Another Caltech Post

This is written for applicants to Caltech considering the school. I recently saw a blog post from a freshman who said she couldn't find much in terms of blogs of real students. Hopefully if anyone is really interested in finding out what's it like for somebody who had a tough time here during core, they can find this.

Pretty soon there'll be the class of 2011 and the class of 2012 under me... it doesn't feel right. I kind of want to recap why Caltech is an awful place for just a few students to pick. Since the Caltech class of 2012 had a May 1 postmark reply deadline of notifying schools, it's too late. But I'll pretend it's not too late.

If you look at the Caltech admissions page, they still have the class of 2011 statistics posted. 605 offers of admission, 235 matriculated. SAT middle 50%: 2190 - 2320 (for you old folks, that's about 1460 - 1550), ACT mid-50%: 33-35. 99% of those at high schools who ranked students were in the top 10%. 74% were on science/math teams, over half did community service, and 38% had done scientific research in high school.

That's pretty intimidating. How could students with those credentials have trouble in college? This year I've been watching as these guys go through the classes that ran me over last year... and to my surprise, the ones I know, live with, and hang out with, can take it, and are maybe even excelling. They're very intelligent, and they still have to work hard. Most nights there are more than a few of them around in LD or Snatch (two hallways in Ricketts) working on sets. And of course they complain. But it's not the same as it was for me.

My friend who's taking Bi 1 this term, the biology component of the Caltech core curriculum, was just whining about it. "I can't wait to be done with it. It's so boring," he says. I've learned to keep my mouth shut when people complain, it's really boring to hear me go off about how terrible a place Caltech is every time somebody makes some small comment about a class.

But my experience here has been very different from that of the frosh. On the first week of third term last year, which was probably representative of the rest of the term even though classes hadn't really gotten rolling yet, I logged my work hours each day. The weekend was relatively clear, between 1 and 4 hours of work each day, but during the week I was doing homework or in class for 56 hours between Monday, March 26 and Friday March 30. And I was only taking four classes.

So the big question that remains is "Why was it different for me?"

Looking back through my posts, I don't think I've tackled this question. During third term last year I wrote:

"As a conservative estimate, between Monday and Thursday I worked or was in class forty five and a half hours. That's not fun. It's not like I had that much to do... I had classes to go to, a physics set due Wednesday, math set due Friday, and physics lab due Friday afternoon. I don't really understand."

I think I understand now. So I'll spend just a little bit of time talking about it now.

It all comes down to raw intelligence. I'm not as smart as these kids. I don't have as high of an IQ. Another strike against me is that I haven't been trained in math, physics, and analytical thinking from a young age. That's it. It's simple, really.

So why did admissions let me in? I wanted to go to a good school, so in my senior year of high school I spent a lot of time getting to know how my TI-89 worked and taking practice exams for the SATs. Every weekend I took practice exams. Practice, practice. I got really good at multiple choice exams by doing them over and over again. Combine good SAT scores with the senate page thing and the fact that I fixed and sold iPods, and someone from South Dakota who wasn't even in the top 10% of their public high school class was accepted to Caltech. At a place where the curriculum is set up to challenge kids who have professors at Caltech, Stanford, or Ivy league schools for parents, kids who competed in the Intel with their research from high school, I was not cut out for it. It was like being tossed into a gunfight with a butter knife. Sure, you might survive by some freak accident, but you're not going to be at ease and you're probably going to get fucked up because everyone else is better equipped for it.

So if you're considering Caltech for an undergraduate degree, make sure you're the right applicant. The successful student here probably completed most of a physics or math degree at a very good university, or at the very least took AP Calc and AP Phys and got 5's on the tests without a sweat. You probably competed in the Intel, academic decathlon, quiz bowl, math competitions, physics competitions, and other nerdy stuff like this. Your SAT scores were over 1500 and you probably took the test hung over and without studying. And most importantly, you probably pushed yourself to learn stuff, anything, starting from a very young age. I'm guessing that without these things, you won't do well here.

For future prospective students, here is a list of some posts I have about my experience at Caltech, good and bad. But don't worry, I'm the exception, not the rule. A lot of people don't have too much trouble.
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2006/09/los-angeles.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/01/caltech-round-two.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/02/shortest-set-ever.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/02/post-drop-day.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/02/nobel-prize.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/04/another-update.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/04/april.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/05/caltech-it-is-i-guess.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/05/math-1c-set-6.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/05/whats-going-on-here-and-in-n-out-16.html
http://robertkarl.net/blog/2007/06/work-tomorrow.html

As of right now, I'm doing OK. A little behind, but not tragically lost. It's midterms week, and if I start dragging myself to class more and spending more time on homework I'll get C's or better.