<p>What is the student body like at NU? From postings on this board, I get the feeling a large number of students are unhappy with their choice of NU. Is this typical, or just a few vocal people with bad experiences?</p>
<p>My experience is that most people are happy to be there. There is an urban legend that everybody at NU is there because they didn’t get into an “Ivy” which is simply not the case. My observation is that the student body is a very diverse group…there are preppies, there are frat people, there are athletes, there are “nerds”, there are arty types…but no particular group predominates. It is just a great place to go to school. Great location, great facilities.</p>
<p>More directly on topic (though Objective has a good answer) is that it is in fact just a few loud whiners who feel its socially acceptable to whine and generalize to everyone else, which is a part of NU’s culture. My argument after 3 years is that this is socially acceptable at NU because 1. There’s a lot of Medill kids who need to fill space in their papers, so will print anything, and 2. NU is in fact so full of people happy and busy with their lives they don’t have time to bother shouting don’t the malcontent whiners.</p>
<p>I haven’t yet met a single person who is unhappy with their choice of NU. Most people I know love their classes and are involved in activities that they love. Almost everyone I’ve met has been thrilled to be here.</p>
<p>The vast majority of people I know are as happy as a clam here :)</p>
<p>^ Seconded.</p>
<p>If people at NU were truly unhappy, why would they be at NU…? </p>
<p>I assume you could spend a lot less money being unhappy somewhere else :P.</p>
<p>I think “the student body is unhappy” thing might fly at a super cheap local 4-yr, a community college, a commuter college, or otherwise at a place where there’s a lot of people who are forced to be there. I don’t think anyone is twisting studnets’ arms behind their backs and marching them into NU lol. Not much of a punishment, if they are ;).</p>
<p>Generally college students are a happy bunch, and I believe those fortunate enough to attend a top 20 institution near a big, awesome city are probably MORE happy than others…and probably had more choices during the application/enrollment process than others as well.</p>
<p>Three types of people at NU:</p>
<p>People from the midwest, happy to be there
People from California, happy to be there, but talk often about California
People from the East Coast, generally happy to be there, but this is the group where you sometimes get the unhappy people, particularly if they are from NYC. But lots of people from NYC who love northwestern, so i think this is personality-dependent.</p>
<p>Sorry to bump this topic, but elsijfdl, I found your post to be very true! Hahaha.</p>