Be careful for what you wish for...?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
21

<p>I disagree with the statement above that MIT may not be a happy place overall. </p>

<p>My D enrolled as a freshman this past year, and she reflected at length with us over the holidays about her first semester experience. Although this has been the most intense academic experience in her life so far, she is extremely happy overall with her choice and she feels that most of her classmates are also happy. She realized she could have made an easier choice when she met her HS friends going to other elite colleges over the holiday break, but did not regret anything. She knows that as a premed she needs a decent GPA but at the same time knows that nearly 80% of MIT students get admitted to med school on their first attempt so she is not overly worried. Our D has already started doing research on some new diagnostic imaging technology and feels she will have a edge over many other applicants. </p>

<p>While the workload is extremely intense she has managed to keep an even keel. She joined a sorority which keeps her busy socially, keeps physically fit and takes time to volunteer at a local hospital. She just started IAP which is an opportunity for students to engage into any number of extra-curricular activities. She could have stayed home and seen her HS friends who won't start second semester for another month, but she couldn't wait to get back to MIT. </p>

<p>Courses are definitely tough. She breezed through Calc in HS but struggled in multivariable calculus at MIT. Psets gave her fits. Exams were hard. It was not enough to understand the concepts but you really had to know how to apply them. It was a complete relearning experience. She persevered and in the end passed just fine, about in the middle of the pack. The good news is first semester is all pass/fail with no grades. This gave her a tremendous boost in self-confidence. </p>

<p>There are clearly exceptions: her roommate from Florida is leaving to go back home after failing one of her classes first semester. This could have been predicted after week one as she was clearly mentally unprepared for the challenge and unwilling to make a real effort, even though she was clearly capable of passing. </p>

<p>MIT makes a major effort to help students manage the stress. Since the initial core is common to all students, nearly everybody is going through the same challenges at the same time. You are never alone to work on a problem. You spend a lot of time in groups, much more than my D was used to from HS. There is virtually unlimited tutoring by TA's. Also by mixing freshmen with upperclassmen in the dorms, it is actually very easy to get assistance from somebdy who knows the course in and out. You also get an extra day off every month just to catch up or rest. The absence of grades first semester, ability to take courses as exploratory sophomore year and P/F junior and senior years also relieves the pressure. Finally, there is no ranking or latin honors, so there is no competition between students. </p>

<p>Also, maybe because they need to compensate for the weekly stress, MIT students party a lot during weekends. With multiple frat parties, sorority formals and other activities on weekends, there is simply no shortage of events to attend. Pretty much nobody studies on Friday and Saturday nights. She has definitely found the MIT maxim "Study, have fun, sleep; pick any two" to be true. At this point she has decided to forgo sleep except on Sunday mornings when she seldom gets out of bed before noon.</p>

22

<p>I tend to agree with pebbles.</p>

<p>MIT is difficult, and I would certainly have had an easier row to hoe going to State U. On the other hand, I am certain that I would not have gotten into the grad school I'm in had I not gone to MIT -- graduate schools were far more impressed with my 3.3(/4) MIT GPA, which is around the average for students and almost certainly below the average of both of my departments, than they would have been with the not-4.0 I would have gotten at State U. Same for my husband -- he would not have the job he loves had he not gone to MIT.</p>

<p>That's not to say that the outcomes should be the only deciding factor, or even a major deciding factor. I chose to go to MIT because on my visit I could tell that I'd stumbled upon a group of people who were like me, and I couldn't give that up. I was right, and I can't imagine having gone somewhere else and not met and made friends with and fallen in love with all the fabulous people I met at MIT.</p>

<p>I had my share of completely insane weeks, and classes, and terms, but I never reached the point where I actually hated MIT for it. I'm not going to say I loved every minute, but knowing everything I know now, I would make the same choice to go to MIT 100 out of 100 times.</p>

23

<p>pebbles said above that school needs to be made the top priority, but approximately how much of a time commitment would this be for the average MIT student? I ask because I have a girlfriend who is extremely clingy and who wants to follow me to college; I'm going to tell her we won't be able to spend as much time together as we do now, but still...</p>

