<p>Im looking for a little help/ advice concerning life at Lehigh. </p>
<p>As a female in engineering, what is life like on campus or off? Is it safe to walk off campus or is security an issue.</p>
<p>Im trying to make final decisions on where to go next year and want to make sure Lehigh is the right choice. Coming from NE I'll be traveling a bit for college and am not familiar with the greater PA, NY or NJ areas. For obvious reasons I want to make sure I pick the right school.</p>
<p>Whats it like as a female in engineering?<br>
Whats it like living in and around campus? </p>
<p>What does everyone do in their free time? As a varsity athlete Im not interested in the party thing. Will this be a problem?</p>
<p>If you are not into frat parties and you are a female worried about nighttime safety, you may need to research schools further. It is, however, an engineering school.</p>
<p>For the hell of it I just glanced at icy9ff8's previous posts and almost died of laughter. I think this person just does drive-by posts on every board on CC.</p>
<p>The campus is perfectly safe. But like anywhere else, a girl should exercise good judgement about walking alone late at night. The periphery of campus is largely student rentals and the downtown area by Mart (the science & engineering library) is fairly vibrant. </p>
<p>There are parts of South Bethlehem (east and west of campus) that are really seedy but unless you're looking to score some crack you'll have no reason to ever be there at night. Things do occasionally happen within the areas off campus that students inhabit ... burglaries, fights and the like but mostly when someone calls it a bad neighborhood it is because they're a sheltered, prissy suburbanite with no clue what a real bad neighborhood looks like.</p>
<p>I never felt uncomfortable off campus for even a nanosecond but how a girl from New England (or did NE mean Nebraska? LOL) would feel, I don't know. South Bethlehem is what it is. Downtown Bethlehem across the river is gorgeous but the south side is unmistakably an old industrial neighborhood without any industry anymore. There are lots of cheap ethnic restaurants, some good bars, coffee shops, funky stores and live music venues but in spite of that the overall vibe is of a charmless transitional neigthborhood rather than being quaint in any way. The Bethlehem Steel facility is in the midst of a major redevelopment including a casino, upscale restaurants and shops, movie theater, a hotel, performing arts complex and various other attractions so the area surrounding campus should be markedly enhanced when you would be there.</p>
<p>I don't know what to tell you about your free time. There are 4,700 undergrads so the questions really are how good are you at making friends and are you a leader or a follower? I was a varsity athlete, worked on the paper, was in a fraternity, and also enjoyed partying but still managed to have a lot of fun doing other things on the (mostly in-season) weekends when I chose not to drink ... and that's in spite of never having two nickels to rub together. There are lots of things to do and plenty of people doing them you just have to convince your friends to join you or have the courage to go on your own. If you're more specific about what you like I could probably be more helpful about things to do but the bottom line is that your reluctance to party would only be a problem if all the friends you made like partying all the time. And whose fault would that be? LOL.</p>
<p>MrMountainHawk - Thanks for your great info. I have been worried by so many posts painting Lehigh as a "only if you want to party at frats" kind of school. I understand that to some degree partying happens at the majority of colleges - just need to figure out what that degree is! My son is not a drinker and not into big parties, however he is social. Will he be totally out of the social scene at Lehigh?</p>
<p>Safety is and has been a serious issue around Lehigh's campus. Frat parties are huge at Lehigh. Anyone posting differently may want to do a little more research. Even a police officer was shot & killed a block or two from campus last year; this prompted a lot of discussion about safety at Lehigh. I have students currently at Lehigh, know several graduates, & have visited the campus a half dozen times. Safety is an issue & drinking is the primary social activity. I don't know where other posters get their info. or what their agenda is, but if you research Lehigh University on CC you will find most comments are similiar to mine. (Just looking over the prior posts of MrMountainHawk will give you a good idea of where he is coming from.) From one publication: "...given the constant prevalence of alcohol--Lehigh is described as a "party school". Another publication, PR, rated Lehigh as the number 3 party school in the US in 2005. "Since most students inhabit the still depressed South Side, caution is advised." Although students feel safe on campus during daylight hours, many student groups have sought funding for increased lighting on the campus at night.</p>
<p>I have a niece who is a recent grad who was a mechanical engineering major and my daughter is a current student, though not an engineering major. From what my daughter tells me, Mr MountainHawk is right on target about the campus and surrounding areas. </p>
