Social Scene at UChicago?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Chicago ✅
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https://www.1843magazine.com/features/the-long-march-from-china-to-the-ivies

This may be true on average, but it doesn’t necessarily mean the students in question are a monolithic bunch. Someone posted this article in the UChicago FB group a day or two back. Anecdotal evidence is what it is, but I figured I’d share it.

One of the students was admitted to UChicago, and seems to fit the school’s profile quite closely. Her chief motivation in going to the US was an aversion to the conformity of the Chinese system, and she’s challenged it in a number of ways. Someone who acts differently in an environment where sameness is encouraged (and who also, it should be noted, steered well clear of educational consultants who offered to write essays, recommendations, etc.) is taking a big step - arguably a greater leap of faith than a “quirky” student in San Francisco. Those are the kids you want on campus.

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@JHS,

Thanks for the useful commentary. Note, I mentioned a couple times that I feel ambivalent about social life at Chicago. There were elements of my social life at Chicago that I really enjoyed, and elements that I didn’t. At least for my cohort, that’s what made Chicago the type of institution it was: a place that naturally led to opinions, sometimes strong opinions. No one just breezed through. I enjoyed being able to join pretty much any club I wanted, with no pressure and no judgment, but I lamented not knowing where to go if I wanted to hang at a nearby sports bar to watch college football on a Saturday afternoon. (Are there more clubs/bars either on or a stone’s throw from campus these days? I hope so!)

This being stated, it’s interesting how you describe your kids - one sounds like a “classic” Chicago type (interested in strategy games, into Scav, etc.). The other, as you state openly, sounds a bit like a hipster.

From my experience, these two groups (hipsters and the more quirky/nerdy type) were by far the most well represented types of students on Chicago’s campus. While we can quibble on terms, there were plenty of hipster/bohemian types at Chicago in my day, and loads of kids interested in strategy games, scav, etc.

It wasn’t until I came to Penn that I came across serious athletes, really preppy types, sons/daughters of tycoons just there for the degree, and, unfortunately for me, a significantly more diverse campus (racially/ethnically) than what existed at Chicago in 1994.

(This is not to say I found Penn to be some sort of paradise - it has some serious, serious problems that unfortunately only seem to be getting worse on campus. I did think it was greatly more diverse than what I saw at Chicago, though.)

If you’re either quirky or leaning hipster, Chicago was a great place then, and continues to be. I don’t know if it’s as welcoming to the wide, wide range of student types out there, and that’s part of my ambivalence about Chicago’s social scene. If you’re a certain type of student, Chicago is paradise. However, as a medium sized college, I felt the array of sub groups should have been broader.

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@VeryLuckyParent

While I agree the composition of the student body has changed (somewhat), and the racial/ethnic composition of the class has certainly changed, I’m unsure if the social experience is that different than when I attended, at least in posts present in this thread. I DO think the social experience has gotten better and a bit more varied, and some Chicago initiatives have helped on this front (having an institute on politics, a broader range of clubs, etc.).

Also, I agree that more students have pre-professional bents.

How has all this, though, changed the general social experience at the school? Frats/apt parties, city exploring, and “nerdy” pursuits (strategy games, scav-like activities, etc.) probably form the bulk of social life. Exams and midterms on a quarter system still lead to a packed calendar and quiet nights. The libraries are probably still central hubs for informal social activity/interaction - more so than at many other colleges. Pre-professional students might be studying for different reasons than those in my cohort, but how are they changing the social experience at the school?

Further, as Chicago’s SAT band narrows and grows ever higher, I’m unsure if the diversity you talk about reflects broad changes in what students do, socially, on campus. I’m not sure why more serious athletes, more legacies just present to stamp their ticket, or any of those sorts of students would suddenly attend. Certainly, I don’t think they’re coming in huge numbers. The numbers bear this out too - Chicago has one of the narrowest, highest SAT bands in the nation, along with Caltech and MIT.

Additionally, I don’t know if the infrastructure has changed that much. I’m not sure there are more bars/clubs/restaurants within a stone’s throw of campus, and getting to anywhere else in Chicago besides the near South Side and the south end of the Magnificent Mile still takes a good deal of time. Combine this with cold weather and long winters, and a certain amount of dreariness can appear.

