For Taylor Swift, class in session; The pop star engages easily with her peers during a performance at Pomona College.

It's a good bet that a fair amount of homework went undone Monday night for about 3,000 students from the five Claremont colleges.

Rather than hunkering down over their books, students piled into Pomona College's Bridges Auditorium and spent most of the evening with Taylor Swift, who used the opportunity to tape a new edition of "VH1 Storytellers."

In an unusually smooth television taping -- there were few pauses and no stops for retakes -- Swift held the equivalent of a master class in pop music stardom after Harvey Mudd College won her national contest to host the singer-songwriter for a concert.

Swift...