<p>We visited both MIT and CMU this year. Lunch choices at MIT were okay but nothing to write home about (subway, pizza, Mexican). I was very impressed with CMU’s lunch choices with custom made salads and sandwiches, lots of fresh food options. It was more expensive but it was nice to have salmon on a salad (instead of process meat). I hope MIT gets the message and stepped up there game like CMU has but it takes a concerted effort.</p>
<p>sorry - their game. I need to step up my typing!</p>
<p>Oh and I do remember there was a talk of Chipotle opening up on the MIT campus. Is there any other new or updated food options on campus? </p>
<p>What is the longest you’ve gone without sleep?
<em>edit</em> The first question I asked could have been taken in the wrong way</p>
<p>Three days sans the two nights in between them.</p>
<p>Three days… oh my god</p>
<p>Twenty-six hours, maybe.</p>
<p>Now I’m curious what the original question was :P</p>
<p>lidusha - Wait, so you did sleep the two nights between them?</p>
<p>I never pulled an all nighter. Certainly a lot of low-sleep nights (like 5hours). I’ve never been capable of all-nighters, and caffeine doesn’t actually keep me awake. I think with reasonable discipline and schedules, it’s perfectly possible to get through MIT with good grades and without all-nighters. That said, my discipline wasn’t perfect, so my grades definitely were worse from not taking all-nighters. </p>
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<p>Those are just the places in the student center, there are a lot of other options on or pretty much on campus which are pretty good. Steam Cafe, Koch Cafe, and Sebastians are all pretty good for cafeteria style food and are on campus, except for Sebastian’s which is across the street from the Koch building. Flour has good sandwiches, and is near Random, there are a bunch of food trucks on campus - I liked Momogoose (Vietnamese food) and Clover (vegetarian sandwiches) a lot, and there’s a Chipotle, Cosi, and now apparently a Clover restaurant in Kendall square. There’s a lot more, but these were the ones I liked the most.</p>
<p>No, I did not sleep the two nights between them.</p>
<p>Your lunch choices at MIT are so much broader than what you can find at the Student Center. MIT isn’t an isolated place. It’s in a city. A city with a lot of restaurants.</p>
<p>I haven’t successfully pulled an all-nighter (I’m pretty terrible at staying up late, even as an MIT student) so I think the longest continuous stretch I’ve been awake is around 22 hours.</p>
<p>In addition to Kendall Sq, there’s a lot of places on Mass Ave. Most of them are pretty mediocre, but a few of them (e.g. Flour) are quite good. On occasion I’ve biked across into the Back Bay, eaten lunch there, and biked back within a one hour break between classes.</p>
<p>Im an international student from India, and I really had my eyes set on MIT. The messed up part is I didnt ever practice for the SAT (ever, didnt even open a book, first time I saw the exam was when I gave it) and got an 1860 (680M 560CR 620W)
So I applied to colleges and got into a few ok colleges (PSU, purdue, ut austin etc) but I have a huge dilemma: Should I drop a year to focus on my SAT’s/subject tests for MIT? and what else would make my application stand out? Any tips? What did your application look like (other than the obvious stellar grades and SAT because im sure everyone who applies to MIT has those)</p>
<p>I’m jealous – if I worked close enough to a Flour, I’d eat there every day.</p>
<p>I came to MIT for the day for a workshop a few months ago, and I was really reminded how much better the lunch situation is at MIT vs. Harvard. At Harvard, all we (grad students) had was the law school cafeteria, which is nice but gets very boring after a few months. And now I’m at the medical school, and the major source of lunch is the hospital cafeterias, which, yick.</p>
<p>Indian5596:
If I were in your shoes, I’d forget about MIT and focus on the various schools you’ve been accepted to (PSU, Purdue, UT Austin). Those schools have a lot to offer and will give you ample opportunity to thrive. </p>
<p>I’m not sure you’ll find anyone who will advocate your thought of taking a year off to try and increase your chances to get into MIT. </p>
<p>How do the different departments at MIT differ in terms of how they treat undergrads? Which department is “friendliest” for lack of a better word? For example, I’ve heard that Course 6 professors are pretty impersonal…
Specifically I’m interested in 6-7, 22, 9, and 8. (random… I know)</p>
<p>I’ve found professors from all the departments I’ve taken a lot of classes in (6, 7, 18, and 21W) to all be incredibly friendly and wonderful people, all very open to meeting and talking, about the class or about life. People here are busy but they are not impersonal. The thing though is that the conversations and connections don’t just happen: you need to seek them out.</p>
<p>There are a handful of professors and especially TAs I haven’t had extremely positives experiences with. But they are very few, and their negatives are far outweighed by the positives of others.</p>
<p>Basically professors are people before they are professors, and people tend to be open and friendly and good.</p>
<p>I would echo what lidusha said regarding professors. I imagine the reputation of course 6 professors may have something to do with the very high student to faculty ratio in course 6.</p>