Again, I don’t say all this to disparage Chicago’s social scene. It really is paradise for some, and many are perfectly happy with the social aspect of their lives. I was just surprised when I visited other campuses, and thought there was so much to do ON campus (and, for urban areas, a lot of easily accessible activities off campus too).

I’m not sure how much of this has changed. It’s moderated a bit, I believe that, but it’s far from being a school that can appeal to a broad base. The lure of the USNWR, though, and the declining ability of students to be accepted at a range of top schools, probably adds to the lure.

(I should add @JHS - I have a close relative who attends Yale, and I think Chicago’s goal should be to become a kind of Yale/Columbia hybrid. After seeing my relative’s experience at Yale, it very much stood as what I hoped Chicago should be. Academically, the schools are comparable, but in terms of the attention and care paid to other facets of life, it’s not close. The outlets and opportunities for Yale students outside the classroom - both in terms of social opps and extra-curricular opps, greatly outmatch anything Chicago offers. Further, students come to a Yale for a wide variety of reasons. Some are intensely academic and focused, others got in primarily because of crew or squash or baseball, and still others are the scions of the rich and powerful. If Chicago could tap some of that, and, along with Columbia, maintain it’s presence as a core-focused school in a world-class city, then we’d be talking.)

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Cue7’s vision of what he thinks the U. of C. should be is very disheartening to me. When I was a student we laughed at any thought that we should be like Yale or Northwestern or Penn for god’s sake. That sort of talk was what you expected from the deep plotters within the administration. Chicago was a unique sort of place. Seems like it still is. Let the partiers go party at less serious schools! Let the athletes throw their javelins and put their shots. Let the rich kids swan about. I’m not impressed by any of that and, come to think of it, not by the U.S. News rankings nor by appeals to the cosseted privileged life of fun which is held up as a sine qua non of college experience. How about a little sturm und drang, how about a little suffering and introspection and pondering of the big questions? Many of us came up to Chicago because we wanted to put an end to a prolonged adolescence and do exactly these things - and find a community of others similarly inclined. The frivolous things have their appeal, and it’s a free country. But why can’t there be at least one institution that privileges the serious things, the lasting things? Why must we all aspire to the condition of Harvard-Yale-Princeton? So go to these places or go to Northwestern and Penn and party it up if so inclined! It’s a free country. But don’t go near the U. of C. The frivolous things don’t last. You will have squandered the precious few years allotted to you to start to understand the real world that exists outside the stereotypical bubble of college life.

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@Cue7

My point is that fifteen years ago the kids coming to Chicago were very different from the kids coming to Chicago today. The kids coming to Chicago today could be easily seen in any other selective campus, hence their interests and tastes are not that different from students at other schools. Racial/social/ethnic and other demographic changes affects the social scene on campus.

Actually this may not be true anymore, primarily because of new ways of getting around like Zipcar. You pay $8/hr and hop into a car and drive downtown with a few friends. Come back and leave the car at the designated spot. There is also Uber and Lyft now that were not available before. These ways of getting around were unheard off two decades ago. You had to take the train, or the CTA or have a car. No longer true. And the city offers quite a bit of options for socializing. My son plans to use Zipcar a lot.

Now this is a good point. This is one significant way that UChicago differs from some of its peers, although Dartmouth, Stanford and Northwestern are also quarter based systems if I recall correctly. The semester system moves a lot slower. This does contribute to a certain kind of academic stress among students

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Re Nerdville, changing demographics, comparisons to Penn.

Just a small sample, but the kids from my daughter’s east coast private school who are interested in Chicago are very different from the kids who are interested in Penn. Each group/type seems pretty consistent from year to year. Zero overlap. Almost antagonistic cultures. But the same “demographic” if all you’re looking at is SES and SATs.

Basically, Nerdville can get more diverse and still be Nerdville. Or, to put it another way, intellectual kids come in all sorts of flavors and from lots of different backgrounds. And they tend to be different from (rather than representative of) their HS classmates.