<p>I have a feeling that the reputation as a party school and reality are two different things, based on what my daughter tells me. She tells me that at some parties, there are bracelets to identify over 21ers, but I know that you can't police every square inch of a building and anyone who is determined enough can get alcohol. Last month, two students wound up in the hospital with alcohol poisoning (I think it was a pledge initiation). Almost a dozen were cited for underage drinking and two cited for serving alcohol to those underage students. I bring this up because I expect my daughter will be telling me about an increase in police presence and a decrease in partying.</p>
<p>She never called me saying she was bored and had nothing to do.</p>
<p>Posts #3 & #6 contradict themselves. Both attempt to dispute Lehigh University's well known national reputation for heavy partying, then discuss seedy areas, buying crack, frat parties, alcohol poisoning & citations for underage drinking. As I wrote above, just research prior discussions on CC re: safety & drinking re: Lehigh University. Or buy a copy of PR's Best 361 Colleges. Just reading post #3 above is enough to scare away most sensible people, in my opinion. Quoting MrMountainHawk's CC post on March 2 or 3, 2005: "It isn't news if someone drinks themselves into a virtual coma in a freshman dorm or an off campus apartment at Lehigh..." MrMountainHawk's other posts regarding racism are cause for more concern. From The Big Book of Colleges 2008:"I wouldn't walk around town- it's very unsafe," according to a current Lehigh student. There has been a significant number of drug related arrests over the past few years." I wouldn't say there's a huge drug scene, but every type of drug you could possibly think of is at Lehigh..."</p>
<p>icy9ff8, can you tell me where I can read these publications that you quote? I am not familiar with PR. You mention you have students at Lehigh. Are they happy there?</p>
<p>You can find all of these publications at Barnes & Nobles or at Border's books. PR = Princeton Review. CP= College pr-wler's Big book of Colleges. Also ISI's Choosing The Right College. Just pick up any publication on colleges and universities. Well, the guys like to party. The girl left for a small prestigious LAC due to concerns regarding safety & drinking. You can also research comments on CC over the last year or so after the police officer was shot & killed a block or two off campus.</p>
<p>I see there have been quite a few comments in the past about this issue at Lehigh. There were probably a few groans out there when I brought it up - sorry to rehash old subjects!</p>
<p>Of course PR= Princeton Review! Still learning the abbreviations. The ISI book looks very interesting - getting it out of the library.</p>
<p>I have to commend Icy9ff8 on his ability to make me laugh. What I wrote was:"It isn't news if someone drinks themselves into a virtual coma in a freshman dorm or an off campus apartment at Lehigh [or at ANY OTHER SCHOOL IN THE COUNTRY]." That's a hell of an omission. The question of course is whether this is a reflection of poor reading comprehension or dishonesty. Neither speaks well of someone who is apparently a teacher.</p>
<p>being on campus at lehigh is very safe; there is ample lighting everywhere around campus. </p>
<p>south side bethlehem isn't the safest place, but most students don't end up going there anyway. not because of the safety issue, but because the south side isn't college-town like. most lehigh students aren't going to shop at a dollar store or eat at an ethnic restaurant. if they really want to go shopping they'll either go to the promenade or the lehigh valley mall. from what i hear there are a few bars around, but if students go off campus its more likely to a nearby house party. off campus lehigh students tend to live very close to campus in the safer residential areas, so i don't think walking around at night to parties will be a problem.</p>
<p>i don't consider drinking a social activity; when i am with friends, i tend to drink however.</p>
<p>I don't recall that happening either. Then again we are talking about a poster who bounces from board to board as though he knows every college better than the people who actually went there/go there so who are any of us to disagree? LOL.</p>
<p>There was a student who got shot at (not hurt, let alone killed thank god) in a confrontation off campus in the middle of the summer when it is a ghost town and there is zero student presence around. That's likely what he is referring to. An unfortunate and unprecedented incident But I figured anyone who is smart enough to get into Lehigh would have picked up that this poster is kind of a clown who is trying way too hard so I saw no need to pick apart his comments.</p>
<p>The funniest part to me is that in addition to deliberately misquoting me he actually tried to impugn my character for a post defending the student body against some spurious accusation of being racist and yet here this pig is trying to scare people about a working poor hispanic population that on the whole is hardly menacing. There is crime, to be sure, but very little of it is random. When I was in grad school at Columbia I couldn't so much as leave or enter my girlfriend's apartment building without being bothered, accosted or, occasionally, threatened so I find alarmists about the student-inhabited parts of Bethlehem to be rather cute.</p>