International student profile: Wei Lin Wong

Home town
Singapore

Majors
Communication Studies [School of Communication]
International Studies [Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences]

Current project
Working on Dvorak's "American Quartet" with my string quartet

Hobbies
Violin, clarinet, soccer, basketball

Questions and Answers

Why did you choose Northwestern?

My dad was an alumnus here, graduated with a chemical engineering degree. Aside from that, I was attracted to NU's academic rigor, its beautiful campus, and its proximity to Chicago.

What is the best thing about being a student at Northwestern?

STUDYING ALL THE TIME. No, no, that's not true. Just being surrounded by people who are constantly challenging you to do your best.

What is your favorite book?

Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air

If you weren't a student, what would you be doing?

Backpacking for an extended time in Nepal and eventually making it up to the base camp of Mt. Everest.

What is your favorite spot on campus?

The lakefill on a spring day. It's perfect for getting away from everything.

What's your favorite class? Why?

Rhetorical history classes. I've taken a few rhetoric classes about past presidencies and U.S. history, and I think it's great how we can look at the speeches and other rhetorical works to get a feel for the time period.

What do you think about the quarter system?

There are pluses and minuses. I've been able to take a lot of classes that are really diverse, a bunch of different stuff. Basically I can take what I'm interested in. I have a really great adviser [Susan Dun]. She's helped me out a ton with what classes I should take. She guides me, but at the same time I get to pick and choose what I'm interested in academically. It's been really good.

Tell me about your involvement in music at Northwestern.

I play the violin. I've played since I was four. So, when I came and visited Northwestern, one of the things I was looking for was a strong [music] program for undergraduates that I could pursue even though music wasn't my major. I'm in the Philharmonia, it's the non-major [orchestra], and I just recently this quarter joined a quartet. Northwestern's music school is really helpful even if you're a non-major.

What other schools did you look at and why did you choose Northwestern?

I looked at a whole bunch of schools, kind of a wide array. It came down to Northwestern and Notre Dame and I decided that Northwestern's music, for one, was a lot better here and I think general academic level, achievement level for students, was better here, too.

Wei Lin Wong

Wei Lin Wong