Rather depressing review of Tulane, clarify?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Tulane University
1

<p>I found this review of Tulane on a website and wanted to ask to extent is it true.
The major stereotype about Tulane is that we are both a party school and a "good" school, that partying and academics manage to coexist. We are also known for extremely slutty women and high prevalence of STD's.</p>

<p>Are the stereotypes accurate?</p>

<p>Unfortunately it seems that most of them are. There is a lot of heavy drinking, but most people seem fairly successful academically. While there are obviously exceptions, going to any traditionally Tulane bar or frat party will expose you extreme sexual callousness and depravity from both genders. Its more degrading to women, unfortunately, but guys are just as responsible, if not more so. I have heard it said that statistically we are the school with the 3rd highest rate of STD's in the whole country, but that's only hearsay.</p>

<p>The Big Picture</p>

<p>I find it impossible to separate my time at Tulane from the Hurricane. The school has changed so much since my freshman year. During my sophomore and junior years it hit an absolute low, but in all fairness i have to say it might be beginning to come out of it. The past few years led to the development on campus of a feeling my roommate and I have called "the Madness," which is a elusive combination of apathy, depression, and anti-social feeling following the Hurricane. I'm sure a lot of people got through it with alcohol, drugs, and partying, and will say they enjoyed themselves, but deep down I think everyone feels it. There has been a sinister edge to the partying that was not there before the Hurricane. The administration at Tulane is horrible. Scott Cowen's "Renewal Plan" for the university basically consisted of an organized sack of every academic program to divert resources to the Business and Medical Schools. The Engineering program was canceled outright, and most other programs are severely depleted. Finding recommendations for jobs and graduate school has been a challenge as my professors rarely stay at the school for longer than a semester. Many of us on campus feel abandoned by the school, but perhaps this is one of those things that is improving as well.</p>

<p>Tulane University Academic Life</p>

<p>Academics at Tulane are haphazard, and require a lot of personal initiative. Students rarely study, and its possible to get an A in a course while learning nothing of the material in many cases. However, there is a lot there if you put the effort in. Course offerings are similarly random, and it can take a lot of searching to find major requirements in some departments. The political science department is especially subject to these constraints. There are few professors and fewer course offerings, and most courses are taught one semester and don't reappear. Departmental support for research and career opportunities is not really there. My academic advisor rarely has anything useful to say, and basically serves as a rubber stamp for my own ideas, which can be a problem when i'm unsure of things. The education is there if you're willing to dig for it, but on the whole it seems far more difficult than it should be. In terms of reputation, resources, and departmental support, it all went the Medical and Business programs. If you don't want to be a doctor, lawyer, or MBA, there really is no academic reason to attend this school.</p>

<p>Tulane University's Student Body</p>

<p>Tulane is known for being geographically diverse. While there are far fewer local (New Orleans or Louisiana) students than you'd expect, a disproportionate amount come from the Northeast, particularly New York and Connecticut (myself included). Socio-economic status is rather high for the most part, though you will find normal people here and there, especially because Tulane is so big on financial aid. Most Tulane students seem very apathetic when it comes to political or societal issues, except for the Jewish community, which is very strong and very active. Also I have always found a real problem with gender relations on campus. The exploitative "Girls Gone Wild" culture is really pushed on a lot of people, whether they like it or not. People I've known who have tried to get involved with feminism groups or date-rape awareness campaigns have been openly ridiculed and ostracized by a large portion of the student body.</p>

<p>Tulane University Student Activities & Social Life</p>

<p>I've always found the social life at Tulane to be a missed opportunity. There is a lot of apathy regarding student groups and activities. The party culture really muscles other avenues out. A lot of people will tailgate at sporting events and then not go to the actual game. The same goes for New Orleans. There are truly incredible opportunities to explore the culture of this city that few people take advantage of. The dating scene is pretty awful as well, drunken awkward hookups being the norm. A lot of people either jump into this culture, or give up on the opposite sex quickly and avoid dating altogether. I find people keep their guard up to the degree where its almost impossible to meet and get to know someone you really care about. There are a lot of interesting and wonderful people at this school, but they seem to get beaten down or silenced by a destructive culture most of the time. You have to find people on your own, and create your own alternatives.</p>

<p>The Naked Truth</p>

<p>A lot of my responses to this survey seem negative, and I do this in the effort to be honest about the severe problems, social, administrative and academic at this school. That said, I have had a wonderful time here, and have gotten a great education. Tulane is essentially the Jungle. If you come here, you will have no support, no safety net, and this place can tear you to pieces if you're not careful. However, if you keep you're head on straight, you will find friends and be closer to them because of the challenges you face. If you dig for it, you can get a great education too. Personal responsibility is the key at Tulane, far more so than at other schools I've heard about. Survival of the Fittest. Good Luck.</p>

2

<p>Is this another ■■■■■ joke? Where did this “review” come from?</p>

3

<p>sorry if i was unclear about the source ***** dot com i assumed its a reliable source because the reviewers have pictures of themselves?</p>

4

<p>u n i g o</p>

5

<p>I went to that site just to check it out. First off, I could not find anything that had a date on it. It was impossible for me to figure out when those reviews are from. Some of them sound like they are quite old. Anyway, there are 79 reviews total. Tulane received and 8 out of 10 for all the reviews. Seems like a good number to me! You can always find a bad review if you look hard enough. There will always be some dissatisfied with Tulane and some who love Tulane. When my DD was looking at colleges, I often sought out reviews to help me help her. However, almost all the review sites made alot of the schools sound not so good. I gave up on these sites as being a good measure of a school. Take what you read with a grain of salt and go visit.</p>