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You guys are selling Penn short. Penn has plenty of intellectual nerds and intellectual hipsters, too. They are a subculture there, not the dominant strain, but there were plenty of them among my kids’ combined 40 or 50 classmates and friends who went there. They were there because they didn’t want to go far from home, or because they got the best financial aid there, or because it was the best place that accepted them, or even because they really loved it and wanted to go there more than anywhere.

The Penn admissions staff doesn’t sit around trying to pick the most bro-ish class possible. They are happy to admit UChicago types, and do. Chicago may have a bigger concentration of them than other colleges, but you can find kids just like the ones at UChicago everywhere.

Even Northwestern. In her first job, my daughter met a guy who had graduated from Northwestern the same year she graduated from Chicago. They were like identical twins, He grew up and went to school five or six miles from our house (and a long way from Chicago). The two of them knew dozens of people from home in common, and had been in the same summer program in high school (but never met). Their academic interests were identical; they had both written senior theses on modernist poetry of the 1920s. He had loved Northwestern, and had never considered applying to Chicago, because it seemed too nerdy. She had never considered applying to Northwestern, because, well, it seemed like the Chicago version of Penn.

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I agree with JHS - others are selling Penn short.

This being said, let’s turn the question around - while the dominant strains at Chicago may be nerdy/quirky/hipster - are there subcultures of preppy, or serious athletes (where athletics is one of their main pursuits), or students who are there just because their parents are tycoons/politicians/in channels of power? What frat at Chicago is known for having the senators’ sons, or the dance group that attracts the Talented hip hop artists that were drawn to the school precisely because of this group? When I was at Chicago, there really weren’t any of these subcultures present, although they seemed to exist at other top colleges.

Those more reaching questions aside, I present some scenarios for current students to answer. The below are what I think should exist at any college - and can exist whether the school is a bastion for serious thought (as Marlowe suggests) or is utterly practical/pre-professional.

1.) it’s 1am on a Tuesday and I want to go out for pizza with some friends. What are some places within a 5-10 minute walk from campus that are open?

2.) it’s 11pm on a Friday and I want to a glass of wine. I’m a fourth year who is 21+. What are some options that are a short (10 minute) walk away - where I can meet up with friends and probably run into others I know?

3.) it’s 1pm on Saturday and I want to watch college football and grab lunch. What are some sports lounges/bars I could go to for this that are close to me (again, let’s say about 10 minutes away walking)? (I’m 21+)

4.) it’s winter quarter and it’s cold. I want to stay indoors and on campus. What’s a student group event or sports team that draws a lot of students, and even sees alums coming back for shows/games? What are the marquee student groups and teams that are a draw for students and alums at Chicago? At Penn, the basketball team gets thousands of students/alums to come for games. Certain a Capella groups are also popular - like penn masala or the glee club. Mask and wig put on a big comedy show that draws in alums. Basketball is growing now at Harvard and Yale. Yale has the whiffenpoofs and lots of other signature events (h-y football game etc). Ice hockey is big at Cornell and Dartmouth.

Those are all perfectly reasonable activities at most college campuses. How do they unfold at Chicago? When I was there, at least, it was hard to do any of the above.

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  1. Right now, I happen to know two families with kids at Chicago. One has a net worth well into nine figures, the other merely mid-eight. You would never, ever guess it from the kids,though. (The kid from the really wealthy family may well have no idea how wealthy the family is, except for knowing the grandfather's name is on a few buildings back home.) My kids had four very wealthy friends. My kids knew about three of them, one because his family lived in Chicago, another because, well, it was obvious, and the third because they had grown up together. The fourth my kids had no idea about. All but one of them would have presented as super-typical Chicago students -- mathy econ/IR majors and a Latin poetry geek who took Akkadian and Middle Egyptian, too. The exception was a hipster fine arts major, but a very intellectual hipster fine arts major. In other words, there are some very rich kids at Chicago, but not so many very rich kids who come off as frivolous and entitled. There's little or no culture of flaunting your wealth (unlike Penn), so you don't have the feeling that you are constantly in the presence of rich kids.
  2. I knew two athletes at Chicago (since graduated) who were Division I recruits, one in football and one in baseball. They came to Chicago because they decided that's the kind of education they wanted, much to the surprise of both sets of parents. The football player actually hated it and thought he had made a mistake, but stayed to graduate nevertheless. He had some friends at nationally prominent programs, and he envied their lives. The baseball player pretty much loved everything about Chicago. His father really wanted him to try pro ball -- he might have had a shot -- but he wanted a career in finance, and got it.
  3. I am pretty sure you can get pizza somewhere near campus at 1 am, and Valois is open 24-7. Its charm escapes me, but it's very popular with kids who are up late. I think there's a bar on campus, other than Jimmy's Woodlawn, but I'm not positive. There are a few places in downtown Hyde Park, closer to the lake (which is probably close to where you live if you are a 21+ fourth year who goes to wine bars).

