<p>My son just returned from a long trip visiting three schools （H,Y,S). He did not go to the admit weekend at Harvard. He visited there and stayed with a wonderful host during the stormy days.</p>
<p>The kids at H gave him a very good impression, particularly intellectually. They are outgoing and smart. However, a few students he met at H told him that making friends at H seems a bit difficult. Usually, kids have a small circle of friends and they do things together. This is a huge concern for him. My son likes to meet different people besides being challenged academically. After H, he visited Y and S, Y has the friendliest kids. Even though he knows H and S have stronger programs in his intended major, he is leaning to Y after the visits. </p>
<p>Is it true that kids at H seem less sociable because of its competitiveness?</p>
<p>My S is not the super-social or super-friendly kind, so I may not be the best person to comment on the social scene in general. It is true that Harvard does not have a campus-wide social scene, but that does not seem to bother my S. He has several overlapping circles of friends, and none is based on competitiveness.<br>
He is very good friends with members of his blocking group (from his freshman suite and the kids across the hall). They'll stay together for the rest of their time at Harvard. He also made good friends with kids from his freshman math class and is in two study groups with those who are now taking the same classes as he is. Some of his roommates are also taking other classes with him and they study together. The study groups are intended for the students to help one another, not to compete.
S also has a few ECs that draw students from different dorms/houses, classes and interests. And of course, he has gotten to know friends of friends. They sound quite different in their academic and non-academic interests, and my S sounds quite happy.</p>
<p>I totally agree with marite. It seems that though my best friends are all in my blocking group (which would be expected), I definitely have various circles of friends whether they're from my seminar, intramural sports, my latin heritage club, etc. Though I have to admit, though my blocking group is particularly diverse, I find that many Harvard students, though very social, tend to stick with their own ethnic groups, athletic teams, etc. which can often make it difficult for those on the outside to break through, but in reality, is this much different from high school? or even the real world? But I would never say that H students are less sociable because of the competitiveness.</p>
<p>Harvard social scene is what you make of it, as is everything else at the University. If you're someone who doesn't want to go out and make an effort, no one's going to come to your door begging to be your friend, but beyond that I've never heard anyone say they didn't have enough friends. </p>
<p>Best thing for a freshman to do is get involved in an organization. Comp the Crimson, try out for an a cappella group, play a sport, join a comedy group, try Kendo, just do something. Even if you pick a group which is competitive enough that you get cut you'll still make a lot of new friends in the process of trying out. And if you make it in you automatically have a group of kids to hand out with.</p>
<p>Additionally, Annenberg itself is set up to facilitate socializing. It's the freshman dining hall, meaning all the froshies eat there but no upperclassmen do. What this means is that from day 1 you get a chance to meet new people just by sitting at a random table, and that you continue to meet new people at meal times throughout the semester. Annenberg actually becomes something of a social phenomenon b/c people will go there and stay for hours running into friends they don't see that much and catch up.</p>
<p>My D, a freshman, is in social life heaven. She's inclined to join everything possible, which I'm sure helps. But she's also not that into the partying scene, favoring small groups of friends who go out together to do "neat things." H seems to be the world epicenter of "neat things," as far as clever, creative, interesting young adults go, and that's what's been her favorite aspect of the H experience.</p>
<p>@zzzz... I think that this is an issue which has been expressed best by the current students themselves. Yale ranks in the top 10 universities with the "Happiest Students". Unfortunately, Harvard does not make it. Harvard, on the other hand, is the only ivy that ranks in the top 10 of "Their Students Never Stop Studying". I'd say your son's overall impression is accurate.</p>
<p>I would be reluctant to go with anecdotal impressions from here. No one's S or D happen to be a representative sample of the overall "feeling" . Rationalization is rampant in CC, as you can see.</p>
<p>Harvard is a very extracurricular-based school. Many of your friends will be people who share common and similar interests with you, and that usually means members of the same group. While I'm not implying that everyone that is part of an organization will be "buddy, buddy,"--which is probably true of any organization--you will find that most of your friends do and pursue the same activities you do. </p>
<p>Harvard doesn't have official frats or sororities, so the ECs and a small final clubs/unrecognized frats scene make up for it.</p>
<p>What h-bomber and gadad says are true; though I can't say much about Annenberg as I've never experienced the joys of freshman year here.</p>
<p>I don't think the survey results MovieBuff cites are any more valid than the anectodal evidence you're finding here. At least with the information people are providing here, you can ask follow up questions and get clarification of answers. </p>
<p>For my own anectodal evidence, my D is having a wonderful experience as a Harvard freshman. She has lots of friends -- from her dorm, her ECs, her pre-orientation camping trip, her classes, Annenberg, and through friends of friends. She has a racially, ethnically, politically, geographically, socio-economically and academically varied assortment of friends. Honestly, she would not have time for more friends than she has, and in my view, has a bit too much of a social life. She has found it incredibly easy to make friends there. </p>
<p>Do she and her friends study a lot? Yes, but certainly not to the exclusion of an ample social life and a very time consuming extra-curricular activity. And she works in study groups to do math and economics problem sets. I have asked her directly about her sense of competition among her fellow students, and she says she has no idea who's getting what grades and that everyone is extremely happy to help others out with notes from missed classes or just taking the time to help one another figure out a difficult problem.</p>
<p>zzzz-Wish your son could have attended Prefrosh weekend at Harvard. </p>
<p>If his Yale visit was to Bulldog days, that's not really a fair comparison, as both schools tend to pull out all the stops/throw all the parties/etc for the visiting students.</p>
<p>zzzz, my DD attended both the Yale Bulldog days and the Harvard Prefrosh weekend. Additionally, she visited Stanford a week before Bulldog days.
Her perception is that all three schools are very different socially. </p>
<p>She, too, said that Yale kids seemed to be friendlier and she saw less self-segregation (e.g. groups of students of the same ethnic group seated together in the cafeteria) than at Harvard. This is not to say that Harvard did not have friendly students, but the feel was different. As an aside, one of the things that she really appreciated about Harvard was the apparent large involvement of students in volunteer activities in the local community.</p>
<p>Stanford, on the other hand, was very "chill", to use her words, and the students were very friendly.</p>