6

<p>OK, I will assume by looking at your other posts that you are serious. And you seem intelligent, which makes it more surprising that you would post that. I mean if you have questions, fine, but that isn’t the way to go about it. First of all, everyone on that site is anonymous, and the pics mean nothing. I saw pics of babies and cartoon drawings, and the teenagers could be anyone. Second, I saw a ton of positive reviews on there. Why pick the worst one? Third, since there are no controls on a site like that, how do you know that person even went to Tulane? As we have seen on CC many times, there are people that flame for all sorts of reasons. Maybe they got turned down by Tulane. Maybe they got kicked out. Maybe they flunked out. Maybe they just are a bit “off” and think it is funny to post things like that on sites like that.</p>

<p>Of course there are things about Tulane that are not perfect, or even good perhaps. But that review is absurd. The odds of it being from an actual Tulane student are pretty small. “A sinister edge to the partying”??? That is a hysterically bad line. Wait until you are in college, you will see how bizarre that line is. Also funny is that they say it is so horrible, yet they enjoyed it so much.</p>

<p>There are numerous factual errors a real Tulane student would have known better. The engineering program was not canceled outright, it was reduced to Chemical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering. They got rid of civil, mechanical and electrical. Kept 2, got rid of 3. The lines about feminism and date-rape awareness are equally ridiculous, Tulane has been strong in those areas for some time. I won’t waste time refuting every point, I just find it disappointing you could read this and think it has any credibility, it is so clearly over the top. It is also distressing you focused on this one when there were so many on that same site that said exactly the opposite.</p>

7

<p>Sorry that probably was not the best way to express concern over Tulane and I understand there are several positive reviews on that website, however, as disturbing as it may be, I find that people typically tend to be more affected by negative comments than the positive ones. I am glad however that you were able to refute some of what was said in that review and that it may not even be a legitimate source to use. I was just a little bit worried.</p>

8

<p>I might have been a bit hard on you as well. After all, this will be a major decision for you and naturally you want everything to be perfect. I think I was really just peeved at the review itself. There are a few like this every year where people exaggerate things about Tulane for no discernible reason. Take the partying for instance. Every school has a lot of drinking and sex. It is college. Every school also has a lot of people that choose not to drink or drink very little, and to be much more selective in their sexual activity. Both groups of people have wonderful opportunities and report being very happy at Tulane. Some even report that a smaller percentage of Tulane students drink heavily because there is so much else to do in New Orleans as compared to a rural college. I don’t know if that is a fact, but it makes a lot of sense. The thing about STD’s is another idiotic absurdity.</p>

<p>Probably the absolute stupidest thing said on that review are the statements about apathy, lack of involvement, etc. Tulane is considered one of the most involved student bodies in the country. There has been a ton of publicity about this. Calling Tulane people anti-social is like saying that the Pope is not very religious. It is the exact opposite of their reputation.</p>

<p>The geographic diversity statement is also silly. Tulane lumps all of New England and the mid-Atlantic, including Pennsylvania and NJ, into one region (Northeast) so it looks like there are a lot of students from there. But NJ is not a lot like Mass or NH, in general. So if you assume New England is about half the Northeast and the mid-Atlantic is the other half and then look at the overall breakdown, it is:</p>

<p>Florida - 4.5%
Louisiana - 16%
Midsouth - 3%
Midwest - 15.5%
New England - 16.5%
Mid-Atlantic - 16.5%
Southeast - 9.7%
Texas - 7%
West - 11%</p>

<p>Looks reasonably diverse to me.</p>

<p>To say that people don’t take advantage of New Orleans is another laughable statement. I mean it is nuts. Sure, one could argue there is always more to get out of a city, but that would be true anywhere. People have a lot to do between school, clubs, sports, whatever. But New Orleans is not huge like NYC. It is accessible, and besides the obvious areas like the French Quarter and immediately surrounding area, students take advantage of Magazine Street, and of course the Uptown area where Tulane is located. In addition, Tulane students are involved in many areas of the city that would normally not be places they would go. Tulane requires two semesters of “service learning” courses, and many students volunteer beyond that.</p>

<p>The ranting about there being few professors, few course offerings, and the professors not staying is easily refuted by looking at the faculty list, the course offerings, and the professors’ bios. It is true that some faculty did not come back after Katrina, but it was hardly the disaster painted by this person. It is rather inconsistent that the person claims Tulane has no money for programs but is so generous with financial aid. In fact, while for the weeks immediately following Katrina there was a lot of doubt as to how things would go or if Tulane would even survive, once the situation became clearer and Tulane started up again that January, people realized Tulane would in fact bounce back. It took some hard decisions and sacrifice, but Tulane’s endowment still hit $1 billion shortly thereafter (like all schools, it went down with the market a year or so later, but it is still very strong) and the school was stable financially. In short, Tulane has actually thrived since Katrina.</p>

<p>Clearly that review is at least a couple years old, since Katrina was 5 years ago and it sound like it was written about 3 years after. It is impossible to know the motives of the poster, but as I hope I have shown it is riddled with factual errors and posits opinions contrary to those held by almost everyone else. Again, this is not to say that Tulane is perfect. It isn’t, and besides what is great for one person may not be at all to the liking of another. I hope that if Tulane is on your radar screen at all (which I assume it is or you wouldn’t have bothered with any of this), that you will visit and see for yourself.</p>