Come to think of it, there is probably a sports bar, somewhere, because my daughter’s housemate fourth year at one point drew a cartoon of the two of them at a bar watching an Oregon football game on a big screen TV. Neither of them would have traveled any distance to watch a football game; the roommate’s utter ignorance of football was the point of the cartoon. So there must have been a bar near their apartment with a big screen TV.

But, yeah, it’s no secret that Hyde Park itself lacks amenities compared to practically anywhere.

  1. University Theater is very active; there are often multiple shows competing with one another, including a pretty successful improv troupe that gets some draw from outside the undergraduate population. There's a professional repertory theater on campus, too; it's not the Yale Rep, but it draws people from outside the university. There are any number of musical groups, including a cappella, choirs, an orchestra, chamber groups. I don't know how many alumni come back for them, but they are popular with students.

I think there is a persistent minority of students who want to get excited about sports, and who try to turn out for football and men and women’s basketball. They have a mascot in a funny costume and everything. Again, it’s not the Palestra (but the Palestra isn’t full anymore for Penn games; they have been pathetic for several years).

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@JHS

I’ll address your other points further below, but much of what you said supports my position that the social climate at Chicago, for some reason, is tamped down. For instance, you said: “But, yeah, it’s no secret that Hyde Park itself lacks amenities compared to practically anywhere.”

That sums up what boggles me about the area immediately surrounding the University. UChicago isn’t a small, quaint college - it’s a medium-sized, national university, with thousands of students living either on or a few blocks from campus. Despite this, on a recent Google search I did, I couldn’t find a nearby pizza place that’s open at 1am on a FRIDAY, let alone a Tuesday or Wednesday. Further, there’s only one near-campus bar (Jimmy’s), serving such a large number of people, from what I can tell.

Why aren’t there a few bars or late night eateries located steps away from campus? Yes, there’s Valois Cafe (and some other little diner near Valois) - but those are about 2 miles from campus. Do Chicago students not want to eat (or drink) late, in contrast to their peers at Penn or Yale or Michigan? On this note, the student body is considerably LARGER than it was in my day, yet I can’t find any new late night eateries/bars/lounges that have opened up very close to campus in literally the past 20 years. This is unbelievable to me.

While I couldn’t find a restaurant open at 1am on Friday near campus, you want to know what is open late on Friday? The library.

Now, JHS, re your other points:

  1. Rich kids at Chicago - you said you know a few, and they were all "classic" Chicago types - Latin poetry geeks, mathy econ majors, etc. This is exactly my point, and apologies for not making it clear earlier. I'm less concerned with the actual backgrounds (wealthy/less privileged, coming from power or not) of the students, and more interested with their REASONS for being at Chicago. At other schools I visited/know, students were there for many reasons. At some schools similar to Chicago (Yale comes to mind), many where there primarily for the academic opportunities. There were others who were materially ambitious, and felt that the college was a great stepping stone to that. Still others (perhaps some who came from underprivileged backgrounds) who truly wanted to change the world, and an elite college degree was a credential that offered credibility. Others were elite athletes who were drawn to the high level sports. Still others saw it as a type of elite finishing school - a ticket to stamp to continue their journey of privilege. There was a range.

What you describe, JHS, is what I saw at Chicago. Sure, there were a few outliers, but the reason the vast bulk of the students came to Hyde Park was for the academics. It led to homogeneity in the student body - I didn’t see much diversity in what students were trying to do while attaining their Chicago degree. Don’t get me wrong, Chicago places well in the Peace Corps and Teach for America and JP Morgan. For as many students in my day who went for those types of options, there were loads of kids who essentially treated college like a book club. This can be wonderful, but this can also be fatiguing.

