Hey y'all, welcome to the woods! My name is Garrett Crouch, and I'm a '26 from Edmond, Oklahoma. Besides blogging, I'm involved in Greek Life and Dartmouth's Psychological and Brain Sciences Department. I enjoy reading sci-fi, listening to 90s rock, and playing video games in my free time. Other than that, I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to share a bit of my Dartmouth student experience with you—stay a while and enjoy!
For my first term at Dartmouth, I had a lot of fun exploring different courses/areas of study that piqued my interest—EARS 14 is a perfect example. This course in particular was very friendly to new students. I had a lot of fun analyzing the ways in which Earth's weather system works, everything from the tornado and climate labs to black lightning and supercooled ice. Professor Osterberg made the course extremely fascinating and personable! I'm extremely glad I took this course and recommend it to anyone interested in Earth Science.
I had zero programming experience prior to taking this course, and quite honestly, It was a split decision on my part. Nonetheless, I'm extremely glad I took COSC 1, and as a byproduct, I have a newfound love for computers. I came out of the course with a solid foundation in computer science principles as well as programming skills. More importantly, I made my own fully-functioning video game! ; )
I didn’t anticipate this course being all that different from Latin I, but it ended up being a nice surprise. A typical Latin course at Dartmouth involves small class sizes, group work, and the occasional lecture; however, within Latin II, we had opportunities to take a wide variety of field trips and learn more about the history of the Latin language as well as the many people that spoke it. I thoroughly enjoyed stepping outside the sphere of strictly language work (grammar, vocabulary, etc.) and learning more about the history of Latin in Latin II.
Psych 6 is by far my favorite course I've taken at Dartmouth—this course made me decide to pursue the neuroscience major. Whether it was walking out of the Moore Psychology Building with goosebumps down my spine having just seen a human brain in the flesh, or lying in bed rewatching lectures on the cellular mechanisms of long-term memory storage. This course genuinely made me feel like a kid discovering the world again for the first time, I loved it.
I loved this course—it was a fascinating mix of the neuroscience behind addiction as well as a deep dive into every class of drug. What particularly stood out about this course was the ability to connect my undergraduate research lab experience with the concepts I was learning (I'm currently involved in a neuroscience research lab studying psilocybin, the main psychoactive compound found in magic mushrooms, so it was fascinating to see the parallels there).
At first, I was worried Cognitive Psychology was going to be a slight rerun of some of the concepts covered in Psych 6: Introduction to Neuroscience, but this class was actually a pleasant surprise. We covered everything from how babies accurately learn their native language so quickly, to how we uniquely store complex, emotional memories as humans. We even covered a unit on everything psychologists know about the problem of consciousness, which was my personal favorite. There’s something alluring (and undeniably meta) about being conscious while learning about how we know nothing about consciousness—a recurring theme in the Brain Sciences!
A few weeks ago, I (as well as three other PPP bloggers) participated in an episode of "Admissions Beat," a podcast show hosted by Dartmouth's Dean of Admissions, Lee Coffin. The podcast covers all things "college admissions" through various topics and themes. The episode I got to be a part of was titled "Take an 'Existential Selfie'" in which my peers and I discussed the unique aspects of our college search process. Feel free to check out the episode (as well as the other episodes) here: admissions-beat-podcast! Dean Coffin does an awesome job of facilitating meaningful conversations that shed a lot of light on the reality of the college search/admissions process. All in all, it was a phenomenal experience; I've always wanted to be on a podcast!
Recently, I've been thinking a lot about the nature of the conversation I had with Dean Coffin as well as my blogging peers—"Why Dartmouth?" In other words, what did my college search process look like? More importantly, what did that final moment of actually deciding to choose Dartmouth entail?
Within the podcast episode, I talked about how I felt influenced by my peers early on when starting my own college search process. In Oklahoma, at least at my high school specifically, most of my friends knew where they were going/what they were doing after high school fairly quickly (attending The University of Oklahoma or Oklahoma State University). It actually wasn't until the fall of my senior year that I definitively realized I wanted to get out of Oklahoma.
During the fall of my senior year, I attended Dartmouth's Indigenous Fly-In Program indigenous-fly-program, and that was arguably the defining series of moments behind my decision to apply. I had researched Dartmouth the summer before my senior year, but the idea of actually attending and or being accepted was more or less a distant dream.
On top of being certain I wanted to get out of Oklahoma, I also really liked what Dartmouth represented as an institution, (collaboration and community in the woods!) so I ended up applying Early Decision.
In short, the moments leading up to choosing Dartmouth as my target school entailed a lot of dread and confusion related to the influence of my peers, but that moment of actually sitting down and deciding on Dartmouth was memorable and satisfying (even though I thought I had no chance getting in).
To this day, I have no regrets about choosing Dartmouth. Even though I've yet to experience a lot, being a first-year student and all, I can confidently say my enthusiasm for this school will never fall short : )
Learn about the different programs Dartmouth offers prospective students to explore campus life, learn about Dartmouth, and enjoy an all-expenses paid trip to Hanover!
"What's it like working for admissions?" "Are you being truthful with your answers?" "Are you being scripted?" Let's dive right into all these questions.
It's been (almost) a full year since I was in your (figurative) shoes! Let's take a trip down memory lane and dissect my Dartmouth application process. Part one of a long journey!
Choosing the right college is a critical decision that extends beyond mere rankings. Without the benefit of campus visits, it's vital to thoroughly research and understand each institution to ensure a fulfilling and safe experience.
Summer is a great time for high school students to visit campuses and better make sense of the schools they want to apply to. In this blog, I will talk about some advice to make the most of your campus visit.
