<p>Any insight (postive, negative, and in between) would be extremely helpful. I am almost equally set on 3 schools, including Rice, and would like some information to separate them. List your experiences so I can know what I could expect as an incoming freshmen '11. Thanks!</p>
<p>Well, I am a fresham and my first semester is but one day from over. And it was the best ddecision I ever made to come here... </p>
<p>I can help you out with whatever you need to know.. but ask me questions.. things where you want to know how rice stands oout. That would be a much better way tpo answer yyour Q</p>
<p>instead of deciding now, enjoy your senior year and see if you get into these schools first...</p>
<p>i love it here at rice. it seems that a lot of my friends from home were not happy with their first semester experience, to the point where some of them were surprised at how happy i was with mine. the only time i really felt stressed out/slightly unhappy was this last finals week, but that's about normal. </p>
<p>antarius is right: ask questions and we would be happy to elaborate on specific topics! i'm just not sure what angle of insight you want.</p>
<p>Sorry to hijack this thread but I also have some questions (applied ID):</p>
<p>1) I know that other schools of Rice's caliber generally have cut-throat competition and hostility, but Rice is known for students working together. To what extent is this true?</p>
<p>2) I know that its one of the easiest places to double major but would you recommend me double majoring in something like history if one of my majors is engineering?</p>
<p>3) Have you guys done any research your first semester? Is it hard to do research as a freshman?</p>
<p>4) How is Houston in general?</p>
<p>After undergrad I will attend law school. To do this I will need, in addition to a high GPA, good recs, and extensive LSAT prep.
1. Does Rice have a pre-law group?
2. How accessible are the professors?
3. How do you like the college system? I don't plan on joining a fraternity and my other top choice is a big greek school. I like the idea, but want to know more about it.
4. Has anyone studied abroad? If so elaborate on your experience
5. I will be doing Social Sciences, but Rice is most well known for the Engineering. Anyone from SS want to give insight on the program?
6. What do you do when not studying? parties etc.?</p>
<p>Thanks all.</p>
<p>To Answer lebron james</p>
<p>Sorry to hijack this thread but I also have some questions (applied ID):</p>
<p>1) I know that other schools of Rice's caliber generally have cut-throat competition and hostility, but Rice is known for students working together. To what extent is this true?</p>
<p>Well, it is pretty cool here. On a subject which is really hard and has a big curve, I have worked together with many friends to help study and do the assignments. The night before our physics exam, all physics people in our res. college got together and had a review session</p>
<p>2) I know that its one of the easiest places to double major but would you recommend me double majoring in something like history if one of my majors is engineering?</p>
<p>Why not. Engineering needs like 125 credits to graduate. Histoory is small... You are looking at 140 odd credits to graduate... If you come in AP credit.. that makes that number much smaller. I am as of now a Chemical and Biomolecular engineer and a Theatre major</p>
<p>3) Have you guys done any research your first semester? Is it hard to do research as a freshman?</p>
<p>I havent personally, but I have done some special projectss in theatre.. and some work for credit on a production. A friend of mine is doing UG rresearch or right now working in the lab on Carbon nanotubes... i hear it is easy to get in.. ask the professor who's research you are interested and he may accept you</p>
<p>4) How is Houston in general?</p>
<p>Houston in general... It is huge... The city itself I like, but I do not have a car and the public transportation is fairly bad. It is not non-existant.. but I need to set aside time for it nd plan way in advance. Otherwise I like the place...</p>
<p>To answer EgoExisto:</p>
<p>After undergrad I will attend law school. To do this I will need, in addition to a high GPA, good recs, and extensive LSAT prep.
