Transfer Students’ Stanford

Having attended other post-secondary institutions, Stanford’s small and tightly-knit group of transfer students has the unique ability to make comparisons and shed light on what many Stanford undergraduates likely take for granted.  Diana Munoz-Villanueva, Teryn Norris, and Tenzin Seldon are three such transfer students.  In addition to telling their stories, they were asked to compare their former post-secondary institutions to Stanford, focusing specifically on making comparisons regarding Stanford’s political life, academics, and social life.

Diana Munoz-Villanueva

Diana Munoz-Villanueva was born in Mexico and moved to the US when she was 14 years old.  After living in Los Angeles for a brief period of time, she and her family eventually moved to San Francisco.  She says that she is 100 percent Mexican and takes pride in her roots, but, at the same time, calls the Bay Area her home and takes pride in living in this country.

Out of high school, Munoz-Villanueva applied to and was accepted at a number of schools throughout California, including U.C. Berkeley.  Munoz-Villanueva says that she really wanted to attend Berkeley, but, due to financial concerns and because she wasn’t sure what she wanted to study, she ultimately decided to attend City College of San Francisco.  Munoz-Villanueva says that she had no intention of applying to Stanford until her chancellor at City College recommended it. “Even though you’re breathing, your lungs are still empty,” she said about learning of her acceptance to Stanford.

Munoz-Villanueva was once again accepted at Berkeley.  “Honestly, it wasn’t even a real question.  I knew that it was going to be Stanford.  The textbooks that I’m reading are the textbooks that my professors wrote, and there’s absolutely nothing better than knowing that the person teaching you is the best at what they do,” she said.  Munoz-Villanueva is a junior, and has plans to major in engineering.

Political Life: “In San Francisco, it wouldn’t be a Wednesday if students weren’t gathering and talking about something that was going on, whether it be the war or the bank bailouts.  They were very outspoken about how they felt.  I haven’t seen as much of that here at Stanford, but I don’t want to say that it’s because Stanford students aren’t as mobilized or as outspoken.  Clearly, this is an institution with amazing students and amazing minds.”

Academics: “I don’t think the material here is impossibly hard, but I do realize that the amount of work that I have to do is a lot more.  The amount of work is three times what I used to have.  Before school started, I read the first chapter for each one of my classes, and, even though I did that and thought I was ahead of schedule, it turned out that I was just with the class.  Everybody had already read the first chapter.”

Social Life: “Of course, in a community college, you live off campus, so you don’t get to experience as many parties.  I did go to one party here, and I didn’t find it that appealing to me.  I felt that there were way too many kids just trying to experiment with alcohol.  I came here to study, to get my work done.  Yes, I want to have free time, but I would rather sit around a table and have a drink with friends.”

Most surprising thing about Stanford: “The people.  I thought the campus was going to be more conservative and that students would not be so open minded.  I actually was very surprised with how liberal students on campus are and how well opinionated they are.  Also, if you say ‘hi’ to people here, they ‘hi’ back, with a big smile.  I’m so used to the big city, where everybody is tired and stressed out; everybody here is always happy and smiley.”

Teryn Norris

Originally from Asheville, North Carolina, Teryn Norris decided to attend Johns Hopkins University after high school.  Norris says that his decision to attend Hopkins was based on the fact that he wanted to study international relations and international economics.

At Hopkins, Norris served as president of his class, and, after a year-long campaign, convinced the president of the university to adopt a new clean energy initiative that he launched.  The summer of his freshman year, Norris worked at a public policy think tank here in the Bay Area called the Breakthrough Institute, which focuses on clean-energy policy. While there, Teryn proposed that he launch a young leaders initiative, and eventually took time off from Hopkins to work at the Breakthrough Institute full time.  Norris worked in the Bay area until he decided to come to Stanford.

Norris says that Stanford had a lot more resources in his areas of interest and that Stanford’s location and good financial aid were particularly convenient.  “I wanted to go to a school that had more resources in energy, especially energy policy but also, more broadly, economic policy,” he said.  Norris considers himself a junior and plans to major in public policy.

Political Life: “The reputation at Hopkins and the general feeling you get being there is not that the student body is apathetic, but that, certainly, there is less student activism.  When I was there, I launched this campaign to get a new energy and climate policy, and I actually saw a pretty significant outpouring of student interest and support.  I do think in the past, Hopkins has been more apathetic, and part of that has to do with the admissions policy.  I believe that the administration is now shifting their admissions policy, looking to build a little more active and a little bit more diverse student body.  I think that, on the whole, the Stanford student body is much more active.”

