originally posted december 19, 1999
what a year!
So 1999 is finally drawing to a close, and this is the last update you'll likely see this year. I'll spare you all the "century" and "millennium" clichés just to sidestep all the debate as to whether 2000 or 2001 is the true milestone. (For all we know, those Gregorians could have screwed up the calendar so much that the new millennium began hundreds of years ago.)
Academically, I'm glad that the first semester is over, and overall satisfied or shocked at some of the grades I've received. College grades can be quite a curiosity from time to time -- for instance, my Matrix Algebra class was looking to be a lost cause what with my 72% test average and 45% homework average. I was happy to walk out of there with a C, salvaging a course I openly considered dropping throughout the semester. However, last week CMU's web-based grades application registered the grade as a B, much to my surprise. If there's one thing that can help you out in higher education, it can be the relative inability of your classmates.
Going into a competitive program like CMU's School of Computer Science can be a humbling experience. Being in the company of scores of highly talented students from all countries, all backgrounds, and a vast range of skills and interests can give two reactions. To the student who achieves just for the sake of competition and one-upsmanship, it breeds inordinate amounts of stress. To the student who interacts with others well and can work in group situations, it provides unprecedented opportunity for advancement. Seeing the power of cooperation and interdependence in action validated all the "intangibles" that come into play during the Admissions Game. Schools like CMU get to choose from a large pool of talented applicants; the admissions counselors have to choose those who will succeed.
| CMU SCS Class of 2003 Statistics | ||
|---|---|---|
|
2,680 applied, of whom 542 were offered
admission. 130 chose to enroll.
80 of the 130 students are male, and 50 are female. This class has the most women of any class in SCS's short history. |
The median SAT I verbal score of an SCS
freshman is 700, and the median SAT I math score is 780.
43 have scores of 800 on SAT I math, and 17 have scores of 800 on SAT I verbal. 9 have 1600's in total. The range of SAT composite scores is 1300-1600. What does this mean? Nothing. |
58 students plan to graduate in the top
10% of their class (only 13 students can possibly do so).
Including the above 58, 98 students plan to be in the top 25% (32 students). A total of 100 plan to be in the top 50% (65 students). A paltry 2 students expect to be in the bottom 50%. |
Overall, I have to say that it's been a satisfying semester on nearly all levels. There also have been many pleasant albeit surreal little touches, like the fact that I've exchanged some 800KB of instant messages with a friend who lives all of one hundred feet away from me, in a span of nearly 3 1/2 months. That's the second-most of anyone on my buddy list this year, and the 2,700KB exchanged when annualized is easily the most all year. However, December 8 brought the one exchange that sent the whole virtual and real relationship for yet another spin; my pronouncement that I "really honestly like" her was met with her response that an attempt to make things more serious would "ruin everything." Ah well, such is life, I suppose.
So what's on tap for 2000? Stay tuned and stay posted.
Back to December 1999, or to the year 1999.
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