Quick Facts
Home: outside Rochester, New York Favorite Movies: Wayne's World, Crash Favorite Singers/Bands: The Beatles, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ben Folds, John Mayer Favorite TV Shows: "Scrubs," "Family Guy," "Monk" Favorite Food: Vegetable Tempura Favorite Subject: History Intended Major: Either History, Biology, or English (but likely to change) Favorite Author: John Updike

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."
-- John Lennon

Hello everybody, my name is Nate and I'm from a tiny town near Rochester in Western New York. My town has only about four thousand people but it does have friendly people, a fine high school, and a strong sense of community. About twenty minutes north of my school is the city of Rochester, while twenty minutes south holds acres of endless farmland. I like to think that I get the best of both worlds living in my area.

Inside and outside of school, I'm a pretty passionate and engaged person. My extracurricular life in school revolves around music; in school, I'm in various choral and music ensembles and also do plays and musical theater.

Outside of school, one of my main interests is my band Soup. Our style is a groovy mix of rock, jazz, blues, and funk, and I write, play guitar, and sing for the band. Currently, we're recording an album entitled "Soul in a Bowl" that will be released later this year. I'm so excited for it. Anyway, I definitely want to take my involvement in the arts to the collegiate level and hopefully get involved in a cappella and theater.

Speaking of college, I want to first highlight that I'm excited about the adventures of the college experience but a little uneasy about the application process. I'm taking five AP's this year (Government, English Lit, Chemistry, French, and Calc) and am a little worried about when I'll have time to do the myriad of paperwork that the college admissions process requires. But hey, all of my fellow seniors are going through the same thing so I'm not too worried.

I'm interested in a ton of subjects (biology, history, English, government, chemistry, etc.) and don't want to specialize too much in college. For this reason, I'm looking for a well-rounded liberal arts undergraduate education. I also like the idea of a small college; I want to be part of a close-knit community.

So far, I have my list of colleges narrowed down to 8 schools. These schools are Amherst College, Bowdoin College, Wesleyan University, Kenyon College, Yale University, Denison University, Swarthmore College, and Princeton University. I've visited all of the schools and could see myself at any of them. Amherst is gorgeous and has amazing facilities, Bowdoin's location near the ocean is key, Wesleyan has very down-to-earth people, Kenyon has amazing humanities, Yale has incredible resources, Denison has great looking buildings, Swarthmore has outstanding science research opportunities, and Princeton is in an ideal college town. All of these colleges seem like wonderful places and have distinct feels to them.

While I've mainly focused on Eastern schools and haven't been exposed to many different campuses around the country, I don't want to worry so much about whether any one of these schools is the absolute "right fit" for me. I think that college in itself is a huge adjustment and that there would be challenges (and hopefully happiness) on any campus. Being that these schools are pretty competitive for admission, my main focus now is trying to get accepted!

While the college admission process is going to be a new and landmark stage in my seventeen years of life, I'm not going to let the process control me. Whatever colleges accept me and wherever I choose to go, I'm just going to try to keep learning, have an awesome senior year, and enjoy the ride. I hope that my documentation of the process helps you guys in your college quest!

Nate