In the US drinking laws are usually heavily enforced at grocery stores/clubs. Those places face big fines and charges if they’re caught selling alcohol to minors - which is the case pretty much anywhere in the country (not just around Stanford). Going outside buildings with alcohol (e.g. a red solo cup) as a minor especially can result in tickets/write ups from police.
As far as drinking on campus, the RAs job is mostly to make sure everyone’s safe and okay (not to be mini-police in the dorm, but rather make sure that no one is dangerously drunk, make sure parties have non-alcohol options, make sure everyone drinks some water, etc.). If parties are too loud after quiet hours then the RA will probably shut it down. But otherwise they usually don’t go into your room to make sure no one’s drinking. In my four years here I’ve never had the police come into a dorm building just because of parties where underage students might be drinking (if there were medical issues or fire alarms going off it’s different of course). From what I’ve heard that’s not how it works at some other schools.
On the row (frats) they rarely card you for a 21+ ID (they do sometimes card you for a Stanford ID to make sure no non-students come in).
Lots of support! Almost all professors hold weekly “office hours” where you can drop by and ask any questions. If you’re in larger classes usually there are TAs as well (graduate students or undergrads who previously did really well in the course). TAs can lead sections covering material and also often have office hours. For certain disciplines (writing, computer science, etc.) there are even more resources. We have the Hume Writing Center where you can make personal appointments and they’ll help you with anything writing-related (papers, outlines, proposals, etc.). There’s also peer tutoring. All of these are free to students.
Most students live on campus for all four years (and I think freshmen are required to live on campus). I would be a little wary of commuting because a big part of the community feel of the school as well as many of the social activities take place in a dorm. Since there are a variety of dorm options it’s not too hard to find one that fits your personality (e.g. quiet dorm, party dorm, studious dorm, themed dorm, etc.). Campus housing here is generally more desirable than living off campus.
Stanford subsidizes campus housing so it’s generally cheaper to live on campus than off. Because of their pretty generous need-based financial aid most students can afford to live on campus (and not have to commute from home). It’s definitely not a commuter school.
My family is middle class so doesn’t qualify for financial aid I guess. Are there work-study opportunities on campus? How well does it pay? Also given the quarter system and almost 45 hours per week for the course load, will I have the time to work?
Their need-based aid is pretty generous - even if your family makes over 100k I’d expect that you would still get some aid. I’ve received some aid and my family is generally considered middle/upper class. Last I heard about 50% of students get financial aid from Stanford. Considering the amount of wealthy kids, even a middle class family is probably in the lower half of income for Stanford.
There are work-study positions (library front desk, researcher, archiving, office assistants, etc.) but those spots are reserved for students who qualify for federal work study. Looking at our career site now there are options that pay anywhere from $13 to $18.50 per hour.
There are also many on-campus job opportunities (office assistant, research assistant, TA a class, staff in a dorm, tutoring, etc.). These positions generally pay around $15+/hr (I think campus minimum wage is $12.50 but I’m not positive). Tutoring usually pays $20-25+.
As long as you aren’t taking the most time intensive classes or are overly committed to ECs you would probably have time to work part time. Stanford won’t let you work more than 20 hours per week during the school year if you’re employed by them. Personally I did try working 20 hours and it was pretty hard so I chose to cut back. I’d recommend working 5-10 hours per week (at least initially) if you do want to work. Some jobs (like the library staff ones) have quite a bit of free time where you can do homework. A lot of the on campus jobs are also flexible which is really nice. You pick the time/days and, at least where I’ve worked, you can request taking finals week off or rescheduling during hectic times. Look for a flexible job that’s not too many hours per week if you’re concerned about the load.
The 45hr/week is more of an estimate. The more productive you are when you’re studying/working the fewer hours it’ll take. During dead week and finals week you’ll probably be putting in a lot more than 45 hours, but during weeks 1 and 2 you’ll probably be spending <45 hours. You can also take fewer units (freshman are encouraged to start with 12-15) to see how you handle the workload.
Thank you so much for your detailed responses! One more thing - does Stanford have a shopping period for classes? How well-taught do you find the classes? Thanks x
Yup! You have until the end of week 3 to finalize your schedule. If you’re shopping for classes, usually people start out taking an extra class or two and then drop their least favorite. It’s a bit hard to add a class at the end of week 3 because most of them will have already covered a lot of material (there are 10 weeks in a quarter, not including finals week). Dropping classes by that deadline is no problem though.
Generally extremely well taught. Professors are often pioneers in their field and doing groundbreaking research. Even in larger lectures most of them go out of their way to involve students (asking questions, demonstrations, etc.). I’ve never had a professor who didn’t seem to know the material extremely well. Some profs are more engaging than others, but usually you get a pretty good sense of that by talking to other people in the class or by shopping the class (and then dropping it if it’s not required).
Would someone who wants to focus exclusively on pure science be able to fit in well at Stanford? I have absolutely no interest in entrepreneurship, engineering, applied science, etc. but it kinda seems like those areas are the school’s focus.