24

<p>Well, I mean, you can spend plenty of time with her if you're willing to define "spending time together" as "doing homework together". ;)</p>

<p>I am a big proponent of the virtue of combining pieces of MIT life -- if you combine work + significant other, or work + friends, or relaxation time + extracurricular activity, you don't have to "choose two", as the saying goes.</p>

25

<p>Well she would not be attending MIT, that's the thing; I have no problem just doing homework together, but if she has homework that takes less time and finds herself a lot less busy than I am, that is where I foresee problems.</p>

26

<p>Never mind - mollieb already made the point I was going to make. Your girlfriend shouldn't need to be entertained every minute you are together. Even of her HW takes less time, can't she just read or something? Maybe she'll make other friends at her own school and not need to rely on you so much. I don't know. My boyfriend (now husband) was also an MIT student. Made things easier.</p>

27

<p>I think the important thing is that the admitted student and his/her parents all understand that an MIT education will be very rigorous. If the parents are expecting a continuation of straight A's in MIT, they may inadvertently put additional pressure on a student who is struggling with the general institutional requirements. </p>

<p>Berkeley's School of Engineering is no less rigorous, but it's much more brutal than MIT. I spoke last year with a young man who had dropped out after freshman year, and he told a story about a professor who said to the class, "Look around. See all these filled seats? By next semester, about a third of you will have failed." MIT's retention statistics are excellent, and the Institute provides a lot more support. I think that any of the top engineering and scientific schools are similar. </p>

<p>My daughter is a freshman, and she LOVES MIT. She had a great time during the first semester, and she's made some wonderful friends. I would hate to think that this thread had turned someone away from MIT who could have done well there.</p>

28

<p>For the record, I totally love the place, too.</p>

29

<p>pebbles, honestly, the implication that if you're not doing okay, it's because you weren't working hard enough, or think that you're too good for homework...is kind of insulting, and also not true in my experience. Which doesn't mean that one should give in to learned helplessness. Part of the issue is that people who put in the time and are genuinely working <em>hard</em> aren't always working <em>effectively</em>, because they don't know how. Or they have other underlying issues...mental problems, anxiety brought on by family dynamics, burnout, etc.</p>

<p>I'm not sure what test averages have to do with anything, when most classes are curved. Most people I knew <em>liked</em> tests with low averages. It meant that they could afford to have screwed up more.</p>

<p>I do in fact agree with various others that MIT is not an unhappy place. It's a roller-coaster place, with tremendous highs and lows. People work hard and play hard - it's like everything is burning extra-hot, everything has an added dimension of intensity. There's a lot of happiness there, and a lot of wonder, and beauty.</p>

<p>Mollie, you ended up with a good GPA. You did well. You were never on probation, never in danger of being forced out.</p>

<p>
[quote]
I would hate to think that this thread had turned someone away from MIT who could have done well there.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>There are plenty of threads singing the Institute's praises already. There's plenty of highlighting of the awesome...I've written quite a bit of it myself. But people should go in with their eyes open.</p>

<p>
[quote]
For the record, I totally love the place, too.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As do I. I sure spent enough time fighting to preserve its essence, to keep it special. Like Mollie said...knowing everything I know now, I would still choose to go, 100 times out of 100. IHTFP, and ILTFP.</p>

30

<p>I think all view points are valuable. If everyone agreed there would be no discussion and we'd be sitting around bored. Moreover, I think it's helpful to have both extremes presented, and therefore we span a whole spectrum of experiences and the average student can recognize in his own experiences a mosaic of the crap we tell him. I dont mean to insult.</p>

