At Last, Harvard Is Home

Transfer students have never had to explain a missing identification card to Domna in Annenberg Hall and, to them, the term “proctor” means nothing more than an exam supervisor.

But while they might have missed out on some first-year rites of passage, transfer students say they wouldn’t exchange the perspective spending a year at a different institution has given them.

This year’s group—55 students out of more than 1,000 applicants—say their experience elsewhere and, in many cases, numerous attempts at Harvard acceptance, has made them appreciate their long-awaited status as Harvard students.

The Long Road to Harvard

Transfer students often say their reasons for choosing to pick up and come to Harvard are academic. Many of the transfers say they had applied to Harvard in high school and were rejected.

Amie N. Broder ’04, a Wellesley College transfer and mathematics concentrator, says she came to Harvard for the quality of the Faculty.

“The professors are the top of their field worldwide,” Broder says.

Hani B. Rimlawi ’04, a Notre Dame transfer, says he found the required courses at Notre Dame did not allow for sufficient academic flexibility.

Rimlawi applied initially during high school and then applied to transfer during his first year at Notre Dame.

He says he was thrilled to relocate from Indiana to Massachusetts and says the relative diversity of Harvard’s student body has been quite refreshing.

To be considered by the Committee on Transfer Admissions, potential transfers must have spent between one and two years at another four-year institution.

This year’s group of transfers include students from Vassar College, Gettysburg College, University of Pennsylvania, Middlebury College and Northwestern University.

‘Transferlinks’

For transfer students who have beaten the slim admissions rate, the Harvard experience begins with a day-long orientation which often leaves them “feeling like first-years all over again,” says Judy G. Fox, director of transfer and visiting student programs.

But although administrators can explain the Harvard University Police Department, the blue-light phones and the Core Curriculum, they can’t explain the difference between the Fly and the Bee.

For questions on the intricacy of Harvard social life, transfer students are offered a built-in network called Transferlinks, an organization made up of past transfers.

Amol K. Tripathi ’03, who is a co-chair of Transferlinks and an MIT transfer, says transfers are eager to become involved in the program and share their experiences with new students going through the process.

Transferlinks organizes dinners, parties and outings into Boston for the new students.

While Tripathi calls the transfers a “little community,” he says it is by no means a reclusive society.

Some transfer students remain heavily involved in the transfer network throughout their Harvard career while others, like Brian S. Fuchs ’04, say they were eager to get to know other non-transfers as well.

“I want to make my own friends and not just rely on the transfers,” he says.

Fuchs, who transferred from Brandeis, says he would characterize Harvard as welcoming, although he found the fraternity-driven Brandeis social life more accessible.

Broder says that although other transfer students are her closest friends, she has also had an easy time getting to know Currier House residents.

She also says she has enjoyed the community feel of the dining halls and the variety of the food, as well as Harvard’s sunnier rooms.

“Wellesley is in an isolated area. It’s a little closed off,” she says. “Whatever sun filters through the trees is all you have.”

Getting Acclimated

Many transfer students tell a number of stories about memorable first encounters with Harvard’s quirks.

At Wellesley, Broder says she had become accustomed to paying campus police to let her into her room whenever she was locked out.

But when she tried to pay to be let into her Currier House suite, Broder says the House employee simply laughed at the suggestion.

“He said, ‘I wish we got paid to do this,’” Broder remembers.

The intricacies of Harvard e-mail have made for some more confusion.

Some transfer students were not listed under the telnet “ph” command for directory information until two weeks ago.

Fuchs said he did not figure out that the telnet command existed until he was already listed.

But transfer students say their appreciation of Harvard goes beyond the small, more superficial details—like the real dishware in the dining halls and the reclining desk chairs in dorm rooms. According to Tripathi, many transfers “have a more positive opinion about Harvard because they have been to other places and are astounded by the opportunities.”

Often, Fox says, transfer students are very likely to become involved in extracurricular activities.

She says transfers are “disproportionately engaged and majorly involved” in the school’s activities.

Indeed, Broder compares her current evenings at Harvard to the hours she spent last semester baby-sitting local families in Wellesley—and calls Harvard “fantastic.”