<p>I saw it somewhere from a website …I don’t know if it is true ! Can anybody tell me what it real feels like to be at Brandeis ? Right now I can’t decide between Brandeis and Bryn Mawr …please help me …I’m going crazy~~
imeldamarcos’s Full Review: Brandeis University
Wow. Going here sucked. Here’s why: </p>
<p>Student Body
The students, and most of the university, live in a bubble, unintentionally symbolized by the fact that the school sits on top of a hill surrounded by a peripheral road. Town-gown relations aren’t that great, as the part of town Brandeis sits in is largely blue collar Massachusetts locals. Students are mostly upper middle class suburban white kids, about 2/3 Jewish, and at least half come from either Massachusetts or New York. There’s a big divide, and quite a bit of unspoken resentment, between the Jewish students and non-Jewish students. The school is very racially self-segregated, more so than what I’ve seen at other similar-sized schools. </p>
<p>At the time I was there, the student body was largely politically apathetic, but that started to change by my senior year, and now I’m hearing about how the student body is “too” activist. So I guess it changes every few years. </p>
<p>Brandeis has a TON of pre-meds and other biological and chemical science majors. There are also a good number of pre-law and computer science students. Few people play musical instruments. Despite its liberal arts atmosphere it has quite a preprofessional student body. If you’re a free-spirited punk rock artiste, you ought to look elsewhere. </p>
<p>Social Life
Social what? </p>
<p>Brandeis students love to complain about how ugly their peers are, and one of the campus myths is that we are consistently ranked on some Playboy Top 10 List of Ugliest Student Bodies or something like that. Well it turns out that there is no Playboy Top 10 List, but I have to admit that we really are much uglier than the general population. Perhaps it is because we are so studious? Very studious + ugly = not a great dating scene. Needless to say, that should be a superficial consideration because it’s not like we go to college for the hot babes and sex, right? </p>
<p>Regardless, I personally found most undergrads extremely uptight, and this is coming from a person who doesn’t like to drink, smoke, or party all night. Whether it was refusing to work in a group because you want the answers to yourself, or accusing everyone and their cousin of cheating, or music from your laptop speakers being too loud, or sabotaging each other’s experiments, or mistakenly eating near a group of people fasting for a Jewish holiday, or accusing someone of “ruining the curve”, or complaining about something that was offensive (I don’t mean controversial jokes on the radio, I mean something more innocuous like having a Christmas tree or making ramen) - seriously, Brandeis students made this stiff-upper-lip nerd look like Snoop Dogg. </p>
<p>Students here are wealthy and do have the accompanying snobbery associated with upper middle class Yankees; however, there are more than enough people who are not like this at all. Overall though, there is a general ignorance of people who aren’t well off - you won’t be able to commiserate with many people about things like filing the FAFSA, sending money home, taking a semester off to save money for the next semester, etc. - because most Brandeis students will never have to do this. </p>
<p>The frat scene here is pathetic - for me that was excellent. I do really like the fact that Brandeis is about as non-jock n’cheerleader as you can get. Go nerds! Now only if y’all took the sticks out of your asses… </p>
<p>Those of you who did not grow up wealthy and/or not familiar with Jewish religion and culture will definitely have a greater period of adjustment than most - this, to be honest, made my experience hell for the first few months. In retrospect it’s a a good learning experience if you’re prepared for it. I wasn’t. </p>
<p>Facilities and Campus
Compared to schools of its caliber, dorms are way below average, classrooms and office buildings are about average. Freshman dorms are pretty horrendous - dingy bathrooms, stained carpets, 3 students in a double room, etc. Upperclassmen and graduate housing are only a step up. Ridgewood was designed as temporary housing only but I guess the school was too lazy or cheap to tear it down. Ziv has those kitchen spaces without kitchens in it supposedly because they ran out of money during construction so it was left unfinished, and also explains why one of the Ziv buildings is missing a floor. Rosenthal smells BAD BAD BAD! </p>
<p>I haven’t seen the new student center yet, but what everyone was asking when it was being built was, “Why spend all that money making a new student center when no one was complaining about the old one, yet spend no money upgrading the dorms?” </p>
<p>The layout of the cafeterias defied common sense, but fortunately I only had to live with that for a year before they outsourced dining services to Aramark. Of course, students complained anyway, but in truth there was a huuuge improvement when Aramark came along. The food was not perfect but for cafeteria food I thought it was damn good, and I think students everywhere just like to complain about the food for the sake of complaining. </p>
<p>The campus grounds are ok. It becomes, like the rest of the New England landscape, depressing and desolate in the winter which often lasts through April. </p>
<p>Sports
You mean, like, something you do outside of a library? </p>
<p>Brandeis’s gym is really, really nice for a school of its size, and especially for a school that is sooooo unathletically talented (and, for many of us, proud of it). Supposedly the Boston Celtics used to practice there. </p>
<p>Academics
I saved the best for last. This was really the only part of my experience at this school which I truly felt with confidence was genuinely better than anything I could have gotten at an Ivy League. The intro classes suck and the science professors definitely care more about their research than teaching freshmen (I don’t blame them), but if you can get through that, the smaller upper-level courses are excellent. Academics here are not only rigorous but are enjoyable and you WILL get a lot out of them. Professors are pretty available though some of the ones who double as advisors or department heads will be quite busy. </p>
<p>My academic advising was pretty poor; I guess I wasn’t really one of the department’s stars so no need to spend any time on me. I remember the disappointment I felt when I discovered that my advisor had replied to a friend’s email about getting a quote for a campus newspaper article he was writing - a few hours after he wrote it. Why was I disappointed? B/c my advisor never replies to my email or returns my phone calls. It definitely showed me where her priorities were. </p>
<p>Anyway, with that exception the professors in general are pretty good, though the social science profs definitely top the science profs in availability and relationships with their students. You’ll never hear the same complaints about Intro to Chem as you do with Intro to Anthropology.</p>
speak of having fun, no offend,but is “the Ugliest Student Bodies” real about Brandeis ? I hope it is not ,anyway , we are just there to study .:P</p>