<p>Being essentially a native of NJ, there certainly is a pretty large element of loud and kinda brash people in the state and that includes many in the upper middleclass. Enought to make the stereotypes at least partially true. Now the nice parts of the state are very attractive so that element of NJ bashing is off base.</p>
<p>I thought Madison, NJ was a lovely town. I would have been very happy to visit there over the next four years. As far as "rescuing" my son from there, we had to look at it as consumers. Even with his scholarship, a single semester there was going to cost us roughly $13,000. We'd be borrowing nearly $100,000 over four years. Worth it for an enriching educational experience, but a lot to pay for misery. For what it's worth, he's been much farther away from home and was fine with it. He's been to Germany 3 times on his own, staying with unfamiliar families on two occasions and traveling alone, staying in hostels, etc., the other. No hard feelings toward NJ, but it wasn't a good fit.</p>
<p>TourGuide, I still think you're being presumptuous with your statements. You can't judge an entire state and incredibly diverse city based on the tiny percentage of those people that you've met. IDK about "references to NYC" or anything. Sure there are a few people who think they're better than everyone else but I'm pretty sure you'd find such people anywhere you go. Ever thought that the Duke girl might just be an idiot? one idiot does not make the whole state an idiot...
the hygiene thing is gross, but again---only a couple of individuals
just because two people are unhygenic this makes the whole state have the same qualities?
these are types of people that can be found anywhere. </p>
<p>these types of stereotypes are idiotic. "these people I met were pretentious so the whole state is pretentious." Increase the scale a bit, and you'll get "Islamic terrorists killed thousands of people so all Islamic individuals are murderers"
stupidstupidstupidstupid
and wrong.</p>
<p>I have also noticed many kids coming home from out of state, this year. I thought it very unusual. These kids seemed to want to recreate their high school experience. Same friends, same feeling. Many of them come home every other weekend. The kiss of death as far as I am concerned for a successful college experience. Maybe it is a delayed adolescence. What ever it is, it is disturbing.</p>
<p>Paradoxically, I think for some students, college is a more adolescent experience than what they have grown accustomed to at home. For students who have had a lot of independence already and are very socially mature, college dorm life can seem like a step backward, rather than forward. It's not the independence that's miserable, it's the forced cohabitation with a crowd. </p>
<p>Not to OVER-generalize, but one of the common themes I've heard (and that was pertinent to my own son's experience) is that heavy drinking is a huge problem. Imagine sharing a communal bathroom with a whole floor of people throwing up. Or having someone mistakenly stagger into your room at 2 in the morning, thinking it's theirs. This isn't a NJ problem or an East Coast problem, but a prevalent reality at most colleges. I know for a fact that it's part of the dorm culture in Portland, Oregon, just like it is in Madison, NJ. At schools where underclassmen/women are required to live on campus, it's difficult to escape it. So my son may have been just as miserable in a dorm at PSU or Lewis & Clark as he was at Drew. His (former) roommate, who is a friend from Portland, seems very happy there.</p>
<p>Kids today are such coddled pansies.</p>
<p>I've lived in Virginia, Kansas, and Georgia over the course of my life. I can't say I've noticed much difference in the attitudes of the people around me. (I'm still in high school, mind, and lived in reasonably affluent areas near cities in all three states--in the DC, KC, and Atlanta areas respectively.) In all three areas, there is/was a lot of turnover--in one class last year, we had one of those mixer games where you go around and introduce yourself with a fact about your history, and one kid mentioned that she'd never moved in her life--a fact which was greeted by expressions of mild shock from the other kids in the room. My mother, who was raised in rural upstate New York, has commented that Atlanta is MUCH more diverse and "liberal" than her town ever was! I really think that this issue is more a city/rural one than a NE/South or NE/Midwest difference. </p>
<p>Really, I'm not worried by culture shock when applying to college--I've found that people tend to be essentially the same wherever I go. I didn't apply anywhere on the West Coast simply because I want to be fairly near my family to save on travel costs for the holidays, and all branches of my family are East Coasters. </p>
<p>That said, I REALLY want out of the South. I enjoy tea, but it would be nice to be able to order it in a public place without having to emphatically insist over and over that I want it unsullied by sugar, corn syrup or sweetener. And I really miss snow. (It's also creeped me out that my aforementioned New Yorker mother has occasionally started saying "y'all."</p>
<p>Not all kids are coddled pansies but it is exhausting how many are.