<p>I'm still of the firm belief that the stress and difficulties are manageable as long as you make a reasonable choice of major that takes into consideration both your interests and your abilities. I agree, working well and working hard combine to make a successful student, but learning how to work efficiently is an obstacle conquered best by the end of first semester freshman year with little permanent consequence (Pass/No Record) , and no later than second semester freshman year (ABC/No Record). Extenuating circumstances such as ADD and eating disorders and family dynamics are unique to the student and not the school, and shouldn't come into play when discussing MIT's difficulty, though should be kept in mind by the individual considering a path in a high-stress field. At the end of the day, if a student is working as hard as they can and has sought out every avenue of help available, and is still failing a significant fraction of his classes, then he has simply over stretched his abilities, or perhaps chosen to attend the wrong school. That is not to say that he is not intelligent and cannot go on to do great things in his field (I believe, surely, he may), but that he is wrong for this particular institution or perhaps for studying in a particular department within this institution. Basically I believe that MIT is designed so that you are challenged but that ultimately you can succeed (by succeed I do not mean necessarily match Mollie's GPA, but just, not be in danger of failing out), and that if you are having extreme difficulties in doing so, it is an indication that something needs to change on your part.</p>

<p>Actually, I dont even think this is an extreme view in the least. I think River Phoenix should pipe up with his extreme views.</p>

31

<p>
[quote]
Mollie, you ended up with a good GPA. You did well. You were never on probation, never in danger of being forced out.

[/quote]

Sure, but that wasn't a foregone conclusion when I went in -- I really struggled first semester, and I passed my technical classes by very narrow margins.</p>

<p>All of our opinions on this matter are colored by our environments at MIT. And my opinion is colored by not having been around people who were having the significant academic struggles that we're talking about. The people in my environment were mostly not having trouble, and those who were having trouble dropped some classes or took an extra term to graduate or switched majors.</p>

<p>I don't want that to be patronizing, but the people in my immediate environment who struggled were generally those who didn't choose class as a first priority. That's not to say that everybody who struggles at MIT does so because of their priorities, or because they don't study efficiently. That's just to say that in my immediate environment at MIT, inefficiency and alternate priorities were the major factors.</p>

32

<p>One thing that often surprised me was how in different parts of campus people were more or less open about academic difficulties. I actually had friends from parts of campus where they were the only person I really knew there who would zephyr/IM me to talk about their problems, because in their own social group nobody ever talked about such things and they were ashamed to discuss it with the people there. I was taken aback by it. Note, Mollie, that I am not saying that was what was going on in your social group. Nobody who ever pinged me about this was from MacGregor. It's an interesting issue, though.</p>

<p>Another odd trend that I noticed...the people at either extreme of the academic success scale (the people flunking out and the people who were taking 90+ units a term and getting As with plenty of free time to spare) seem to often pick the same living groups. I have absolutely no idea why this happens.</p>

<p>To pebbles: Another issue is that different departments (and sometimes different classes within the department) have different study methods that work effectively. A strategy that works great for one class could lead the student to crash and burn in another. Other than my struggles in 5.112 (which I shouldn't have taken in the first place), I actually did just fine as a frosh, oddly enough. Whatever I was doing to study was working okay then.</p>

<p>I actually agree with your statement that MIT is supposed to challenge you but that ultimately you can succeed. The problem is in figuring out WHAT needs to be changed if this is not happening (and then making that change). Sometimes it is obvious what needs to be changed. Sometimes it is not. </p>

<p>I do want people to realize that "challenge" may be something a bit beyond what they, as brilliant high schoolers to whom things have come easily, normally associate with the word. And also that, well, a quarter of them will be in the bottom quarter. I think that a lot of people come in emotionally prepared to be average in their new environment. This is what everyone emphasizes when telling incoming MIT students what to expect - that they may no longer be at the top, they might be in the middle. People gloss over the fact that some of them aren't going to be in the middle, either. I've known few students who came in prepared for that possibility.</p>

33

<p>Almost everyone's comments have given me useful perspectives, so thanks. I remain conflicted, and will probably remain so right up to decision day. I understand that use of time and prioritizing are vital to success, or rather survival, but I'm wondering if there's another variable that people can comment on. While I'm still unsure of what I'll end up majoring in, I'm leaning toward courses 7 and/or 18. However, when I speak with current MIT students they warn me about the unexpected level of difficulty of 7.012 and indicate that only the very best should consider majoring in 18. Anyone less than phenomenal in 7 (so I'm told) is encouraged to go to course 9, and I find people viewing course 15 as the Institute's academic safety net. Is this then how some can argue that sub par students (by MIT standards) can "make it?"
Do you think there are students at MIT who would be standouts, in say Bio or Math, at another institution but who get advised to try a different major at MIT -- simply because the competition is so fierce? Don't get me wrong here; I think it's great that some people emerge from the MIT fire more confident and more tempered, but what about those students who've had their dreams and ambitions crushed or re-directed?
Finally, what of the students who end up in the bottom half of the class? What are their employment options post graduation? Do they end up as lab. techies? What sort of grad. schools or prof. schools can they get into? I return to the original question -- will MIT hurt the less-than-above-average student in the long run?</p>