  1. I highly doubt that elite athletes can form anything close to a subculture at Chicago. There may be a handful, but that hardly constitutes a meaningful subset of students. Maybe it's improved now, but in my day, the sports games resembled the affairs at mediocre sports high schools. I doubt now that I'd ever want to take my kids to a Chicago sports event - it wasn't part of my experience at Chicago and, given the attendance stats I looked up, it doesn't look like it's a meaningful part of most current students' lives, either.
  2. I responded to at the top, and expressed my disbelief at how little has changed immediately surrounding a campus that is growing steadily.
  3. I'd describe a handful of Chicago student clubs as "good," and there were some events that were fun to go to in college. UT was solid, and DOC films was good to have on campus. There was an improv comedy group I liked, and the Asian students put on a nice cultural show in the winter. The orchestra was nice too, and almost anyone could join - it wasn't selective. By spring quarter first year, though, I had basically found the 6-7 groups/clubs that would hold my interest, and there wasn't much new to discover for the next three years.

I was rarely wowed by the events, and there’s certainly nothing (besides mock classes) that I’d seek out as an alum, or that I’d try and attend with my kids. I doubt that Michigan or Duke or Penn or Yale alums feel the same way. Penn alums often bring their kids to the Palestra for a game, and Yale alums will go out of their way to hear the Whiffenpoofs sing. Further, alumni will go back for club reunions, and these clubs have their own little mini alumni networks. I’m not sure if many (if any) Chicago clubs have these sorts of entrenched roots.

Again, I don’t mean to deride Chicago’s social scene completely. There were some great elements about it - especially because no one judged what you chose to do for fun, and virtually every club was not selective. You could be a part of whatever you wanted. At the same time, the whole climate seemed a bit tepid and tamped down. Further, it was crazy to me that there weren’t some easily accessible places to go for late night food or drink, where I’d bump into other fellow students. Sure, I could walk 2 miles away to find that, but that wasn’t always worth it. Re the infrastructure surrounding campus, it’s almost as if the administration worked to make sure there WEREN’T social outlets for students right off campus. Because I’m sure, if a commercial developer looked at the area on 55th st or 57th st, or maybe by the frats, someone might say - how about we build a little late night pizza or taco shop here? What about maybe having three or four bars surrounding the thousands of students who live within a half mile radius of school?

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Can someone also comment on Greek life at UChicago? I understand Greek life represents a relatively small part of the social scene, and I haven’t found too much info on the different frats/sororities.

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@Cue7 you have a somewhat distorted view of Yale, at least from my perspective. When I was there, the one person I knew who was truly miserable was the grandson of a Yale Corporation member and substantial donor who was only there because it was the family school. He struggled in his classes, he felt disrespected by everyone, and no one cared that he had all the money in the world. He was really a sad guy. Of course, there were lots of other very rich kids there, but they tended to be totally into their courses and such. And, at least in the past, conspicuous displays of wealth were considered completely gauche. No one did that stuff. There was no set of glamorous rich kids who were separate from the normal run of students.

I don’t know that the Yale of my youth had pizza available at 1 am by the way. I remember making last-minute runs to Yorkside for pizza or grinders, but there was definitely a point where that option closed down, and it was earlier than one would have liked. Yankee Doodle stayed open all night, if you wanted a grilled cheese sandwich or something. A number of the residential colleges had small butteries in their basements, and those stayed open until midnight or so, but after that you were SOL. I think the new Chicago dorms have something similar, no?

Valois, by the way, is nowhere near two miles from campus. It’s about one mile from the center of campus. But remember – half the students don’t live on campus, and most of them live between the campus and Valois, or even further east.

But I’m being argumentative. Yes, there should be more student-oriented amenities in Hyde Park. The bars will be a problem, though, since I think residents can ban liquor licenses on a precinct-by-precinct basis, and they do.