1. Does Rice have a pre-law group?</p>
<p>I really dont know this...although there are law classes i believe (i hvent looked at this field at all)</p>
<ol>
<li>How accessible are the professors?</li>
</ol>
<p>Very accesible. Ive been over to a Professors house for dinner before. My chem and math professors are easy and realy nice. My physics prof has a policy of walk in if im there. If you have a doubt, you go to the professors or email them... they are very accesible..</p>
<ol>
<li>How do you like the college system? I don't plan on joining a fraternity and my other top choice is a big greek school. I like the idea, but want to know more about it.</li>
</ol>
<p>Well, I love the college system. Basically, if you have read Harry Potter, thats how it is. There are 9 residential colleges: Baker, Will Rice, Hanszen, Wiess, Jones, Brown, Lovett, Sid rich and Martel
Each college has its uniqueness and spirit. Im at Wiess.. Also, once you get into a res. college, regardless whether you are on or off campus, thats who u belong to. Wiess for example has oits own government, own sports teams, own Court. and all the other colleges echo similar stuff. It creates spirit in the college. If you are a quiet person, then its hard to meet that many people initially. In your res. college, only the 300 odd people of ur res. college are there normally.. buyt go out then its easy to make many friends</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Has anyone studied abroad? If so elaborate on your experience
I am a first semester freshman, so I havent aand couldnt tell you. But my orientation advisor did his last semester in Nigeria, another friend in France. Two in China and a friend is leaving to Scotland in the next few days..</p></li>
<li><p>I will be doing Social Sciences, but Rice is most well known for the Engineering. Anyone from SS want to give insight on the program?
The social sciences fields are by no means weak. Rice is a great school, even though the engineering, archi and musi schools are most reputed. </p></li>
<li><p>What do you do when not studying? parties etc.?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Loads of Stuff. Parties on the weekends mainly. Otherwise we hang out, watch movies, go off campus, play ping pong etc. etc.
Generally, there is work to do during the week and the weekend is for fun...</p>
<p>Antarius:</p>
<p>What is the student body like? Are people generally conservative and religous or is there a good mix? Are they accepting of out of state kids?</p>
<p>
[quote]
1) I know that other schools of Rice's caliber generally have cut-throat competition and hostility, but Rice is known for students working together. To what extent is this true?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>i think you need to put this in perspective. first i don't believe that other schools of similar caliber generally have cut-throat competition and hostility. that is a very strong claim. Rice however does not even have rumors of being cut-throat. it is very much self-motivation here, but i would add that there are plenty of resources to get help. the college system helps to organize this. at every college there is some form of tutoring group (e.g. Fellows, Peer Tutors). review sessions held by upperclassmen are also common at each college. </p>
<p>imho Rice students are hard-working and not at all arrogant, but the atmosphere does not have an intellectual feeling. students work hard in their areas, but may be sheltered academically. an issue of the Thresher (student school newspaper) in November voiced this concern and basically called it a communication gap between engineers and academs. i think it goes even further than that, though.</p>
<p>
[quote]
After undergrad I will attend law school. To do this I will need, in addition to a high GPA, good recs, and extensive LSAT prep.
