<p>So along with my acceptance to RPI came a good sum of money. Enough to make me and my parents consider it as a top school for me. With RPI's excellent engineering rep, it seems like a perfect fit- </p>
<p>BUT it's a tech school. As someone who enjoys going out during the weekends, and having a good time with friends and such, I'm scared about the social life. I don't want to feel like I'm surrounded by nerds basically. I visited, but in the summer, so I really didn't get a feel for the student body. But can anyone give me the 101 on RPI's social life?</p>
<p>Yeah would totally have to agree with you engineering gal....not muh for the nerd life! Im pretty much a socializer as opposed to well...most of the pri students!</p>
<p>a lot of people here are friendly and party, socialize, date, etc. there aren't many girls here so a lot of guys date girls from other schools.</p>
<p>there are also people whose lives consist of studying, studying, studying, and studying. there are a lot of "geeks" here. of course there is a lot of middle ground and some people find happy mediums.</p>
<p>in terms of social EVENTS, there's plenty. they have movie nights, shows/plays, lots of clubs, fraternity/sorority events, parties, and you'll see ads all over campus for tons of random social events. plus your e-mail gets flooded with invitations to such events, a downside of being at the "most connected" college in the United States.</p>
<p>at any college, freshmen are realizing their new freedom so the freshman class is probably the most sociable and parties the most. but most of them mature.</p>
<p>let me know if you have any specific questions about the social life or my response or anything about RPI!</p>
<p>This is an accurate assessment by Dan. My son is a freshman at RPI and his assessment is that there are a lot of kids who study study study, and more than a handful of nerds. He is in NROTC though, and has joined a fraternity, so his social situation is acceptable...girl to boy ratio is not to his liking...he came from a town with an oversupply of trophy wives and therefore, cute daughters, so RPI was a bit of a culture shock for him. Full disclosure though, he is trying to transfer to GW (got in GW last year, but didn't get an NROTC spot until too late to change)...he switched out of engineering, so if you're not in engineering, then the liberal arts options are fairly limited at RPI. One more thing, even though he's from New England, he got tired of the upstate NY winter pretty quickly....all that said, and even though he's made up his mind to transfer, he's starting to have mixed feelings b/c he's made a lot of good friends at RPI.</p>
<p>zespri, it's funny that you agree with my assessment because, like your son, I am transferring out of RPI too, and the people are part of the reason. I am going to UConn this fall. Like your son I was accepted there last year but ended up here. However, I disagree with the lack of options besides engineering. That is one thing I appreciated about RPI's academics: the options. Off the top of my head, the programs they have besides engineering are: management, architecture, physics, biology, chemistry, mathematics, psychology, computer science, various electronic arts programs, information technology, philosophy, economics, and communications.</p>
<p>He really likes the NROTC.....since he was considering transferring...we gave him the option to make a clean break altogether...that meant if he didn't really like NROTC, that he didn't have to continue. But out of everything, he really enjoyed NROTC, and more so as the year went on. He's pretty committed to the Navy. He's trying to get his younger sister (HS Jr) to consider it, she's still waiting to hear back from NASS, which my son went to and it led him to want the Navy..didn't get into the Naval Academy, but got into NROTC. Lt Chuma is his advisor/CO and is a good man. He's been great and very helpful.</p>
<p>If his transfer doesn't go through for next fall, he'll stay at RPI and switch his major to philosophy. He was disappointed this spring b/c the only elective that he really wanted to get into (english lit) and was really looking forward to, but didn't get into. I've looked through GW's course list for liberal arts, poli sci, phil., etc. and there's no comparison as far as the number of courses available. I just saw pics from his frat. formal this past weekend and he looked like he was having a great time. :) We visited GW and he really liked the fit there. I went to UConn, nice school (hope that the UConn dairy bar is still going), was a suitcase campus (empty on weekends), but that has probably changed by now. I drove thru the campus a few years back and almost didn't recognize it with all the new buildings....</p>
<p>My son has tried to get in touch with the RPI NROTC office; but he has not gotten a return call yet. He wants to see if there is room for him in the unit, as his scholarship is assigned elsewhere. At this point, I think would like to transfer his scholarship there. As per some advice he had gotten at RPI, he didn't put RPI at the top of his NROTC list since he wasn't sure he would get in. Boy, what a pleasant surprise to get that blaring music when checking the status page of admissions when they posted their decisions!</p>
<p>Interesting: GW was the first college, other than USNA we visited. My son did not want an urban atmosphere. The NRTOC officer we talked with there (a USNA grad) was extremely helpful, and we really got a handle on the scholarship process last May. GW was offering room and board for engineering students going into ROTC, a way of building the engineering program there.</p>
<p>GW is the MOST expensive university in the nation right now!</p>