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Last year when we were comparing UChicago and Mudd we did check into yik yak a number of times. There were definitely some similarities and overlaps but the one huge difference we found was that the Mudd kids were much much more open about sexuality but maybe that is more of a California thing? My son loves the social scene at UChicago but he’s the type that prefers hanging out with small groups of friends either at home or somewhere in the city to a part type atmosphere with a lot of people he doesn’t know.

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@Cue7

I’d like to give you a current student’s perspective on social life here.

  1. I think Chicago has an incredibly diverse social scene. There's greek life available for those who want it, and a lot of the social life on campus centers around RSOs (Activities) like Model UN, Debate, Intramural sports teams, Dance teams, and so-on. What I'm saying is that a lot of the social scene is "opt-in, opt-out" so if there's something you want to do, you can get involved in it, but if there's something you'd prefer to stay away from, you can easily do that. So for Greek Life, if you'd like to be in it, you'll find an active community, but it in no way casts a shadow over the rest of campus. There is definitely a lot of stuff going on - like Dance shows, cultural shows, a capella performances, debate clubs, speeches by people coming to the IOP, and then of course, the city of Chicago. I do understand your point about social life at this school being relatively tamped down because of the intensity of the academics - but I think increasingly, Chicago students are apt to pursue social activities and extracurriculars with the same energy as they pursue their academics. There will always be that hardcore element to the University (which is what I love) - that people really DO care about their classes, but the recent admits at the University are being equally intense with regards to extracurriculars (which do not necessarily need to detract from classes - many students are involved in the Institute of Politics and bringing interesting speakers to campus). This is definitely a good thing! But, I think there will always be a hardcore element to the academics here, which is still what many people who come here crave (I definitely know that's why I did).
  2. With regards to the point about late night spots to go to, the place everyone goes to after they get drunk is Clarke's on 53rd Street, which has terrible food and terrible service, but at 3 a.m. you're so desperate for food/drunk/otherwise intoxicated you trudge there with your friends anyway and order a greasy burger. There's also a new spot called Mikky's (yes, spelled with two Ks) where you can get better food than Clarke's but with fewer options. Lots of people also go clubbing downtown these days too, and a particularly popular thing to do is Karaoke in Chinatown, which is insanely fun.
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@neweducation

Thanks very much for providing a current student’s perspective. Please note, I realize that social life issues at Chicago are champagne problems, but I have some follow-ups to what you presented above, and my apologies if any of the below comes off as overly skeptical or biting.

1.) Chicago has a diverse social scene: remember, Chicago’s college now is about 50% bigger than when I attended. I have no doubt that there are more clubs, more social groups, and more intramural sports teams. I have no doubt, more generally, that there are a broader array of options present than what I attended. My central contention, though, is that the school (the administration) hasn’t done much to foster/cultivate this new energy, and the feel of the clubs is still considerably tamped down in comparison to other top liberal arts institutions.

Some points on this: while the student body has nearly DOUBLED in size in the past 10-15 years, what major student life initiatives has the administration backed besides the Institute on Politics and the (long overdue) Arts Center? The IOP only developed, by the way, because a major Obama-strategist and Chicago alum, David Axelrod, came to the University and requested it BECAUSE his extra-curricular experience at Chicago was so poor. Further, he pitched the idea to Northwestern, and he would’ve gone there if Chicago denied the proposal. (That would’ve been a black eye for the school.)

On that note, the student center (Reynolds Club) is still the same size as when I attended. Ida Noyes is still the same size. The growth of the student body hasn’t led to a growth in offices for clubs, hangout spots on or right off campus, etc.

Moreover, MORE extra-curricular options doesn’t necessarily mean better options. As far as I can see, the Chicago Maroon still only publishes twice a week, which is amazing given the size of the student body, and because all of Chicago’s peers have daily publications. I haven’t heard of any groups (aside from maybe UT and Voices in Your Head - which are good but easily replicated at most other top schools) gain much traction or acclaim. The clubs you describe seem like the sports teams - small pockets of students may go, so the options may be broader in my day, but I’m not sure how much better they are.

You present a convincing argument that there’s more on campus - and that’s a good thing. I don’t know if the tone is that different than when I attended, at least from what I’ve seen. Sports attendance is about the same, the Maroon still trudges along, etc. It’s better to have more, but there are so many factors that keep the out-of-classroom experience down - a packed academic calendar and a lack of true administrative backing being two big issues. I’m not sure if the growth in student life is in any way commensurate with the explosive growth of the college population.

