<p>@TopTier </p>
<p>This is a Princeton vs Duke discussion! </p>
<p>I appreciate your unsolicited advice and concern regarding my outlook on life but, as always, character assessments from short pieces of text online are fairly inaccurate/borderline insulting.</p>
<p>I agree 100% that one should endeavor to challenge themselves at college and in life. For precisely this reason, I’m flying half way across the world from a small homogenous village (<1% are non white) to one of the best universities in the world with diversity I’ve never before encountered (>44% of the Princeton class last year were non white, >10% were international). I feel challenged and excited by Princeton, it has its own share of Conservatives (see the Anscombe Society) but most critically I feel SAFE and comfortable in my own skin there. </p>
<p>*****There is a difference between ‘challenging yourself’ and putting yourself in an environment where you feel uncomfortable, especially for the sake of being uncomfortable! I chose not to elaborate on why, and I will stick to this, however having spoken to many people at both schools, I felt the environment at Duke made me feel a little unsafe/uncomfortable in ways I do not think are conducive.</p>
<p>TL;DR You have misinterpreted me. One of the principal reasons I am going to the US is to greet ‘a widely diverse spectrum of values, attitudes, standards, cultural principles, mores and so forth’.</p>
<p>However, as I said at the beginning, this is my subjective point of view, and one of the reasons I am choosing not to elaborate on why I would feel unsafe is because I don’t want to give the impression to any prospie that Duke is not a wonderful environment! It is.</p>
<p>I think we’ll leave it at that! I don’t intend to get into a long debate with you, particularly as I think there’s been some miscommunication. Any opinions regarding the decision between these two opportunities is certainly welcomed! :)</p>