Away from Home
As a student whose home is situated over 2,000 miles away from Pomona's campus, I can't go home for Thanksgiving without shelling out over $500 in a roundtrip ticket, so I'm staying in California for Thanksgiving. For those of you in a similar predicament, fear not, because you can still celebrate Thanksgiving albeit probably differently from how you used to. Here are some opti...
Read More
Investigating the AAMP Snack
(more…)
Read More
Five Steps to a Fountaining
A birthday at Pomona isn't just any ordinary birthday. If your friends have enough time, maybe they'll decorate your door (see picture below). They might bake you a cake (or buy you one depending on how much culinary talent is in the sponsor group). Perhaps they'll throw you a surprise party (less of a surprise if some people can't keep secrets). Or maybe you all have midterms ...
Read More
Open Channels
If you didn't already know, Dean Feldblum loves to tweet (see her Twitter), which makes her one of the coolest administrators I've ever known. But aside from that, she's not just an awesome administrator, but also a great human being. For many college and high school students, administrators--and even the Dean of Students (or the equivalent)--can sometimes be shadowy unknown fi...
Read More
Working at the Organic Farm
Just about 6 months ago, I was sitting at my dining room table, staring at a bunch of glossy college brochures, wondering exactly how I was going to make one of the biggest decisions of my life in just one month, given so many amazing choices. But, by the end of the month, my feelings had changed, and one college became the clear answer: I chose to attend Pomona College.
I b...
Read More