<p>How prevalent is drinking at Duke (in comparison to all other peer colleges except dartmouth lol)? How about for freshman vs. upperclassmen? About what percentage of the class starts heavy drinking/partying their first year? I don't really drink, but don't really want to be pressured or left out, so this is kinda a concern for me..</p>
<p>comparable to Dartmouth-- lots (most maybe?) drink a fair amount and you will definitely have the opportunity to but you wont really be pressured to do so…the party atmosphere here is a lot of fun in my opinion; i have friends who don’t drink and have an awesome time at parties where there is drinking going on.</p>
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<p>Many of my best friends don’t drink, and never have and never will. They still love Duke :). Drinking isn’t the only thing to do - you won’t feel left out. And people are pretty respectful of those who decide not to. There are even frat guys who don’t drink.</p>
<p>I mean… my mind might change later on during my upperclassmen years. My question really is: how prevalent is drinking during freshman year, especially given that 1st year students live on a separate campus?</p>
<p>East Campus is supposed to be dry, so that might curtail drinking a little bit. I’m so it still occurs in the freshman dorms; hopefully a Duke student can provide insight.</p>
<p>There is pretty much no drinking going on east (very few students drink in their room), unless you live in Epworth…</p>
<p>A sizable proportion of freshmen flock to west campus on weekends to drink.</p>
<p>i’ve heard that it’s basically the same as UPenn</p>
<p>Drinking is fairly prevalent. East Campus (where all freshmen live) is dry. A lot of people still drink on East but they do it in their rooms and they don’t rage too hard so they don’t get written up by RAs. West is most definitely not dry, and you’re unlikely to get in trouble even if you’re drinking outside during the middle of the day. (Drinking games are illegal in NC and will get you in trouble, though.) You can definitely find places to drink, especially during fall semester. Lots of frats have section parties. Kville is also home to lots of drinking.
Overall, I’d say that the majority of Duke students are occasional drinkers. There are people on either extremes - maybe 20% who party a lot and 20% who never drink - but the majority are people who study during the week and go out maybe once or twice a week.</p>
<p>Here are some estimates: (These numbers are entirely anecdotal and likely very inaccurate. If any current student sees these estimates as disproportional, feel free to share your own).</p>
<p>My freshman dorm has about 100 people, half male, half female.</p>
<p>First semester:
- About 40 would go over to West on Friday/Saturday nights.
- About 15 would go over to West on Thursday nights.
- Drinking on East depends largely on how strict your RA is; maybe about 10 people drank on East (in their rooms, with a small group of friends) on Friday/Saturday nights, usually to pregame for something on West.</p>
<p>Second semester:
- About 30 go over to West on Friday/Saturday nights.
- About 10 go over to West on Thursday nights.
- About 5 go over to West on Tuesday/Wednesday nights.
- About 10 people drink on East on Friday/Saturday nights to pregame for something on West.</p>
<p>After first semester, frat parties are no longer open, so the overall numbers of people who go out decline. However, some join certain frats/sororities and start going out on Tuesday and Wednesday nights too…but that’s pretty rare.</p>
<p>There’s never more than half the dorm out. Still, 30-40 out of 100 is a pretty visible amount of people.</p>
<p>*Edit: By “going out,” I mean going out to drink/party. I’d say that on Friday/Saturday nights, about 10 go to non-party events. This number goes up slightly after first semester, as more people start joining clubs/organizations.</p>
<p>Nationally, the percentage of underage college students who report having been drinking in the past 30 days is between 55-60%.</p>
<p>My experience about drinking at Duke:</p>
<p>A lot of freshman start drinking when they get to do, mostly do to they freedom they have. However, orientation week and first semester is usually pretty full of freshman who get rushed to the hospital from drinking too much. And drinking culture is pretty ovious on campus just by walking around on weekends.</p>
<p>However, this doesn’t mean you have to drink to have a good time. I know a lot of people who part hard and drink every weekend and I know a lot of people who haven’t touched a drink this entire year. At this point, it’s a personal choice, but you shouldn’t ever feel pressured to drink especially since there are quite a few people who don’t. (Duke always goes out of its way to host weekend events called Devils After Dark to have activities for students who don’t like to party or drink.)</p>
<p>I agree with Chie about orientation–if you do start to drink once you get to Duke, learn how to limit yourself. I couldn’t count how many ambulances I saw in that one week.</p>
<p>Also, here’s more info on “Devils After Dark.” They advertise their events pretty well, so you always know what they’re doing each weekend.</p>
<p><a href=“Duke Student Affairs”>Duke Student Affairs;
<p>Daughter is at Cornell Days right now checking out Cornell and is coming to BDD next week. While at the Cornell Engineering breakfast the kids and parents were talking about what other schools they were looking at. Several were also considering Duke. One mother who was there totally flamed about the abundant drinking culture at Duke and just went on and on. They had attended BDD earlier in the month at Duke. </p>
<p>It really freaked out my daughter. She is a social kid but she is not a drinker (yet?) and doesn’t enjoy being around people who are falling down drunk. She is okay with social drinking but not just drinking to get drunk. Does that make sense?</p>
<p>Any comments from those at Duke now? I was quite surprised by what this mother had to say–was it that apparent/bad at the last couple of Blue Devil Days this month?</p>
<p>Is the drinking that much more than at Cornell?</p>
<p>Hm. Drinking at BDD is generally discouraged even the students, but sometimes you can’t help but see it. The day they also attended was likely the night of the championship game where everyone was celebrating, therefore drinking is normally nowhere near the level it was that night. </p>