<p>It could just be me who thinks not-so-highly of the people at RPI so I don't want to make some statements, that only I think, that will end up stopping people from coming to RPI when it could have potentially been a good match! I just think the people here aren't open about things. They're not the type of people you can say "I can talk to him/her about anything!" The friendships are based on shallow gossipy conversations and it just bugs me. I consider that immature and it just seems to me like the people here don't see the big picture.</p>
<p>Hi, I'm a sophomore Physics Major at RPI, I thought I would just weigh in: </p>
<p>I would say there are enough people here that you can find a small group of friends who like to do things you do fairly easily. The overall culture of the school is nerdy of course. People here spend a lot of time online, studying and playing video games. But it is worth noting there is a large split divide between the off-campus and on campus cultures. A lot of the people that want to party and hang out with friends a lot join fraternities or sororities. </p>
<p>Now about the ratio: it does create a lot of tension, and I do consider it one of RPI's greatest problems. However, I will note that in general a ratio is the cost of attending a sci/tech school (apart from MIT). Also, they are trying to improve the ratio, this year's class had a ratio of 1/3 (up from 1/4) and it should be the same or a little better this year. Finally, it is usually noted that a lot of guys just play video games, so chances are at a lot of social events (other than video game ones) the ratio will normalize. Many girls are "taken" however... There is also a girls school less then half a mile away (Russel Sage) however I do not know anyone who has ever gone there, let alone picked up a date there however dsilva seems to point out otherwise, which is probably correct. </p>
<p>Note: as a guy my view on this is biased, I suppose. I am not sure what most girls think about the ratio, a few I know seem to really like it, others seem irritated by it. </p>
<p>I also went to a dance party in Troy recently (a very unusual occasion for me), and there were a lot of girls there from all over.</p>
<p>My S is considering RPI but is concerned about it being too techie. He is really interested in outdoor activities-hiking, skiing, rock climbing. Does anyone know folks who do this instead of playing computer games? I know these clubs exist and think overall the school is a good match for him but he's trying to decide if Lafayette might be a better match for engineering for him. Any insight appreciated-I've been a lurker for quite some time!</p>
<p>Troy is between the Adirondack Mountains to the northwest, Lake Champlain to the north the Berkshire Mountains to the west, the Catskill Mountains to the south west and the upper Hudson River. The Adirondacks I believe is the largest state park on the mainland U.S. The school takes advantage of this and helps you exprience every thing you described during your first week at school with their "First Year Experience" program. (except winter activities, obviously). There are definately plenty of students doing these activities.</p>
<p>pcpeacock-- Hi, I'm a sophomore RPI student. A lot of my suitemates are very involved with the RPI Outdoors club, which sponsors outdoor activities just about every weekend. In the fall their trips were geared towards warmer-weather activities like camping, hiking, rock climbing, kayaking, etc., whereas during the winter months they did a lot of skiing (downhill and cross-country), snowshoeing, winter hiking / camping, and other activities. They also have mid-week events, such as today where they were practicing kayaking skills in one of the on-campus pools. The outdoors club is pretty well funded, and has a "Pit" in the basement of the athletic center where they lend out various outdoors equipment. Most weekends, my suitemates are away doing something with outdoors club early on Saturday, but are usually back between 8-10pm, unless it's an overnight trip. They really seem to like everything they're doing with the club... I believe a lot of the equipment they use is owned by RPI and is free to borrow. RPI also has a ski / snowboarding club, but I haven't had much experience with it.
That's not to say they don't play videogames (most everyone plays some sort of videogame on a semi-regular basis) or do technically-oriented things (most of my suitemates are computer/electrical engineers), but there's definitely other things to do on campus.</p>
<p>Feel free to PM me if you have any questions!</p>
<p>Aceera2001-- I'm not sure what dsilva's talking about. I transferred here from a small liberal arts college in the region, and the friends and conversations I've had at RPI are entirely more real and relevant than any ones I ever had at my other school. In my experience, RPI students are much more friendly and understanding, and more willing to have "deep" discussions than my previous college. dsilva may have a slight grudge against RPI as a former student (dsilva, Julia, DMV and Liz would not be happy to hear that you didn't like having them as friends), but hopefully you're liking it better whereever you are now. There definitely is a good share of socially inept nerds and/or students who don't speak english, but there is also a good smattering of normal, friendly college students who can talk about both "normal" topics as well as serious topics and "geekier" things. I didn't have very many close friends at my old college, I do at RPI.</p>
<p>My d has made some wonderful, caring friends. She has brought some home on breaks and has gone home with them on breaks. She is a sophmore and finding good friends has not been an issue.</p>
<p>hey NBinks...I take it you know me? Who are you? Well I don't have a grudge against RPI, and I'm actually still here so you obviously don't know me too well. But I was glad to have DMV and Liz as friends...just so you know. And Julia...well she blatantly ignores me every time I say something to her so I obviously don't consider her a friend. Let me know who you are NBinks!</p>