Richard Mondello

I paid a visit to Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) today, and I must confess, I couldn’t have chosen a worse day to go. The weather was lousy; only now, homeward on Interstate 84, is the weather slightly welcoming. Unfortunately, it has shifted from unseasonably cold to unseasonably warm. To compensate, moving down a highway at 60 MPH with the windows open, listening to one’s favorite music, while typing a blog post is awesome.

But let’s get down to business: the visit.

Worcester Polytechnic Institute is a really nice school. Unfortunately, I was so fatigued after my four informational sessions, lunch, and campus tour, that I didn’t have the stamina to take photos. I made a bad decision in seeing Across the Universe last night, because I got home with only a half hour to sleep before having to wake up early to travel to Massachusetts. I will never do that to myself again. My photos wouldn’t have been all that flattering anyway, seeing as though the scenery was dreary.

Upon arriving at WPI, my family and I made our way into a gym where there was a brief welcome meeting, accompanied by a limited assortment of food. Everyone was given a grid of possible sessions to attend in different time-slots, and were free to choose the ones that they wanted to attend. I really enjoyed the freedom of being able to self-plan the entire day, seeing only the stuff that was relevant to me. The coolest thing, however, were miniature WPI puzzles. There were little cards with six puzzle pieces contained within them, to be punched out and put together as a cube. There were four different colors with varying difficulties. Frankly, I find them the coolest things ever.

The first session I attended was held by the Mathematical Sciences department. It was small, friendly, and informative. Essentially, what I got out of it was a better understanding of the various branches of mathematics. At this confusing point in my college admissions experience, that was really helpful.

My next session was by the Computer Sciences department. Compared to the Mathematical Sciences department, their presentation was unpolished in rhetoric and technical savvy, ironically. It wasn’t bad; it just couldn’t compare to the great job done by the Mathematical Sciences department. I found everything they said to be fascinating, despite those issues. One student spoke about his research project concerning manuscript proofing, and a software package he is writing to facilitate the process, with utopian hopes of collaboration between historians. That was super cool.

The third session I chose to attend was by the Electrical & Computer Engineering department. Honestly, I didn’t get all that much out of this one. My position in the room was inconvenient, and I was ravenous, which didn’t do wonders for my concentration.

Lunch was back in the gym. I ate far too much and enjoyed every moment of it. Right after eating, I made my way upstairs from the gym to collect some pamphlets and other literature. I chatted for a bit with a financial aid officer, mostly about my anxiety about how the FAFSA doesn’t compensate at all for extenuating circumstances like a parental profession change, parental loss of a job, or family disaster. I knew what answer to expect - write letters to the financial aid offices - but I probed her for more specific information on doing so.

After lunch I attended a rather bland session on Admissions, and was proud to be familiar with almost all of the terminology. I was made aware of the recently-premiered universal application, but don’t plan on using it. I noted that high school valedictorians and salutatorians receive a $17k merit scholarship per year at WPI. Nifty.

Finally, after wandering astray throughout the day trying to find my sessions, I took a campus tour. Mind you, the only way for me to attend all of the sessions I was interested in was to defer the tour until the end of the day. Our student tour guide was as inspired and lively as my group was not, and the weather remained a downer for the visitors. The quad was a tad drab, as was almost everything else.

A ubiquitous theme at WPI is the school’s project focus. All students must complete group projects frequently, and have two major projects during their junior and senior years. While the teamwork paradigm is interesting, I’m undecided on whether I like it or not. At WPI, in addition to other schools, I was told not to worry about picking a major right away; that is highly comforting.

I know this visit was unexpected, and it was taken mostly on a whim. The jury, me, is hung on tech school v. general university debate. I wanted to have another technical school to base my decisions off of besides RPI. I don’t think using a single school does the debate justice.

Right now, I haven’t made a conclusion about WPI. I’ll definitely be applying to it, and I think it fits me as a “good match”. It really did feel like a tech school though, which is both terrifying and exciting. I can’t just close this loop and put the debate behind me yet; soon, however, I will.

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