<p>What are the stereotypes of each college? What colleges do other students secretly wish they were in? What colleges do students loathe?</p>
<p>Good question!!</p>
<p>Anyone have anything to say about JE and Calhoun?</p>
<p>Objectively speaking, they are all tight-knit communities that are the heart of the undergraduate experience for ~400 students any given year. It’d be impossible short of a “satisfaction survey” to quantify which is best. Nor is there any reason to mine for the answer either. The best one is the one you’re assigned to and no one will be able to tell you differently.</p>
<p>Of course the exception is JE. It just happens to be the best. Oops, stepped away from my objective voice there! Forgive me! Go Spiders!</p>
<p>Everybody secretly wants Berkeley!!!</p>
<p>Morse and Stiles are generally the least desired of them, perhaps a result of their placement.</p>
<p>Can anyone give any thoughts on Calhoun. Out of all the RCs, it’s the one I know least about and would like to get a feel for the college beforehand.</p>
<p>Do you stay in the same college all 4 years or do you move around?</p>
<p>You are assigned to a college before you start. For 10 of the 12, you live with other freshmen from your college on the Old Campus freshman year, then move into the college as a sophomore and stay there the remaining time. The other two colleges (Timothy Dwight and Silliman) have their freshmen living in the college.</p>
<p>5-10% of students wind up living off campus, mostly juniors and seniors, but they retain their college affiliation. It is possible to change colleges (usually between freshman and sophomore year), but it’s pretty uncommon – far less than 1% of students do it.</p>
<p>In terms of architecture, I like the Harkness Quadrangle colleges best – Saybrook and Branford. Frank Lloyd Wright is said to have commented that if he were at Yale he would want to live in Branford . . . so that, being at the foot of Harkness Tower, he would not have to look at it so much. Branford’s combination of one giant green courtyard and three intimate ones is hard to beat, and it does have Harkness Tower. Saybrook has two smaller towers that people actually live in, and its dining hall gets the best view of the Branford courtyard.</p>
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<p>It’s not so much the placement as it is the architecture. The upside (for some students) is the plethora of singles, although that will change once they’re renovated.</p>
<p>Saybrook, the name says it all</p>
<p>Stiles and Morse were opened in the 70s and did have a higher no. of singles than the ten previous colleges. During their recent renovation, this has changed so that more suites were available. In the 70s, the drive towards more individualism led to more singles. It was later understood that this lessened the cohesion and fraternity versus the other colleges where housing was clustered around the suite-concept.</p>
<p>The plethora of singles, over time, was seen as a negative for MC and ES.</p>
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<p>They told you to say that, didn’t they? </p>
<p>(congratulations, anyway!)</p>
<p>Davenport is everyone’s second favorite college. Or at least in the top 4. Therefore, it is the best residential college. I also personally like Morse and Trumbull.</p>
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<p>Why MC but not ES? I always think these two are similar to each other.</p>
<p>how about silliman? any specific good/bad qualities?</p>
<p>No Calhoun?</p>
<p>Branford is the best residential college without a doubt. Not only did Robert Frost call it the “most beautiful” of all of Yale’s colleges (it is old Gothic architecture and houses the famous and iconic Harkness Tower), the Yale Daily News said it was Yale’s equivalent of Gryffindor because “all freshmen want to be in it after Bulldog Days.” Its mascot is also the squirrel, which is friggin’ awesome.</p>
<p>Disclaimer: I am in Branford!</p>
<p>i like morse people better than stiles people. though i love stiles people too. and i think that stiles is uglier than morse. they’re similar but not identical at all.</p>
<p>It really depends on what you want…</p>
<p>The colleges are built in different styles, and you may prefer one over another. Pierson and TD are sort of red brick/georgian, Berkeley, Branford, Calhoun, JE, Saybrook, and Trumbull are collegiate gothic, Silliman and Davenport are kind of hybrids. Morse and Stiles are similar to the gothic colleges in that they’re big stone behemoths, but they’re much more modern (/visually interesting). </p>
<p>The locations vary. Berkeley (my college) and Calhoun are pretty ideally located (ie, right in the middle). But different colleges might be more or less convenient depending on what you’re doing on campus. JE is closest to the cultural houses and art history dept. Morse, Stiles, Trumbull and Saybrook are right by the shopping district on Broadway/York St. Silliman and TD are convenient for science majors. Anything central is reasonably convenient for humanities majors. Etc. etc. etc. The campus is pretty compact in general, so even when someone complains that they’re college is <em>so far away,</em> they’re probably just whining. </p>
<p>Except, of course, if they’re a geology major in Pierson. That seriously blows (i know a g&g major in pierson, btw).</p>
<p>The quality of the rooms is all pretty good, particularly in the renovated colleges (all the colleges will be renovated by the time you live in them). The size varies from room to room, and the design/size of suites/amount of housing varies from college to college. Some colleges have party suites, and others don’t. Some have to annex more than others (Trumbull, JE, Calhoun, and Berkeley annex the most, i believe, because they are the smallest colleges). </p>
<p>I could go on for sooooo long. Don’t sweat it… you’ll like your college. Stay positive, even if you don’t get your first choice. </p>
<p>PS: BK was my first choice! I got super lucky…</p>
<p>Silliman is a four-year college, and it has more people living in it than any of the other colleges. In addition to having the freshmen live there, I think it has somewhat more people per class than any other college, too. It’s also relatively far away from the other colleges (but somewhat closer to the science buildings, and TD is just across the street). It has less distinctive architecture than any of the other colleges (which, looking at things from a Sillimander point of view, means it’s less kitchy and fake). It is built around a huge internal courtyard with plenty of room for games and such like. It seems less intimate than the other colleges.</p>
<p>People in it love it, of course. They think it’s the best.</p>
<p>If you live in Silliman, you get your pizza at Naples, which plays the part of “traditional college hangout” complete with hyper-carved tables and wall panels. Oozes atmosphere. But not as good as Yorkside.</p>