Hi everyone. Just wanted to post this as a reminder to everyone to REALLY look into the school and your reason for going before accepting. I was an undergrad at Duke and found that the culture was absolutely toxic. Maybe 10 years ago it was more fun and personal, but now, the administration will not care about your success and everyone is in constant competition with each other. The culture is dominated by Greek Life and wealth - which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, except for that there are literally no options for things to do outside of Greek Life. You know the rumors you’ve heard about Berkeley and MIT? Those are true for Duke, and even more so because those that get in are not only book smart, but usually athletes as well.
I transferred to Emory, and am having a much better time. The professors actually try to teach you rather than throw abstract theories up on the board, and the deans/administration actually love the students and engage with them. My academic dean at Duke was no help whatsoever - here, my dean mapped out my 4 year plan and even advised me on what clubs to join.
Couple bad things:
There are no Greek houses. The Greeks live in dorms and own houses to party in.
Whatever they say, Duke is not a party school. You will be studying the vast majority of the time.
Your dean and advisors will not be much help. Your classes will be very hard and the deans do not help you pick a major or find a job.
Be very careful about getting in trouble with the administration. Around 20-50 kids are expelled each year for nominal offenses, usually related to drinking. They want a “perfect” community at Duke - if you don’t have money to donate and are causing trouble, you’re out.
If you’re pre-med, go to a state school. You’ll learn the same material, get a higher GPA, meet more genuine people, and most importantly, pay a hell of a lot less. Only reason to go to Duke is to study economics for Investment Bankers.
That’s it. That’s my mini rant. Basically, make sure you know what you’re signing up for if you accept your acceptance into Duke. Emory is similar, but more genuine. If you get in, I would highly recommend taking the acceptance.
As someone who occasionally finds Duke problematic, I find your rant incredibly short-sighted and juvenile. I wonder if you even went to Duke at all because you didn’t even mention SLG as the most obvious alternative to Greek Life
To be clear, as someone who successfully applied to transfer out of Duke last year and ultimately decided to stay, I sympathize with some of your sentiments. But to accuse Duke of all the things you just wrote, again, is incredibly short sighted.
Everybody has a different experience – that doesn’t mean it didn’t occur in the way described by the OP. But that certainly does NOT mean that others have the same negative experience. In fact, if you look at freshman retention rates and happiness surveys, Duke has incredibly great numbers. Something like 98% of Freshmen stick around, suggesting high satisfaction. Post-graduation satisfaction surveys indicate similar results. So, it certainly can happen that somebody is unhappy, but the statistics show it is by no means the norm. I had a great experience at Duke. It can also be somewhat random in that you do/don’t find a group of students/friends that you enjoy spending time with. Sometimes things just don’t align, but more often than not, they do. Duke’s student body is not really any different than peer schools like Penn, Brown, Dartmouth, Northwestern, etc. Yeah, there may be slight differences, but by and large, they attract VERY similar students.
I found Duke students incredibly welcoming, not cut-throat in the least, amazingly diverse and passionate, intelligent, and also overall inclusive. I did not join a fraternity or SLG and had a good social experience, so saying everything revolves around the Greek system wasn’t true in my experience. With 50% (or thereabouts) of the student body independent, you think they all have no social lives? I went to plenty of parties and social functions while balancing my majors in biomedical engineering and psych. (I did also go to sorority functions, so did get to see that world). I had a fantastic experience and had friends of all races, from different parts of the world, rich and (relatively) poor, that all enriched my experience. I also had a great experience with a Dean in Pratt who really wanted to help all students and helped me formulate my curriculum plan.
Duke is not just for investment bankers, but I agree that going to public school for the pre-med route might be a better choice (but that’s not just Duke, same for an ivy league) as it likely would be cheaper/easier. Overall, everybody’s experience is unique, so I can’t say your experience didn’t happen, but statistics show that your experience is anomalous and the VAST MAJORITY of students love their Duke experience and find their peers the best part of it.
