Questions about Duke culture and social life

<p>Hi there, and it is good to meet all the other undergrad and grad students around here.</p>

<p>Some things I was wondering about Duke, since I admit I have always found these Southern Ivy League Universities to be fascinating and wanted to understand more about their culture and the kind of students they have.</p>

<p>One thing I wondered is, is it true that Duke is conformist and forces students to conform to certain image and a culture? I have heard that if you are a typical nerd type intellectual, like that which would be found at MIT, or, say, a free spirited musician-activist type of intellectual from the West Coast or a Jewish or Asian quiet intellectual type from, say, new York or Philadelphia, or especially if you are gay, lesbian, black or Latino, indeed anything other than the rich, wealthy Southern prep in polo shirts and designer jeans that you will not fit in at all and will not be seen as conforming enough and will feel forced to change your clothes, your demeanor, the kind of music and movies you like to talk about, your hairstyle, everything. And that the students are often very judgmental towards others who do not conform to what they think an ideal college student is. Is this true or is this merely a misconception?</p>

<p>And as far as the social scene, it has been said that Duke has a reputation for being an out of control, binge drinking "party school" while maintaining a great academic ranking. As for the party school thing, I had always wondered about that because for starters Duke has never made the Playboy list of top 10 party schools and on this list : Top 100 College Party Schools for 2013-2014 -- NEW YORK, Aug. 8, 2013 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- it is not even in the top 100. In Duke, roughly speaking, what percentage of the students do not partake in the party scene at all, what percentage partake 1-2 times a week as a casual social partier, what percentage have 1-2 nights a week where they binge drink and use every drug they can find and are out of control in an Animal House on Steroids fashion and what percentage are binge drinking and doing the out of control thing at least several times a week to as much as every day of the week?</p>

<p>I wonder because I know that Duke has been given a reputation as a school that is not merely a school with a great social scene but a school with an obscene, destructive, out of control social scene that the majority of students feel pressured to get involved in. After the Lacrosse Rape Case and certain magazines attempting to weight in on it: Sex</a> And Scandal At Duke | JANET REITMAN that reputation magnified. It seems like there are two possibilities: 1. That while Duke does have a great social/party scene, at least by top 15 school standards, the out of control partying, I Am Charlotte Simmons type stuff is completely blown out of proportion for media hysteria purposes and most duke students either abstain entirely or have maybe 1-3 times a week where they are involved in social partying within reasonable limits and causal, social drinking and not binge drinking. 2. All the hysteria is true, which means that if is true at Duke, that would mean that at larger, rural state schools, like Florida State and Arizona State where it is no doubt way worse, it would have to be considered a true national emergency that needs to be addressed. So which depiction is true, is it more 1 or more 2 in this case?</p>

<p>…I was with you and then I wasn’t. At all. Let’s take this one step at a time.</p>

<p>

We’re not an Ivy League. We’re geographically southern, and I would say we are culturally moderately ‘southern.’</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Holy mackerel. I’ll say this: I’m ethnically Chinese, identify as culturally American, and have yet to drink a sip of alcohol at Duke. I’ve yet to go to a single party. I spend most of my ‘free’ time sleeping or watching TV. Depending on the situation, I can by loud and obnoxiously energetic or quiet as a mouse.</p>

<p>I have never, ever felt pressured at Duke to drink or to change. The people here respect my choices, and with a huge undergrad population, you can definitely find your niche.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>A fair number of first-year students go out on a bi-weekly basis (Wednesday and weekends). Some of them moreso than others, some less. Some are more responsible in their decisions; some of them have yet to learn how to be responsible. There is no number on this-- you can choose to go out on a given evening, but I have a number of friends who will go out some evenings and decline invitations on other evenings because of homework/obligations. Duke parties, I’ve heard, can get crazy, and the party scene is fairly intense.</p>

<p>

This statement is completely false.</p>

<p>Please, when you ask questions like this, leave room for an answer. If your question is ten lines long with forty adjectives and you’ve already made up your mind, it’s clear you’re not looking for a right answer, but rather your desired answer. If your essays are full of this type of hyperbolic, doomsday language, I would suggest you look into moderating them.</p>

<p>I think the key to being socially successful at Duke is knowing what kind of person you are, and what your limits or expectations are with regards to drinking and partying. Stick to them. Don’t be ashamed of your choices, whatever they are, and you’ll be just fine at Duke.</p>

<p>You are correct that i should have emphasized more that I was only relating what I heard and that I was open to anyone coming on here to explain otherwise and to inform me that what I heard and read was totally wrong. I initially tried to do that but I did not make that clear enough, my apologies.</p>

<p>To others who want to add to this thread, I will emphasize that I am by and large relating info from studies I have read and empirical evidence I have heard from other students. And I am completely open to anyone, like purpleacorn, to let me know if all of it is totally wrong.</p>

<p>I graduated from Duke this past May, and I agree with what purpleacorn said. I had many of the same concerns you had about Duke, but there really is a niche for everyone at Duke. Yes, there are stereotypical fraternity boys and sorority girls at Duke, but the majority of students do not participate in Greek life (participation rate is 30% for the guys and 40% for the girls). Even among those who do participate (like I did), many of those in Duke fraternities and sororities do not conform to the stereotypical image (and my fraternity was nothing like the stereotypical ones). You will meet a diverse group of students in terms of geographic origins, race, socioeconomic background, interests, talents, etc. (unlike how the media portrays us), so I feel that most anyone can find their niche at Duke. You will notice privilege and sometimes elitism among the student body (I’ll be lying if I said it isn’t present), but there are a lot of chill, down-to-earth students that you don’t have to participate in this scene of privilege that characterizes some of the fraternities and sororities on campus. If you do not want this scene to be visible to you at all, I suggest also applying to Rice University, which has a residential college system and no Greek life (and is considered a “Southern Ivy” as well).</p>

<p>purplecorn’s and slick nick’s answers are excellent. I can’t imagine, emax, where such fundamentally erroneous ideas re Dike’s culture emanate – and that’s not a criticism, it’s always wise to dispel incorrect impressions – but the stereotypes delineated in your original post are simply incorrect.</p>

<p>I thought that was actually kind of a fun read. </p>

<p>But yeah, not really sure where you got that from</p>

<p>Wow… you basically copied and pasted this template into Vandy’s forum AND duke’s forum? Are you seriously tht worried about college atmospheres in tht tier? These schools are EXCELLENT… some of the best in the country. No ONE WOULD GO THERE if it was as u described. these schools do Work hard Party hard. Those stereotypical descriptions u made are not like wat people go there. People that go there are not typical movie-style nerds as u see. These colleges want a DIVERSE active community, tht means lots of different types of people. sure, vandy might be more conservative than duke, but both are still pretty liberal in terms of college atmosphere</p>