<p>I had the following question in my inbox,
[quote]
I know Tufts is a very academic school but how much time do students just "chill"?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>So I emailed the freshman I know with the hardest course schedule to ask if he'd share some thoughts, and here is the way too long email he wrote back.</p>
<p>*Though Dan may be partially correct in saying that my schedule is intense, it doesn't mean that all I do every day is work. Granted, I was a little bit overly ambitious this semester, and decided to also take a course with mostly seniors and juniors (Comparative Revolutions), but honestly, it's not unmanageable. In fact, I think my ability to take this class makes everything even a little bit more awesome. I looked through the course book, saw a class that looked like a lot of fun, and even though, as a freshman, I wasn't technically "allowed" to take the class, I emailed the professor, explained my interest, and she signed me up right away. Which is really cool - not many schools have professors that will do that.</p>
<p>As for chill time, I still have time every day to hang out with friends for a few hours, get all my meals in, and be a part of the Tufts Musicians Collective and a few other awesome clubs.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, I may get only about 5 or 6 hours of sleep a night, but the time spent awake is always so fascinating (also, my loss of sleep might be attributed to the fact that I'm trying to teach myself C++ on the side haha). Apparently though, according to everyone else in my EPIIC class, I get the least sleep out of everyone on campus, which is a good sign about Tufts. The average student is able to maintain a social life, get his/her work done, and still get about 8 or 9 hours of sleep a night. And that includes the majority of people in EPIIC. I think I just may not like to sleep. </p>
<p>But seriously, what's absolutely incredible about Tufts is that, even when you have a lot of work, it's so fascinating that nothing is really "work." In EPIIC sat week, we discussed cyber security and cyber terrorism, and read about 150 pages on this virus called Stuxnet. It was so much fun! Seriously, look it up! Basically, Iran's nuclear program was destroyed by a computer virus that knew how to adapt to its environment, create copies of itself, and only attack the centrifuges and nothing more. And then, when it was detected, it realized it was detected, destroyed itself, found the site on which information about it was posted, immediately destroyed the website, and then found and wiped the servers on which the website was hosted. And the most interesting part about this in the IR-aspect: because it was so advanced a virus, we know that it had to have been worked on by several different governments (most likely the US, Israel, and a few others who have the capabilities), not to mention that they needed to have at least a few people from Microsoft and Siemens, too. So incredible!</p>
<p>So yeah, that's a bit of a tangent. Sorry about that. But I wouldn't worry about not having fun. Even if you take intense classes, the course load is manageable (sometimes you just have to figure out good tactics - in EPIIC we create reading groups to split up the 400 pages of reading a night). I always have time to chill. I usually go into Davis Square at least once or twice a week, and I go into Boston occasionally (eat at Wagamama if you get the chance. It's delicious). The thing that really sets Tufts apart for me, the thing that made it my top choice, is that everyone on campus is absolutely brilliant, but instead of stifling brilliance with loads of work, creativity and innovation is encouraged. Instead of having everyone on campus burrow into books all day, the campus condones and encourages people having fun, and will host weekly movie nights and really cool activities on campus. You'll definitely have to work - this isn't a slacker school - but the work is always interesting, and you have the freedom to take whichever classes interest you. *</p>
<p>I liked the way this seems to represent (to me, anyway) so much of what I dig about Tufts. Thought I'd share.</p>