Note, I don’t want to siphon away from academic life in material ways. Rather, I want better options - both student-generated options and administratively-backed ones - to exist, primarily on friday and saturday nights. What you describe is a fairly diffuse social scene - students can be off doing all manner of things on the weekend. That’s fine, but I’m guessing the library is still a hub of centralized social activity - a place where the community comes together. I wish Chicago had more varied mediums through which the community could get together and interact.

2.) Further, you mentioned going to diners on 53rd st for late night eats. These diners are a mile away from campus (if you live in Max) or 1.5 miles from campus (if you live in South/BJ). In January or February (or November, or December, or March, or even April), taking a 20-30 minute walk at 2am to find a solitary late night dining option seems sub-optimal to me. Why hasn’t the University invested in developing some resources right near campus? Heck, bring some late-night food trucks to 55th and Woodlawn on Friday and Saturday nights - students would go. It doesn’t seem like the administration has invested much in this. They’ve put in millions of dollars for the 53rd st lakefront area, but that’s a mile (or more) from many student dorms. Uber/Lyft can help, but again, it looks like the adminstration/ school isn’t fostering the change that is possible.

Again, I think Chicago is better now than in my day - there’s no doubt about that. That isn’t really saying much, though - life at Chicago was somewhat spartan 20 years ago. Further, Chciago hasn’t made the same strides in social life that it’s made in other areas.

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It’s probably true that now, as was the case 20 years ago, many extracurriculars don’t have the same combination of quantity and quality you’d find at HYP. That’s largely a function of the presence at HYP of students who focus on the Daily Princetonian, or the Yale rowing team, or their finals club, and put academics second. At least one professor at Harvard has commented on the subject, noting that many lecture halls are half-full because students are so busy pursuing the ECs that got them admitted. There are of course those who put academics first and foremost, likely a majority of the student body, but each school’s ECs are buoyed by students who can afford to have a below-average GPA and focus on the social and extracurricular offerings of these schools. At the U of C, between the prevailing focus on academics, a greater workload, and less prevalent grade inflation, those kids are rare.

The question is what Chicago wants to be in 2026. If the powers that be want to make Chicago another HYP, the U of C can cut 4-5 hours a week from the average student’s coursework, inflate GPAs by 0.3, spend more money on extracurricular initiatives and less on faculty, and accept more students who have the financial security to spend 4 years as full-time Maroon editors/quarterbacks/thespians/NGO founders and part-time students. If they want to keep something of Chicago’s distinct intellectual experience and rigor, it’s unlikely that extracurriculars at Chicago will mirror those at HYP, but I think the U of C will be better off for it.

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NotVerySmart: Maybe by 2026 you’ll be a wealthy alum or Deputy Provost or Associate Dean in a position to help shape these decisions! I mean this as a compliment and as encouragement.

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If I’m ever a wealthy alum, requests for donations will prompt a reminder that they decided not to stack two of my scholarships, gave me no financial aid, declared they were “proud to offer” tuition remission that comes from my parents’ employer, and increased tuition by $1,500…all in the space of one day. That’s the issue with admitting top students, or even letting the likes of me slip by when the admissions office’s voice of reason is on break; those students - top or otherwise - will have long memories :stuck_out_tongue:

Then I’ll stop pontificating and get down to serious business, like using some pennies I’ve found under the sofa cushions to fund a scholarship for families in the financial “donut hole.” Next, I’ll find out how much it’ll take for the U of C to name that scholarship after Donald Trump, which should be a fascinating topic for the economics students I’ll invite to that meeting. :smiley:

Yes, I’m going to be one of those alumni.

39

@NotVerySmart Are you sure they did that all in one day. Usually the Best practice at UChicago is to spread it over a few weeks so that incoming students get a good feel for what it will be like when they enroll in 4 courses a quarter at the College. Its part of the Pre-Orientation for high achieving students :smiley:

40

No, no, no. When you truly live the Life of the Mind, time is an abstraction, just like food or sleep. One day, a few weeks, what’s the difference?