@Pequenino Students who focus on hard sciences fit in just fine here in my experience. Our tech and engineering programs might get the most attention from the media, but quite a few students choose not to focus on those subjects (and we have quite good programs in other areas). The undergrad class, for example: http://facts.stanford.edu/academics/undergraduate-profile
I’m not an entrepreneurship/engineering/applied science focus and I’ve never felt like I don’t fit in. We also have quite a few pre-med students who usually choose to major in hard sciences (bio, physics, chemistry, human biology, etc.). These programs are pretty well established and it’s not uncommon for students to have a certain area that they’re interested in.
We do have some general ed requirements so you will have to take some classes outside of your major. But a lot of these classes are pretty flexible so you can combine an interest with science into our writing requirement (PWR) by taking a PWR class that focuses on scientific paper writing (or something similar to that). Our general ed requirements are pretty minimal compared to some other schools.
Lagging is right that freshmen are required to live on campus. Even Bill Gates’s daughter and Chelsea Clinton lived on campus, at least for their freshmen years. Furthermore, I’ve never personally met anyone who lives off campus as an undergrad (although Oak Creek sometimes feels off campus) - rent in the area is just incredibly expensive, this being Silicon Valley and all.
Stanford is pretty lax even compared to most American universities. The Stanford police have special policies since they deal with college students - first of all, they don’t come into dorms except in emergencies or to shut down rowdy parties, and as far as I know they don’t bust people who drink in private. When they bust underage people who drink in public, a first drinking offense (such as minor in possession) can be removed from your record as if it never happened.
Plus, although the University itself tries to provide alternatives to alcohol for underage students, university employees (like RAs as well as Resident Fellows and Deans) know underage drinking goes on and don’t police the dorms - instead, they are there to take care of sick people and make sure drinking doesn’t become dangerous.
Off campus, the law is enforced, and in the US, the drinking law tends to be strictly enforced. That being said, it is a college. There is no difficulty getting alcohol on campus. Off campus, although many people who are underage can buy alcohol without a problem, you do risk arrest and won’t get the same treatment as you would from the Stanford sheriff.
Is there a serious divide between humanities folks and STEM kids? I know the humanities department is absolutely stellar and the best/one of the best in the country, but how is the environment surrounding it? I know there’s the whole “techie” vs. “fuzzy” thing… does that kind of thing come up a lot? Prospective humanities guy over here (I was actually thinking of doing the new CS+X – probably English – but mainly want to focus on humanities). Thanks!!
@merovingian Thanks for contributing your thoughts!
@rabblerowser There’s not really a divide in terms of social aspects (e.g. they hang out together, are friends, sit together at meals, etc.). CS does come up in conversation a bit often (especially when larger more intense CS classes have problem sets due) but it’s by no means a daily thing. When it does come up if you’re interested or curious about something they mention like loops or strings they’re usually more than happy to explain and try to involve you in the conversation. I’d guess that some STEM kids feel the same about when humanities subjects come up. The whole “techie vs fuzzy” designation is a lot less emphasized now than when I first came here. I think Stanford’s trying phase out using those words to describe STEM vs not STEM.
Most STEM kids end up taking some humanities classes and most humanities kids take some STEM classes (general ed requirements and all). Since you can take courses in pretty much any discipline without a problem, it’s not uncommon for students to take both STEM and non STEM courses for fun too. In my experience, engineering majors are pretty excited when their humanities-oriented friends try an intro CS course and vice versa. Courses like 106A are commonly taken by non majors and majors alike which helps bridge some gaps between the CS and non CS folk.
As a side note, I’ve taken several English courses here and have had great experiences in them - our English department (and Creative Writing sub department) are awesome!
I just wanted to confirm that the entire week of Thanksgiving is off for students, correct? Also, do most students need that time to catch-up on work or is it more of a true break?
@Preprep - be aware that the “Big Game” is always the Saturday before Thanksgiving. Many students opt not to book flights home until Sunday because of this. The Big Game will be played at Cal for 2016. Stanford gets busses for the road trip over. I believe students have to pay a nominal fee to ride.
My ds had more work over Thankgsiving break his sophomore year than his freshman year. Neither year was terrible, however. I think the level of work one needs to do over the break is primarily a function of the classes you are in.
@PrepPrep You do get the whole week off and, as other have said, generally the homework load isn’t too bad. As far as other breaks go, we also have around a week for final exams and some quarters you’ll finish exams on the very first day so for spring or winter break you may get an additional week from what it says online. Most students don’t have exams on the very last day of the exam period (although you will occasionally).
@proudparent26 I’m majoring in psych and pursuing a minor and some interdisciplinary work as well. It took me a while to find the right major so I’ve taken courses in several different areas including natural sciences and engineering.
@Preprep My freshman son did absolutely no homework over the Thanksgiving break, though was at least one assignment he could have begun working on during that time. I agree with @Hoggirl that the amount of work you’ll need (or want) to do depends in part on the courses you’re in.
Do you know anything about the Symbolic Systems major? Is it a super heavy course load with requirements, etc or not? To people enjoy it? Is it respected? And if someone ended up wanting to go into Law after it would that still be feasible?
Is there grade deflation specifically in CS courses (I've heard that)?
Do you know anything about the Science, Technology, and Society major (STS)? I've heard that it's something that all the athletes take and it has really ruined its reputation? is that true?