College Search

Boring updates on Karen's academic career and prospects.

I have narrowed my list to three school I will apply to for fall 2009.

The Short List:

• Adams State College, Alamosa, Colorado.
• Central Washington University, Elensburg Washington
• Lindfield College

All three offer majors in music composition, art and creative writing.

Adams State
Last week I got to visit Adams State. While it is all fresh in my mind (sort of, the fifteen hour drive home was not the best thing for keeping impressions fresh.) I want to write down the pros and cons and various things that will be important to my decision.

General Information: Alamosa is a very small town in southern Colorado. Adams State is very small public school. I had it on my list because the art department looked amazing on the web site. The music and english departments were passable also but the art department really stuck out.

Important stuff:

• Music: I was not overly impressed with the music department. There are not a lot of vocal ensembles, which is the drawback of a small school I guess. I have been kind of spoiled by the schola. The vocal faculty was very nice as was the theory teacher. They all showed an interest in me and were very excited and welcoming. Especially the theory professor. He was very excited about his composition program. It sounded pretty intensive because of all the personal attention a small school offers.
• Art: The art department was AMAZING!! They do everything! There is almost no limit to what one can play with. They have plenty of room for everything they do and encourage kids to explore as many different media as possible. Really awesome. The faculty I met were very friendly. I just met the painting teacher and the ceramics teacher. The painting teacher who gave us the tour must have known the names of every student in the building. So that was kind of nice.
• English: I didn't get to see the English department or talk to any one. I have e-mailed the head of the department but have had no reply. They offer a creative writing major and a student built English minor. I think I would be doing the minor.
• Campus Ministry: The Catholic students on campus meet Sunday nights for mass and dinner afterwards. Priests from all over the area take turns saying mass for them. It sounded like a small but happy little group.

Other noteworthy aspects:

• Student life: Adams State is not a party school. It's a dry campus and it sounded like no one minded much. The art department was telling us that they really do spend their weekends working in the studio not in a bar. I heard similar things from other kids. This school plays outside. Our student tour guide asked me what I liked to do. I said I liked the arts. He was looking for what sport I played. Rock climbing and biking and skiing are big it seems. Their recreation hall included a dance floor and a basketball hoop and a climbing wall as well as a ton of exercise equipment. Sports and outdoor activity is king at Adams State.
• Library: Not impressive. I don't think the students like it much there. They were plugging the coffee cart they were planning to put in. No one was excited about it and the only thing our tour guide could tell us was that there were a few laptops that you an check out.
• Campus: A lot of the buildings were really old and dirty. They said some of them were getting replaced and updated.
• Theater: The theater department looked pretty cool. I got the impression that they didn't do musicals very often, which is understandable, but that the drama department was lively and growing.

Over all: It's hard to put an over all impression into words. There was no feeling of "This is where I belong" when I was on campus. It was more like "If this is what it takes to get into that ceramics studio I guess I could adapt."