Some of you may be wondering why I wasn’t at school today (won’t be there tomorrow, either: scholarship thingy). I was visiting Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Here’s the setup: I was invited to visit Vanderbilt as part of an “Engineering Honors Weekend” with all expenses paid, etc. So I left early Saturday from SoCal, flew into Nashville, met up with my grandmother, saw the Nashville symphony, and promptly went to sleep. The next day, I arrived on campus, meeting my student host almost immediately. He’s a senior and his housing ROCKS. It’s in one of those big towers near West End Ave with a suite: 5 guys, 3 singles, 1 (massive) double, a common room, and a kitchen. Quite nice, although I hear most of the freshman housing isn’t this nice (especially at Peabody). So I got my stuff up there and went to register and they handed me a nice Vanderbilt laptop bag (the scholarship includes a laptop), an engineering school t-shirt, and a folder with our directions for the weekend. They also gave us a keycard for our dorms, and they’d put $25 for everyone on each card! Very nice indeed: can’t say I don’t like being pampered, although the card couldn’t be used at the bookstore. I went up to my host’s room and we watched the Vandie v. NC State (they were LOSING until a 3 minute rally from 10 down: amazing game! Sweet 16!) game for a while until engineering orientation where we basically got to know everyone and took tours of the engineering building. The students were mostly from the South with a few from more Northern areas and one from California like me, but generally speaking, the Engineering Scholars all seemed to be Ivy League candidates (and acceptees). Anyway, during the tour they showed us this BME robot thingy that you can trace across to more precisely locate areas for surgery (brain surgery), their robotics laboratory (I think they’ve got quite a ways till artificial intelligence), their car shop (yep, they race them), and several computer animated videos made by students. I was very impressed by the depth and breadth of the work being done in a (relatively) small engineering department. Then we went to dinner at the Stadium Club (not surprisingly, overlooking the football stadium) where they served several southern dishes I hadn’t tried before (CA boy) and we got to hear Chancellor Gee (who is apparently much loved) speak along with some a capella and improv groups perform. Side note: They had invited three groups to this weekend: engineers (approximately 21), Peabody students (approximately 40-50), and Arts and Sciences Students (approximately 100). Apparently, the Peabody and Arts and Sciences students had to compete for their scholarships in interviews and suchlike to determine who got the 1/2, 3/4, and full tuition scholarships. Us engineers were all given full tuition scholarships (probably a school emphasis), so we had a great weekend watching the others stress out (“Vanderbilt survivor”). Then the men’s basketball team returned to campus, and all hell broke lose. Skipping out on that, me and a few of the guys went to the rec center, played some pool, shot some hoops, and generally had a good time. Went back to the dorm, watched Family Guy, played a little Mario Tennis and Mario Kart 64 (yeah!) and went to sleep around midnight. Today, we had short interviews: not even about us, but about whatever the professors felt like talking about. In mine, I was asked what I thought of outsourcing (I’m a CS major), what I planned to do with my degree, etc: mainly not typical questions. Bought myself a hoodie, went to lunch and breakfast (for a couple minutes), and then headed home. The bus didn’t show up to take us to the airport so (at about 2:10, my flight was at 3:00), the PROFESSORS took us over to the airport and I made my flight with a little time to spare (good thing I wasn’t red-tagged). My last memory of the dean of engineering, Art Overholser (wrong spelling, I’m sure), was him personally getting the engineering students to their flights. Great trip.
Note: Once you get to the school, the only difference between the Honors students and the regular students is the tuition bill that comes home (plus the laptop, of course). You’re not segregated at all.
My impressions of the school, etc: PROS: Engineering is EXCELLENT. Very personal contact, seems like cutting edge research in every department, great experience. School facilities are also very recent (student center, rec center, nice dorms, etc), the campus is very picturesque (it’s an arboretum), they’ll soon have a residential college system, and they have lots of money to throw at students. To me, 10,000 students seems to be just the right size for a campus. CONS: Lots of frats. Beer is present and used (although I didn’t see conspicuous drunks). Nashville isn’t as nice of a town as Boston, although it still suffices for pretty much anything you can think of. You might want a car to get around. Very Southern, although not extremely conservative. I’d say it leans towards the center.
OVERALL: They just raised themselves a couple of notches in my mind.
Swag that I walked away with:
*Engineering shirt (XL…? I’m not that big )
*Car decal
*Laptop bag with “Vanderbilt School of Engineering Honors Scholar” on the side (to remind you of the laptop you get if you go there!)
*Hooded sweatshirt.
*Vanderbilt pencil.
Not bad.