34

<p>Personally I think that students find out that some others are able to accomplish with very much less effort what they grind out and still cannot achieve. Make sense? What competition does is allow one to discover what they are naturally good at. Just my experience. Some will choose to continue to grind out and peak at a lower level others will find a discipline they are good at and can achieve with not such a huge effort.</p>

35

<p>I'll throw in my two cents both as a professor at another institution and as a parent of an MIT freshman. A degree from MIT will help your career, not hurt it. Employers are interested in your degree and your experience; most will have no interest in your GPA. While it's true that a low GPA will hurt your chances to enter graduate school, you should be aware that significant numbers of graduate students also drop out of graduate programs. So perhaps a fairly realistic scenario could look like this: Student #1 obtains an MIT degree with such a low GPA that she is unable to pursue graduate study in a top-tier university. As a result, student #1 enters the job market and finds a satisfying job; Student #2, having trouble in MIT courses, transfers to a lower-tier university, graduates with a good GPA, enters a graduate program at a top-tier institution, and eventually fails out/drops out of graduate school. The weeding process occurs, and perhaps that's the elephant in the room here. No high-achieving high-school senior wants to believe that he/she could ever fail, and yet it happens all the time, all along the academic pipeline. </p>

<p>I agree with a post made earlier by Ben Golub, that good high-school preparation will help, at least with some of the core courses taken freshman year. For instance, when my daughter and my neighbor's niece returned home from MIT for Christmas break, they had quite different stories to tell about their experiences. My daughter had a relatively easy time this semester. She received A's in the multivariable calculus (18.02) and physics courses (8.02) she took, and she expects to receive A's in her HASS course and in the chemistry course (grades will be posted later). On the other hand, my neighbor's neice, who was a valedictorian at a high-powered science magnet school and a Siemen's finalist, had a difficult time. Apparently she never took calculus BC or AP physics in high school, and I believe her scientific research project was in chemistry. She also signed up for the most theoretically advanced version of the chemistry course. What explains the difference between these two? It's just speculation, but I'd chalk it up to the degree of experience in physics and calculus. Also, we advised our daughter to start with the basic calc and physics courses, rather than dive into the advanced theoretical version, and the result was that she had a very happy semester.</p>

<p>More importantly, we've had repeated conversations over the Christmas break with our daughter about the desirability of majoring in just one area. Like many other MIT students, she currently believes it might be great to double major. We're hoping to convince her that a double major in physics and EECS would be painful. At least we've sent the message that it is perfectly okay to drop a second major. And we've also said -- multiple times -- that if science and engineering majors don't work out in the end, she can major in art at MIT, take a selection of courses in Harvard's design program, and go into a field like industrial design (where she'd probably also be really happy).</p>

<p>In the end, you have far less control over your life than you think. Years ago, I graduated university with a degree in art, but then found that I could not support myself financially as an artist. Eventually I took a doctorate from UC Berkeley in a completely different field, and today, several of my books are in the MIT libraries. Who knew? My husband graduated from Stanford with a PhD in European history, but was unable to land a tenure-track faculty position. Today, he's a VP of marketing in a high-tech firm. Who knew? Abandoning your first dream does not mean there aren't other dreams for you to pursue in the future.</p>

<p>Best regards as you make your decision.</p>

36

<p>CalAlum -- I admire your thoughtful contributions to this thread but have to disagree with you on one big point.</p>

<p>
[quote]
A degree from MIT will help your career, not hurt it.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>This is true all things equal. Even more than that -- quite a few things can be unequal, and it still remains true. A B+ average from MIT is better, for most things, than an A average from a state school.</p>