<p>Overall, while there are some students are often go out and get drunk on weekends, they are definitely in the minority, they just happen to be the most visible and most memorable. Most students are social drinkers or don’t drink at all. </p>
<p>I was never drinker in high school and I remained a non drinker at Duke. While I sometimes see incredibly drunk people on campus, I’m not going to say I see them constantly or even every weekend. Remember, most of this kids still manage to pass their classes, and the same kids who are drinking are still pulling all-nighters in the library during the week.</p>
<p>The work is tremendously challenging at Duke and whether or not you get a drinking roommate that would be annoying or someone responsible is random and hard to predict. </p>
<p>My son’s roommate was a health nut, Outdoors programming leader and went to bed at midnight 6 nights per week and up at 7. Lots of kids at Duke are athletes or were high school athletes and many enjoy working out and healthy living and healthy eating. Most have very big goals and the discipline to get them accomplished.</p>
<p>My D and I were also at Cornell for SWE. We will be at Duke on Tues. We thought that many of the Cornell Engineering SWE women were very academic and not really party types. My D’s Cornell host said that they spend most of the time studying and that Cornell really tried to make it hard on you to do well. This scared my D a little bit! She did like the faculty and facilities tho… We heard little about drinking etc, at the engineering end anyway…</p>
<p>What was your impression??</p>
<p>@ spotlightmom</p>
<p>SWE! I’m going to bit bias, because I’m a part of Duke’s chapter of SWE and adore it. Some of the members of SWE are incredibly amazing in their accomplishments, and I know that all of them work hard. However, the girls always know when to have a good time and not to overwork themselves. A lot of SWE events here mix social life with their academics in their events. One of our events last weekend was to host an Alumni who talked about her career path after graduation and gave all the girl advice about life in general. It was hosted as an informal dinner, so while everyone walked away with some really god advice, we had loads of fun as well. </p>
<p>However, engineers do drink at Duke. I’m going to go out on a bit of a limb, but not as many engineers drink as the rest of the school. Not that I haven’t known quite a few engineers who party hard on Friday night, but it’ll probably be the same person who I once spent an all-nighter in a computer lab programming with. Duke really takes the “Work hard, play hard” motto seriously.</p>
<p>If you are going to be here on Tuesday and want to know more about Duke’s SWE or want to shown around the engineering quad a bit more, feel free to send me a message! I’ll be an ambassador on Wednesday morning at Pratt, but if you want to talk more one-on-one with an engineering, let me know, and I’ll be happy to meet with you. (Or I can arrange a meeting with an engineer who is in your daughter’s interested field, if I’m not.)</p>
<p>I don’t think it can be stated with any seriousness that there is more drinking at Duke than Cornell…so much of your next four years has to do with personal choice and finding a circle of friends who appreciate you sober on your own terms. Lots of Duke students party but a lot of students have personal confidence and can choose to be sober and have great social lives.</p>
<p>A few years ago on CC, there was a very sad incident…a very smart guy who went to Cornell actually, went on spring break to UVA to stay with buddies from his home town…and he died of alcohol poisoning at UVA in a frat house…woke up dead basically. He was very bright and articulate on this board and very confidant. The reason this was very resonant here is that he had such a serious drinking problem that he had been on this website arguing against abstinence and for partying in very provocative ways on CC with parents who challenged his beliefs about his invincibility. It turned out that at Cornell students who liked him had asked him to leave their frat because they were so concerned that his drinking was abusive, but this didn’t register with him at all. So tragic…this kid was brilliant and also an athlete. UVA students by the way…were brought up on charges for providing and buying booze for him although he carried a flask wherever he went. </p>
<p>I bring this up just to point out that bright students often do know when a friend has gone too far and there are many ways to get help to freshmen who make mistakes with booze. Some kids come to college already loaded for abusive misuse of booze…other kids make mistakes and change their ways quickly, other students always manage their choices with a lot of good thinking. In general, I felt that my son’s friends at Duke had superior work ethics and had a lot of fun in their weeks as well and that they would look out for each other well.</p>
<p>I would NOT pick either Duke or Cornell on rumors about drinking…drinking is present at both colleges.</p>
<p>Faline,
I agree with all that you have said. It just frustrated me that this “opinion” from this woman was so strong that it left an impression on my kid. According to my husband she just really bad mouthed Duke in such a way that it was uncomfortable for everyone there. I want my daughter to look at Duke in the same unbaised way she looked at Cornell and primarily focus on the academic programs. I worry that may not happen now. She could think that becuase she is there on a Tuesday night, she is not going to see “what
really happens on the weekends when students cut loose” add sarcasm. </p>
<p>And for the person who asked, the Cornell SWE program was really great. My daughter was very impressed. I will be interested to see what she thinks of Duke’s facilites, faculty, students, research opportunities, etc. </p>
<p>They both seem like fantastic places for engineers so ultimately she cannot go wrong.</p>
<p>I’m currently a senior at Duke and the outgoing SWE President. I will be at the SWE table at BDD Wednesday morning so come by if you have any questions or feel free to message me!</p>