1. Does Rice have a pre-law group?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>yes. you can find information [url=<a href="http://www.ruf.rice.edu/%7Eacadadv/prelawdocuments.html%5Dhere%5B/url">http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~acadadv/prelawdocuments.html]here[/url</a>]. there is a very knowledgeable advisor and he puts out a newsletter if you are put of the pre-law society group. it is school run rather than student run as far as i know. </p>
<p>
[quote]
4. Has anyone studied abroad? If so elaborate on your experience
[/quote]
</p>
<p>this is another question that must be put into perspective. it has little to do with Rice because Rice does not have many study abroad opportunities that are Rice specific. there are a few that are, and they are usually hard to get. most of the options at Rice you could also consider if you were at another university. so any experience good or bad should not be attributable to Rice. for example, i studied abroad last summer through a program i found on the internet. i didn't even know Rice helped students with that kind of thing, and it turns out the only program they knew about (for summer study in Germany) was the same program i found online.</p>
<p>
[quote]
2) I know that its one of the easiest places to double major but would you recommend me double majoring in something like history if one of my majors is engineering?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>hmm, i am not sure how anyone could recommend this path to you without knowing a lot about you. i can say any double major with engineering is tricky even considering the few requirements of the second major. you would essentially be giving up almost all your electives to pursue that major. a double major is not an advantage in and of itself. do you want to learn to write? i would think it would not take a major to do that. do you like ancient history? maybe three or four courses will satisfy you. i am not trying to discourage a double major, my advice is simply to think in terms of courses rather than majors. take as many history courses to satisfy you, and if that is not enough for the major, don't regret it or even think twice about it. that is my feeling.</p>
<p>
[quote]
2. How accessible are the professors?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>very accessible. this is such an important thing and i simply love Rice for having accessible professors and--related to this--small classes.</p>
<p>DD just spent 5 months in Chile. Rice is very accepting of various study abroad options, and flexible about accepting credit. They have many resources and counselors (both peer and university) to guide you in your study abroad program. Check out <a href="http://abroad.rice.edu/%5B/url%5D">http://abroad.rice.edu/</a> for the website. They also have work abroad and direct exchange programs, in addition to allowing programs by butler, IES, etc.etc. They also encourage students to participate in alternative spring break and/or shorter trips.</p>
<p>
[quote]
3) Have you guys done any research your first semester? Is it hard to do research as a freshman?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>jenskate can comment on this better than i can, but if you accepted into the century scholars program i think you start immediately. i would say students at Rice who are not in this really don't do research freshmen year, and basically have the typical mindset of doing research in their major later on. if you are motivated enough i am sure you can find research opportunities or create them yourself at any time. there are some links i posted in the Physics/Astronomy thread that have information about undergraduate research also.</p>
<p>Antarius--</p>
<p>This is going to sound like a completely retarded question, but what's the difference between bioengineering and biomolecular engineering? How feasible is it to double major in bioengineering and chemical & biomolecular engineering?</p>
<p>To answer wrooby.. im gonna keep this short.. I typed a giant 20 line response and it didnt post for some reason!!!! :(</p>
<p>Anyways.. about the mix.. the mix is good. We have people who are liberal and conservative, religious and aethiestic... they are all accepting of each other and helps us have good discussions on these subjects, as people come with different backgrounds and ideologies..</p>
<p>Whatever you are, they will be people like you and things for you to do...</p>
<p>As for out of state.. a huge number opf people are from out of state.. not to mention some from all over the place. I myself grew up in India.. and I have friens from pakistan, india, UAE, Nigeria, Russia, France, England, Mexico, Canada, Argentina, lebanon etc.</p>
<p>So diversity wise, itsa great here</p>
<p>now to me.duh</p>
<p>ChBe is basically Chemical Engineering. The BioM part is a specialization and helps you be able to go intopt he biotech field. BioE is totally Bioengineering.. so if you want to be in bionanotechnology totally, bioE is great but if you want to go into materials sometimes or maybe fuels and engines etc. then ChBe. The ChBe major is new... it used to be chemical engr.</p>
<p>See:
ChBe: <a href="http://www.ruf.rice.edu/%7Eche/%5B/url%5D">http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~che/</a>
BioE: <a href="http://bioe.rice.edu/%5B/url%5D">http://bioe.rice.edu/</a></p>
<p>These two are THE largst majors on campus.. i believe 132 and 134 credits respectively. Double majoring with these is a really bad idea... so id say it is not feasible..</p>
<p>Engineering with a social science is a better idea. But any two engineering majors is not recommended</p>
<p>Antarius</p>
<p>It's possible to switch from ChBe to BioE if you change your mind, so I was wondering if at Rice the engineering students are given the opportunity to gain some firsthand experience with the different fields of engineering?</p>
<p>At the moment, I'm interested in organs and/or pharmaceutical. Which do you think that fits most under?</p>
<p>P.S. Thanks for answering these questions. It really helps to relieve stress.</p>