Hey guys,
I really like the common core found from Columbia and the directed studies at Yale. At Stanford, I liked the STEM focus (makes me feel at home) but also was interested in Structured Liberal Education (SLE).
As a prospective STEM major, I’m wondering if I will be the odd one out with the super humanities students. I have an interest in humanities and want somewhat of a liberal arts education because I don’t think my high school prepared me enough… however, I would not say that I’m a super heavy humanities person.
Also, are the SLE students generally isolated?
You would probably be fine - it’s not uncommon for STEM majors to try SLE. The ones I’ve known who have done it have never mentioned feeling like the odd one out. As long as you’re deeply interested in a liberal arts education it should be fine.
SLE kids seem a bit more isolated but not necessarily in a bad way. I always got the sense that they have a tighter community with each other than the standard freshman dorm, it’s just that they’re less tight with other dorms (vs. all frosh dorms which interact with each other more). If you’re in SLE the stereotype is that most your friends freshman year will be SLE kids. If you’re in an all frosh (or even standard 4 class dorm) there’s less of that stereotype.