<p>Hello, friends from CC!</p>
<p>I'm a high school junior and I am interested in applying early decision to Duke University.</p>
<p>I visited Duke over spring break and I absolutely loved it! I only stayed there for a few hours, however, and I don't feel 100% confident in applying ED. I know a lot about how great Duke is, but could someone tell me some negatives of Duke? If I'm going to apply ED, I want to know everything about it, good and bad.</p>
<p>This is in no way a request for people to bash Duke; I simply want to hear some unbiased comments about the flaws of Duke University. I am mainly focused on the social aspect of the University, but if you're curious, I am planning on majoring in economics with potential for a double major in either history or international comparative studies.</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>If you could be a little more specific about your questions or concerns regarding the social aspects of Duke, I’d be happy to answer your question. Social life here is too diverse to give positives and negatives without really knowing what you’re looking for (or maybe not looking for) in a social scene.</p>
<p>I’d like to know as well. It’s best to know the complete Duke before arriving on campus in the fall. I don’t want any nasty surprises.</p>
<p>I don’t know if Duke has changed in the past years, but my dad went to Duke and he says that Duke paid a lot of attention (as in facilities, classes, etc.) to their graduate students, but barely any attention to the undergrad. </p>
<p>Hope this helps!</p>
<p>For the social scene, there’s a lot of focus on alcohol and partying. I mean, if you don’t do it, nobody forces you or looks down on you, and there are plenty of people who don’t drink to hang out with, but much of the Duke social scene revolves around alcohol. Duke knows this, accepts it, and to an extent, promotes it. There’s free beer at a lot of the events (you have to be over 21 to get it, but I mean, what else are upperclassman friends for?). They also have an amnesty policy so you don’t get in trouble if you call the EMT. You see it almost everywhere, and thursday-saturday nights tend to be a little crazy.
However, it’s perfectly possible to avoid if you want to. And to some people, that’s not really a negative.
Other than that, I see no negatives to Duke’s social scene. You’ll meet a lot of people from different backgrounds who are awesome awesome awesome. C:</p>
<p>I disagree with Duke not paying attention to undergrads. I feel that Duke has a nice balance of an undergrad/grad focus. The highly ranked graduate schools only seem to benefit undergrads, not take attention away from undergrads. A lot of the grad school resources (research opportunities, classes, etc.) are open to undergrads. Not only that, but Duke promotes undergraduate research quite heavily. It is not difficult to develop relationships with professors, especially with the FLUNCH program (Duke pays for two lunches w/a faculty member each semester).</p>