<p>Hi, I was wondering if anybody could provide insight about this. I've already made my selections for housing, but I'm having some ambivalence. I went with four-class housing, which I know is the more unpopular choice. From what I heard, it was a better balance of quiet/social, more conducive to building a genuinely tight-knit community, and a good way to connect with upperclassmen mentors. All-freshmen housing seemed super wild and just constantly loud in comparison. That said, I don't want to miss out on the social experience of my freshman year in college and especially don't want to feel isolated on West Campus. I'm thinking all-freshman housing, though its energy may be kind of overwhelming at least at first, might be a good way to help break me out of my shell. Does anybody have experience that can speak to that?</p>
<p>For admit weekend, I stayed in an all-frosh dorm. Obviously things are a bit different during AW, but the frosh dorms seemed very upbeat and lively, compared to when I visited a 4-class dorm it was a bit more laid back. I think no matter where you live you’ll enjoy yourself, and if you don’t like it, it’s only a year, then you get to move to someplace you might like better. I wouldn’t lose sleep over the matter though, there’s not much you can do now that the Approaching Stanford forms are already submitted.</p>
<p>I lived in a 4 class dorm last year as a freshman and loved it. It wasn’t a party dorm, but the community was great and I loved basically all the upperclassmen in my dorm. I would highly reccomend it. Of course, it may not be the same for everyone, but I think it was a good decision to make.</p>
<p>As an alum of Stanford, I have asked many fellow alums about the choice between an all-frosh dorm and a four-class dorm. Every single person had the same answer: Go with an all-Frosh dorm. Each person–even those who were in all-Frosh dorms–felt very strongly about this. When you are 18 you might wonder about this choice. When you are 40 you will not.</p>
<p>^When people look back, my hunch is that they will weigh the social aspect of the decision more heavily than the true cost versus benefit. </p>
<p>For instance, I bet a lot of people, when they are in a white-collar job, might wish that they had experimented more with drugs back in high school or college. That doesn’t mean that doing drugs would have been the correct decision at that earlier time, however.</p>