<p>But there are people admitted to MIT -- and not a negligible number -- whose lives would be better if they chose to go somewhere else. That's just a fact. It's a fact that every single admit should think on deeply before going.</p>

<p>It pains me to say this, because I have thought a lot about this issue and have not always held this view. I love as much as you do the stories of people who fail out and come back and love MIT/Caltech and would never trade the experience for anything. (Or the people who struggled academically at these schools and are now very successful academics.) Those are amazing stories.</p>

<p>You don't hear the stories as often -- because they're not as fun to tell -- about the smart high school student who doesn't have healthy ways of dealing with stress who finds the school extremely difficult psychologically, graduates with an exactly average GPA in applied math (and no huge Nature paper), and doesn't get a job with any of the many finance firms he applies to. That story isn't that unusual.</p>

<p>You don't hear the stories of people who leave the place psychologically worse off than when they came and never decide that it was really all for the best, like all the characters of the more famous stories. Who wants to be telling that one at a party?</p>

<p>Employers don't fall all over themselves to hire all MIT grads. They love the best and even many of the average. Few want the bottom-quartile person who is troubled and isn't really even sure of what he wants to do anymore, partially because of the environment at MIT.</p>

<p>I have not always thought this way. But I spent four years at Caltech. I served on its admissions committee. I served on the committee that dealt with students who were in serious academic trouble. I watched my friends and neighbors for four years. I also feel that I know enough of MIT to know what's different and what isn't. But, perhaps most importantly, I think people should take my view seriously because my knee-jerk disposition on this issue is probably about as far from what I'm saying in this post as you can imagine.</p>

<p>For most people, it's way better -- psychologically, professionally, academically -- to be in the top quartile at a Brown or Swarthmore than in the bottom quartile at MIT. And it's questionable whether the benefits of being in the top quartile at MIT are really so amazing as to make it worth taking the risk. This is true despite all the anecdotal stories about my sister's husband and so forth for whom it all turned out so well despite a difficult college experience.</p>

<p>I don't mean to be insensitive to the many MIT parents on this thread whose kids are having amazing experiences and who can't understand whence this hand-wringing. Just know that there are many groups and situations whose pain isn't immediately evident but is no less real. To put it bluntly, people who say unequivocally that MIT is a very happy place betray a pretty serious lack of perspective or at least a willingness to ignore some very bad situations.</p>

<p>The OP and all the others who are reading this thread will find unlimited cheerleading about MIT, as jessie said. They won't as often find people (like me) who are deeply in love with the whole MIT/Caltech idea saying that you might be much better off going to a normal, typical college where it's easy to get A's. They won't as often find saying that benefits of the amazing faculty and wonderful classmates are partially balanced by the fact that the place might badly mess you up for a long time. </p>

<p>So if this thread dissuades someone from going to MIT or Caltech, I won't shed too many tears.</p>

37

<p>To the OP: Assuming you are decently good at math, I think the applied option of course 18 could be one of the easiest majors out there at MIT. Don't think you have to be a olympiad winner to do well in it.</p>

38

<p>pebbles --</p>

<p>A separate point. Because I think so highly of you, I'm a very surprised by the depth of the insensitivity in your assertion (a little implicit but not very) that the people who do badly at MIT are mostly to blame, in that they have mistaken priorities or do not take advantage of the resources. This misses the point in such a deep way.</p>

<p>People who are motivated to work, have their priorities straight, and seek help when they needed are never the ones in trouble. They may get bad grades, but they embody the definition of being psychologically healthy and they bounce back in one way or another. The problem with people who end up in trouble is that they lose their drive, priorities, or willingness to reach out for help -- but that's not generally their fault. Do you really, honestly think it is?</p>

<p>The worst way in which MIT and Caltech can mess people up is they can take away that drive, sense of identity, and willingness to seek help that defined most of its students coming in. Academic stress and competition deprives them of the very things that made them healthy before. The problem is that the ultra-intense environment can break the (somewhat fragile) tools for success that these people bring.</p>

<p>Of course MIT is not fully to blame. Psychological problems probably exist already in most of the people who end up in this bad state. But there's no question that the environment exacerbates the problems and is partly to blame.</p>