Academics: “I think people here take academics just as seriously as people at Hopkins, but that here, people are able to manage themselves a little better – they can still manage their academics without allowing it consume all of them.  I think there are more people at Hopkins whose academics end up just consuming all of them, especially the biomedical engineers there.  Hopkins has the reputation for attracting a lot of premeds because of the hospitals and its focus on the life sciences.  So, it’s a little more cutthroat in terms of the academics and in terms of the way that students interact with their classes and what they prioritize.”

Social Life: “Certainly, I think the student body here is happier in general, and I think that’s for a number of reasons.  One is that it’s Stanford, and everyone is proud to be here and knows what an amazing institution it is – everyone here is very happy with their financial aid packages.  A lot of people at Hopkins are Ivy League rejects.  They wanted to go to Yale or Princeton, and Hopkins was maybe in the middle of their selection.  I think there are a lot of those, so they don’t necessarily have as much school pride.”

Most surprising thing about Stanford: “I didn’t realize how influential and important and conservative the Hoover institution was.  Your first impression of Stanford is that it’s in the Bay Area, it’s near San Francisco; you would expect it to be this beacon of progressive leaning perspectives.  Ultimately, it was nice to know that there was a diversity of thought here.”

Tenzin Seldon

Born and raised in India, Tenzin Seldon lived as a refugee before moving to Minnesota.  Seldon says that she identifies most closely with Tibet because her parents fled the country through the Himalayas before she was born.  Although she’s never been to Tibet, she says that she feels that Tibet is the place that resonates most with her. 

Seldon went to high school in Minnesota, but says that she didn’t initially know what she wanted to do when she went to college.  Though she was admitted to almost all of the colleges to which she applied, including several Ivy Leagues, Seldon chose to go to a community college due to  financial limitations  and several other personal reasons.  When she was finishing her last year at her community college, Seldon says that she was looking for more of a challenge and the opportunity to explore her intellect.  According to Seldon, Stanford offered both an outlet for her to explore what she wanted to do and a wide array of classes.  Seldon considers herself part of the class of 2012 and plans to major in Asian American Studies and minor in Ethics in Society.

Political Life: “Student activism on campus here at Stanford is so much more prevalent than at my community college.  Stanford provides students with so many outlets to join clubs and to start clubs.  At my community college, there were only a few clubs, and two of them I started.  You have to understand, community college students are often older students with children – adult and non-traditional students who don’t really have time to invest in the school.  Most community college students are there to get vocational training.  There, I felt that I didn’t have an outlet, and here, I feel like I can organize students, start a club, and do so much.”

Academics: “It’s a lot more challenging here.  Reading and writing are a lot more intense; however, I feel like I can manage it.  At my community college, I took an average of 23 units, and here I feel that is equivalent to 15 or 16 units.  It’s a quarter system, first of all.  Second of all, teachers expect you to know what you’re talking about and expect you to have read the material when you come to class.”

Social Life: “I was shocked and pleasantly surprised to see what a social life Stanford has.  I honestly did not think the social life at Stanford would be such a big deal.  If you go out, there are parties everywhere.  People are very social in general; they’re so warm and hospitable.  I feel like that’s just the atmosphere that Stanford brings out of you.  In my community college, we barely had any social events.  There’s a social event here every single day; I’m overwhelmed.  Every time I look at my calendar there is something going on, and I’m not used to that at all.”

Most surprising thing about Stanford: “I would say the opportunities, the research opportunities.  I would never have imagined.  There is such a huge amount of research opportunities, whether it’s scholarships, internships, fellowships.  I’ve not come from a place where I’ve had those at my hands.  Also, Stanford offers you all the money in the world for you to do research and for you to go out and explore your intellect.  That’s something that I feel that I’ve always been deprived of, and I come here and I’m like wow, all this for me.”

According to the Office of Admissions, the admit rate for transfer students varies between one to two percent every year.  “I don’t think any of us really imagined that we would actually get in,” Munoz-Villanova stated.  “We all knew it was very competitive, and we knew it since the moment we opened the Common Application, and we knew it up to the day that we came here,” she concluded.

All of this year’s class of transfer students resides in Kimball hall.  When asked about Kimball, all three of the students featured in this article said that they are very happy to be living along with their fellow transfer students.