Helloooooo wonderful Barnard acceptees!

Congrats. You are AWESOME. And your lives are about to change forever (dun dun dun).

Your college choice, and the whole of your stint as a college student, may very well shape who you will be for the rest of your life. Don't let that scare you--you're in good company, you've made the right decisions in life thus far (look, you got into Barnard!), and you'll have lots of eager helpers ready to answer questions from each of your college choices over the next few weeks.

My name is Jen, and I'm an archaeologist and member of the Class of 2009. At Barnard I was an archaeology major in the anthro department, a Student Store and Admissions employee, an intern at the Met and elsewhere, a McIntosh Activities Council member and a few other things. You can read a tad more about me in my Blogger bio.

Anywho... :)

So why Barnard?

I did a college fair on behalf of Barnard yesterday morning, and this was an obvious question for prospective students. My answer is simple: I don't work for Admissions. In fact, I have a totally separate job (and a weird one; I'll tell you about that some other time)--yet I am donating hours of my time when I could be working to represent Barnard at a random high school. There are hundreds of alumnae like me, too. So for all of us to do that, Barnard must be special.

I love Barnard so much that I will gladly spend a day answering questions about it instead of being paid, talk on Skype with applicants while at temporary overseas locations, and write for the Barnard Admissions Beat. It puzzles me that not all of my friends can feel this way about their alma maters. For the Barnard woman, a strong connection to and love for the College after graduation is not only common, but natural.

On a slighty less poetic and serious note: how does it feel to have been accepted?!