Sorry to hear about your experience. Duke is not an easy place, no hand holding. It almost sounds like you were looking for someone to map out your steps. The academic advisors and deans are there to help, but certainly won’t spoon feed you.
Glad to hear that you are doing well at Emory. The experience you had at Duke is by no means typical.
@bluedog I’m curious as to what you actually DIDN’T like about Duke. I wouldn’t imagine your 4 years there was picture perfect unless you’re oblivious or bias. As great as Duke is, it doesn’t have it all together so I sympathize with the OP although he/she conveyed their sentiments in a very immature manner.
And whoever says Duke isn’t the place to go for pre-med is absolutely wrong. While achieving a higher GPA might be harder than a state school, scoring highly on the MCAT is correlated with how rigorous and intellectually challenging your college was. The type of preparation you received in school can make all the difference in how well you do on the exam and schools like Duke prepares you very well for it. Earning a high GPA doesn’t mean you’ll score highly on the MCAT.
Since when is that the job of a dean? Academic advising and career centers exist to help with those issues. Support is out there, but the student has to reach out and ask - it’s not just going to happen.
Just dropping by to say my kid loves Case Western Reserve… Anyways, she knows one of the Department Chairs at Duke. He’s down to earth and extremely dedicated about teaching the younger generation. He’s a generous and compassionate man. I don’t know much about Duke U but from what I know of this guy, I say Duke’s faculty must be an awesome bunch.
We probably should just ignore OP. He/she is probably overwhelmed by Duke’s demand for excellence and indepedent thinking. Just not a good fit and one of the few mistakes by the adcoms.
Very little about this rant is credible. Duke does not expel 50 students per year (three million in fees and tuition out the door?). That is absurd. Nor does Duke expel kids for nominal offenses. Anyone who would make such an assertion is not credible. Nor does someone who complains that you “spend all your time studying.” That is what you pay your money for, that is why you work hard to get in, so that you are challenged. If you applied to Duke thinking you were going to party all the time you will be disappointed. It is a very hard school with incredibly motivated students. What is also absurd–that going to a state school is better for pre-med. You can do just fine at the many fine state schools for pre-med but if you know any student who has interviewed at the higher ranked medical schools they will tell you that many if not most of the students who are at the interviews are from the same small set of schools including Duke, top state schools like Michigan, the Ivies, Stanford, Chicago etc with just one or two from outside that group. While you don’t have to go to Duke to go to medical school, it is clearly an advantage. And, finally, contrasting Duke with Emory is the final straw. Duke does have its own personality and it is different from other schools. So, I can certainly see how someone could end up transferring to NYU or Columbia and being much happier. But Emory? It is a great school but pretty darn close to Duke in the nature of the student body.
@markiv1996 Thank you for this candid post. It is helpful to CC to hear from actual experiences from actual students. Your comments will be most helpful to those considering applying to Duke.
While it is unfortunate that you had a bad experience, it is best that you found a more appropriate college to attend. Best of luck to you.
As one poster said, Duke is not an easy school and has incredibly motivated students. It is an amazing school, but it isn’t perfect, like any school. And like any school, not everyone stays, for whatever their reasons. No one on CC should discount that OP obviously had what it takes to get in, but some bad experiences soured it for him. That doesn’t change the good experiences and opportunities the majority of Duke students have, and any prospective Duke student reading this should understand that. I find that some of OP’s criticisms of “bad things” would actually be considered “good” for many students; it depends on your outlook and expectations.
I’m glad OP has found a school that he is happy with.
I’ll discount the OP. The OP said “You will be miserable at Duke if you’re not white” in another post. When asked to elaborate, there was no response. If you put something out there like that and don’t have the guts to back it up…discounted.
Anyways, she knows one of the Department Chairs at Duke. He’s down to earth and extremely dedicated about teaching the younger generation. He’s a generous and compassionate man. I don’t know much about Duke U but from what I know of this guy, I say Duke’s faculty must be an awesome bunch.