<p>One of my friend's brother is in the MIT class of 2012. He says that "MIT is hell" and "No one enjoys MIT". Is that necessarily true? I heard it's very challenging, to the point of all nighters becoming a frequency.</p>
<p>Check out this on the admission website: [MIT</a> Admissions: Work/Play Balance At MIT](<a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/topics/life/workplay_balance_at_mit/index.shtml]MIT”>Clubs & activities | MIT Admissions)</p>
<p>So the sleep thing is easier to address. People definitely pull all-nighters at MIT, but the number you pull and the amount of sleep you actually get depend on your work habits. I pulled two all-nighters at MIT, and neither was actually necessary – they were due to me procrastinating on necessary work until the last minute. My husband pulled more all-nighters than I did, but he works best in concentrated chunks of time – he still pulls all-nighters at work sometimes now that he’s graduated. </p>
<p>Ultimately, you get to choose several things at MIT that affect your sleep habits (and also the time you have for stuff other than school). You get to choose the number and intensity of classes you will take each semester. You get to choose what time you will sit down and begin your problem set or paper or project. You get to choose how many and what kinds of extracurricular activities you will participate in. If you want to go to bed every night at midnight, you can do that at MIT – it’s just that for most people, that isn’t a priority over taking cool classes, being in their UROP lab, going to practice or meetings for an extracurricular, or just goofing off in the hallway with their friends at 1 AM when there’s a paper due the next day.</p>
<p>“No one enjoys MIT” is definitely false. “MIT is hell”… well, we like to call it that :)</p>
<p>From my experience at MIT, you get challenged a lot and often. Whenever that happens to you, at some point it gets old and you begin to resent it. Therefore, the “MIT is hell” comment. However, when you do accomplish the tasks at hand, you do feel a great sense of achievement and pride. </p>
<p>I didn’t enjoy every minute of my time at MIT, but overall I would say that those were some of the most enjoyable years of my life. Like most college students, I grew up a lot in those years. I joined a fraternity, played intramural and varsity sports (quite a change from high school where I had a reputation of not being able to chew gum and walk at the same time), worked on a NASA contract thru one of the professors, did a bunch of hiking and backpacking in the White Mountains in New Hampshire, learned to like Chinese food (thru some of my classmates) and just a whole bunch of stuff Id never done before.</p>
<p>So, MIT is hell, but in a good way.</p>
<p>learn to love LAN parties and MIT won’t be hell</p>