<p>It's such a serious mistake to treat motivation, priorities, and ability to seek help as choice variables, or matters of willpower or character -- so that if someone loses them, it is a personal flaw. This is like telling a person who is clinically depressed to just stop being so morose and get motivated to do some stuff.</p>

<p>This is maybe the main point I wish to convey to all bushy-tailed prefrosh. An intense environment can (combined with underlying factors) change your personality and your psychology. Be aware of that when you choose where to be.</p>

<p>Practical advice? If you go, make sure you are psychologically healthy. Be aware of the particular psychological problems MIT can cause and know the early signs so that you can deal with them before they take away your ability to deal with them.</p>

39

<p>
[quote]
Student #1 obtains an MIT degree with such a low GPA that she is unable to pursue graduate study in a top-tier university. As a result, student #1 enters the job market and finds a satisfying job...

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Whoa, it's me. ;)</p>

<p>I do plan to go to grad school eventually, though. I'm on my way, with a research-oriented job and admission to a part-time certificate program that I hope will eventually turn into a master's. It'll just be a less direct path. That's what I was getting at with my stupid door metaphor a zillion posts ago.</p>

<p>
[quote]
While I'm still unsure of what I'll end up majoring in, I'm leaning toward courses 7 and/or 18. However, when I speak with current MIT students they warn me about the unexpected level of difficulty of 7.012 and indicate that only the very best should consider majoring in 18. Anyone less than phenomenal in 7 (so I'm told) is encouraged to go to course 9, and I find people viewing course 15 as the Institute's academic safety net.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Ugh, ugh, ugh. Okay, now we're in a different topic altogether. A word to the wise...a non-negligible number of MIT students (and all other college students, really) are huge discipline snobs. Take advice like that in the paragraph that I quoted with about a shaker of salt.</p>

<p>Different people are good at different things. I excelled in classes that friends struggled with, and vice versa. I've heard from people who think 18 is the toughest major at MIT, and people who think it's the easiest (it has the fewest in-subject requirements of any major at MIT, and is the most flexible). The course 9 prob/stats class that I took kicked the ass of the course 18 prob/stats class that I had dropped the previous term, all over the field, in terms of difficulty. 15 requires more math than some of the science majors. 7 is less flexible than 9 and goes more in-depth into one field, but 9 requires you to be able to learn totally new subjects very quickly, and requires more math than 7. I did better in 18.310 than I did in many of my course 9 and 7 classes.</p>

<p>What you really need to do, is to pick a major that you <em>like</em> to study. This is important, because if you don't like it, it's going to be much more difficult to put in the effort that you <em>do</em> need in order to succeed. Don't go for a major because you hear it's easy, or exclude it because you hear it's hard.</p>

<p>I will say, however, that different departments treat their students differently. Certain departments are notoriously unsympathetic and unfriendly towards anyone who's not in the top quarter, while others "love you like a fuzzy bunny", to quote a former hallmate, with most somewhere on the vast spectrum in the middle.</p>

<p>Incidentally, I have a couple of alum friends who doubled in 7 and 18. I don't know what one thought regarding difficulty, the other (now a PhD student at a top grad program) thought that 7 was conceptually more difficult but that 18 had a heavier workload.</p>

40

<p>Ben has a lot of good points, and I really don't think I could have said it better so I won't elaborate.</p>

<p>To respond to jessiehl's comment about course 18, she's right that the hierarchy of supposed difficulty of majors is not really accurate. However, I think in the course syllabus it did say next to course 8 and 18 that only outstanding students should do it. That said, different majors are harder for different reasons. In course 8, you had better be good thinking abstractly and you had better have an excellent background in physics (which you can do if you study hard in 8.01 and 8.02.) I think that's what they meant in the course syllabus. However, course 8 and 18 have a lot less grunginess than engineering, a lot less grinding through stuff. In engineering, many equations are provided and <em>can't</em> be derived, so that may be frustrating. If you don't know the first thing about computers or are not great with your hands, course 6 and/or course 2 might be harder than straight physics, even though people think of physics as "harder" because it is more theoretical.</p>