My son is a NYC kid through-and-through. Dad and Mom in advertising and fashion respectively, huge public HS in Brooklyn, lots of diversity and many doses or reality. He has chosen to attend a school in Ohio, and is extremely excited about immersing himself into swing state culture. The school which he will attend is the only non-northeastern school he applied to, yet it was his first choice. It was the college itself that grabbed him. It's COLLEGE folks. An important time for sure but not the end-all, be-all. That said, I do think that kids need to try to hold fast before splitting from a school. Sticking to a decision and making the best of an imperfect environment will make them better adults, employees, leaders and parents.</p>
<p>My 2 cents.</p>
<p>Special note to SolaCatella: I LOVE your comments about Sweet Tea and your mom's tendency towards y'all. Living and working in the melting pot of NYC, I am absolutely charmed by my acquaintances who drink and say such things. I find myself doing the same when I'm around them.</p>
<p>You seem very grounded. Good luck with everything.</p>
<p>Alamode, you need to look past the political correctness. The "we're all the same" approach and nobody can make conclusions simply doesn't stand up to experience. At some point anybody who thinks needs to make some conclusions based on evidence he/she has observed...and there usually isn't time to have your sample size include thousands of items. I'm sure if someone said "Nazis were jerks, you'd say, "How can you say that? I'm sure there were plenty of nice ones!!!"</p>
<p>On College Confidential the typical pattern is for people who make general observations to be challenged for making sweeping stereotypes without specifics. Those who cite specifics are challenged for insufficient and anecdotal evidence.</p>
<p>I've met plenty of people from NJ, who, like Barrons, see enough truth in the stereotype not to dismiss it with a wave of a politically correct hand. And I'm fully aware that any generalization will have exceptions, and one shouldn't use generalizations when evaluating INDIVIDUALS. But generalizations are perfectly legit for evaluating things like colleges, because you will be dealing with lots of people, often in a group-think environment. There is a reason people on college confidential are always asking about their out-of-state chances about UVa and UNC and UMichigan and Penn State, and Florida, but NOT Rutgers. They know once you get a critical mass of NJ folks, the obnoxiousness level is heightened. Even most people FROM New Jersey are dying NOT to go to Rutgers.</p>
<p>As for my own evidence, it started in high school in Mass. A pompous shoplifting jerk (who was abrasive even by Mass. standards) moved to town from NJ. Then I go to a junior college, and the bigest and loudest jerks were from NJ, and the transfer counselor steered me away from the entire state of NJ. Then I go to school in Boston and the biggest nose-picking jerks were from NJ. Then my brother married a gal from NJ, and she's a pushy loudmouthed jerk. Her family is from NJ and they are arrogant loudmouthed jerks. I go in the Navy and the most abrasive loudmothed jerks were from NY and NJ. I suppose I need to meet a few more million NJ folks before I have a sample that's up to your standards, but I don't have time. I've seen enough. If I were evaluating an individual person from NJ, I wouldn't allow the stereotype to shade my judgement (much). But I know I'm not going to live there or vacation there. And I know my kids aren't going to even consider going to college there (except maybe Princeton, which is probably the only college there with a minority of NJ folks).</p>
<p>Brooklyn: Thank you for the compliment! I'm a little worried about living away from home for the first time, so it's nice to hear encouragement.</p>
<p>I've lived in the northeast, and southern California, and spent time in the south, and from experience, the formerly mentioned are much more similar than the south, although southern California is maybe more superficial. It would be a huge shock to move from a very small, close-knit southern community to say, New York city, where you have to forge your own path and depend on yourself.</p>
<p>I grew up in the Philadelphia suburbs, go back to Philadelphia frequently but have lived away since college. I have culture shock every time I go near the place. Whenever someone is pleasant and kind, I'm shocked! I keep an open mind, but the number of Philadelphians who have been rude to me in the airport, stores and on the street is really disappointing. Give me the midwest, Texas or, my new fabulous great state of Tennessee anytime. </p>
<p>On a more positive note, when they are good, they are very, very good. WildChild's girlfriend left a laptop in their cab from the airport to Penn at 10pm. The trunk was dark and they had a bunch of luggage- you get the picture. The kids were frantic- didn't even know the name of the cab company. I blindly got online and made some calls and explained the situation (just as she was doing from the PA end). EVERY cab company dispatcher I spoke with was sympathetic and got right on the radio and sent out a message. 45 minutes later "Omar" called me delighted to report that his driver had the computer and was on his way from his home to Penn with it. I was truly impressed.</p>
