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Physics GRE Study Group in Chicago

Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2011 7:35 pm
by Square47
I'm a recent grad from St. John's College. If you've heard of the place, you might think its a weird that I'm planning on taking the physics GRE. If you haven't, suffice to say its a small liberal arts program with no science majors (in fact, no majors at all). Now, its not that I'm vastly unprepared, but I'm a little out of practice in problem solving. So, I figured a weekly study group would probably improve my performance on the test by leaps and bounds. If you live in Chicago, message me if you'd be interested studying for the next month and a half, hopefully with a handful of like-minded people. Who knows, it might be fun.

The real deal with St. John's is that we do history of Math and Science, and only read original sources. So, if the group is indeed fun, I'd want to organize a reading group to read original works. We might start with Bohr, or maybe Maxwell? If that sounds appealing to you as well, apart from the PGRE, also message me.

Re: Physics GRE Study Group in Chicago

Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 12:48 am
by bfollinprm
I bought the physics lab companion for St. John's last time I was in Naptown...it was actually quite good.

Why is it weird? St. John's has a pretty generous history of Physics PhDs for a liberal arts school, let alone a great books program. I would have gone there, I'm just not that into croquet.

Re: Physics GRE Study Group in Chicago

Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 1:04 am
by Square47
Fair enough. My experience was that very few other grads were interested in science; most people become lawyers or teachers. Luckily, the statement is optative, so I'm not going to commit to the weirdness.

You know, the croquet doesn't really appear in Santa Fe-- but then you would have to deal with Santa Fe :P

Re: Physics GRE Study Group in Chicago

Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 4:41 pm
by bfollinprm
Square47 wrote:Fair enough. My experience was that very few other grads were interested in science; most people become lawyers or teachers. Luckily, the statement is optative, so I'm not going to commit to the weirdness.

You know, the croquet doesn't really appear in Santa Fe-- but then you would have to deal with Santa Fe :P
At least at the Annapolis campus, St. John's ranks in the top 10 nationally in percentage of students attending both math and computer science PhD programs. That's higher than any non-technical school (source, wikipedia, who sources indirectly the Weighted Baccalaureate Origins Study, Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium, 2010*).

*Which I haven't had a chance to read. I didn't go to St. John's, so I fell into the bad habit of trusting secondary works.