<p>MomofWildChild: It's a shame you have such a bad impression of Philadelphia. I grew up in Allentown, PA, attended Lafayette College in Easton, PA, and moved to NYC immediately thereafter - it has now been 23 years. Several of my siblings lived in Philly to work, one graduated from Wharton. I feel very warm-hearted about PA, even Philadelphia. I must admit, I was never proud about the Phillies' fans' comportement.</p>
<p>I am from downstate New York and neither of my kids is obnoxious. However, people do make assumptions about us/them.</p>
<p>We live in exurban Suffolk County near the Sound about 20 minutes away from actual farms. No one at Barnard believed D that this even exists on LI. Furthermore, her friends from Texas and Georgia insisted that all New Yorkers love Rudy Guiliani (ugh) and wanted to bomb Afghanistan and invade Iraq in response to 9/11. This is what their news outlets told them. Also, people refused to believe she was from LI because she didn't have "the accent." FWIW: There is not one person I know who says Lawn Guyland.</p>
<p>So, maybe obnoxious downstaters and New Jerseyites stand out and are easy to identify. But there are many regular folk too. And perhaps some of it is anti-ethnic bias. LI is certainly not homogeneous WASP culture.</p>
<p>DS is in school in New England. I know every kid from CA was invited for Thanksgiving. How do I know? We spoke to the parents directly at Parents Weekend, and DS had already spoken to his friends. They all went home. Well, good for them, but everyone is welcome in my home, especially those alone on a holiday. I have certainly raised DS and DD to feel the same.</p>
<p>DD is in school right now in London. They have a month long break in March. Guess what? The Brits who have been to NY are begging her to bring them home for the break.</p>
<p>I am not a snob. I would have been happy to send kids to any part of the country. But we are a tight-knit family, and I don't think either wanted to be that far from home, especially from each other.</p>
<p>I have lived in CA and West Virginia, and I find American culture so pervasive that I didn't feel much was different, even though for a time I lived in a "holler." The people were cosmopolitan and sophisticated. And they sure did like my all zucchini dinner (nine courses) I made from my over grown garden.</p>
<p>I'm from Minnesota, the state famed for its genuinely nice people, and when I went to the east coast, I experienced nothing of the east coast snobbery about which my friends and family had warned. Nonetheless, I felt that Vanderbilt had a certain vibe congruous with its 'southern-good-ol'-home-boy' reputation.</p>
<p>I quite seriously was never aware of the obnoxious NJ stereotype : o</p>
<p>I'm from the Northeast and I go to a school in the Midwest. After a year and a half, I'm preparing to transfer back east, to a Chicago area school, or out west. The Northeast lifestyle of go-quick everywhere is not really appreciated in the Midwest where they wait for the walk sign to cross the street. I despise the city I live in, and the whole state is full of drunks. I liked the Midwest because I thought it would be kind simple folk, but it turns out they're just really really really annoying. </p>
<p>As someone who has lived near Boston his entire life, I would like to say while the state is pretty liberal, we've had a republican governor for quite some time (before Deval Patrick was elected last year). Furthermore, the percentage of votes are increasingly leaning towards Republicans. So if Midwesterners feel out of place coming to the Northeast, they should keep that in mind. In addition, it's a college campus, and more than likely it's going to have a liberal atmosphere. You can still find those Midwesterners to make you feel comfortable.</p>
<p>I've lived in NYC for many years, and now in the Southeast. One pronounced difference that i noticed is that down here people seem to like to converse. It really is friendly that way. NY'ers can be really friendly, too, but they don't feel the need to stop what they're doing to talk so if they don't have time to stop, they'll not talk and keep going. I'm not being clear here. What I mean is that, say, the nice guy at the deli counter here will put down his knife, stop cutting the meat, and talk. The NY deli guy knows he has to keep cutting the meat so he'll talk AND cut at the same time but not for too long because there's probably a mile long line of people waiting for him to help them. Its just different that way. I've waited up to 10 mins. to get a bagel because of the conversations down here, where in NYC it would take 30 secs. with no talking.</p>
<p>dke,</p>
<p>I'm from the South, and I definitely agree with this.</p>
<p>Bias Observation: It is one of the things I find incredibly annoying about the South -- people seem to expect me to strike up a conversation or smile at them in passing even if they are a random stranger. </p>
<p>When I worked in NYC during the summer, I loved how everyone went about their business and did not try to force a conversation with me.</p>