Stanford freshman taking Q's

<p>dreamer- you only get to pick co-ed, all frosh, etc. But on the roommate preference form, where you sort of give an image of yourself (and there's room to write notes) i know people who have put down that they really really really want to live in some particular dorm... some are successful, others aren't. I feel like I painted myself for Branner (really social, etc)... but who knows.</p>

<p>jellybean- You will get a specific breakdown in April/May that will tell you exactly what the grant money, etc is for. otherwise buying stuff... internet = $12/mo in your room... food that's not from your meal plan adds up... but you can of course ration that yourself... (all you can eat meals are nice cuz you can take stuff from the dining hall) and books/materials/anything you need for daily life that you need more often than you can bring from home. cant think of anything else. other students are also your friends in bookbuying. I got a $145 chem book for $50 from a guy upstairs :-D.</p>

<p>Whats the fine art department at stanford like :) i no this is an absolutely absurd question cuz like nobody nos anything abt fine art teaching, as its a subject rarely studied, but if sum1 cus temme sumthin, anything, abt it at stanford it wud really help..thanx</p>

<p>Is there any way to request a certain roommate if you know someone else that's also going?</p>

<p>and what's the best way to get a single as a freshman? do they even have single suites?</p>

<p>Sorry salsa, I don't know anything about fine arts.</p>

<p>You cannot request roommates, in fact, Stanford doesn't even tell you who your roommate is until the day you move in. They do this so that everybody starts off orientation without knowing anybody else. I don't think freshmen can get singles, unless you have health reasons or your roommate moves out.</p>

<p>I heard that Stanford is pretty laid back but doesn't that depend on your major? Is engineering much harder than other majors there? How does it compare to that at MIT?</p>

<p>stressed- if you put down in the open space that you'd really like to live with such and such a person they will put you on opposite sides of campus. on the otherhand a couple at my school didn't say anything about wanting to live together and they ended up in the same dorm... sort of strange. </p>

<p>anycollege- there ARE singles, but unless you're like a 20 year old freshman (like the guy on my hall, who actually just took leave of absence for a quarter) they're going to put people who DON'T want to be in singles in them, so that they end up being really social. It's sort of weird, but at least two of the three girls who live in singles in branner were really unhappy about being in singles... so that's the theory. </p>

<p>and the roommate moving out thing doesn't work, because they'll put an upperclassman in your room as soon as they can. no fun.</p>

<p>Okay, this might be a weird question, but would you find that most students are friendly? I was just wondering because some people stereotype the Ivy League students as being "snobby" and whatnot, and since Stanford is such a highly selective school, I was wondering if the students displayed those same characteristics.</p>

<p>Absolutely.
I'd say most undergrad students are very friendly (some of the grads are a little weird/sketchy but they're few in numbers or self-absorbed - GSB Students particularly). I remember wondering the same thing last year before attending admit weekend, where I realized that Stanford is most definitely an exception to some of the other elite institutions. Don't think that you won't run into snobby people though because they do exist. For example, you'll find that a majority of the students at Stanford have expensive clothes and gadgets and whatnot. As a student you get used to being around other smart people all the time so when you go home for breaks other people may find you snobby because you may find yourself speaking differently/not what they're used to, etc. I think it's the people who aren't a part of the university community that observe these stereotypes more than those in the system.</p>

<p>This is quite a trivial question, but I was wondering how much does it rain during winter quarter? Isn't it really hard to get around if its pouring buckets all the time?</p>

<p>it never pours buckets. but it rains a lot. I live in palo alto, and it'll get rainy for like two weeks, then sunny for a week or two, then rainy again... it's irritating to have to bike in the rain, but it's certainly possible. Just remember to put a plastic bag over your seat or expect wetness (not so fun).</p>

<p>How hot does it normally get during the hot days (not counting summer)?</p>

<p>well "summer" lasts pretty much into october... we only have two seasons out here in Palo Alto. They are "sunny" and "rainy". The sunny season starts between april and may and lasts till october-occasionally into november. Usually the transition will have two weeks of "rainy" in october then two weeks of "sunny" in november and then back to rainy... and the same thing happens in march/april/may. Given that, it can get into the 80's... hot enough that you don't want to wear much clothing, and pants can feel very confining.</p>

<p>This might have been asked before, but I've noticed that Stanford has a pretty low student-faculty ratio. What is the size of most classes? Do we get taught mostly by proffessors or by TA's? If classes are large, are they lecture-style or split into small TA groups for discussion?</p>

<p>This would be better for an upperclass student to answer but I'll give it a stab. Most intro classes, except the introsems, are relatively large with little student professor interaction, unless you make a concerted effort to attend office hours. Once you establish a major or take some upper division courses the ratio will definitely be lower. You're definitely taught by profs in lecture unless it's like an intro foreign language or something. Many large, and some small, classes split up into discussion sections with TAs in addtition to the lecture with the prof. IHUM, the required frosh sequence, is different in that section is much more important than the lecture, but I usually prefer the lecture, and the TAs aren't TAs they're called TFs which are teaching fellows, which basically means that they already have PhDs. for more information visit <a href="http://cue.stanford.edu%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://cue.stanford.edu&lt;/a>
rest assured you'll get an excellent undergrad education at stanford!</p>

<p>Also, there is nothing that requires you to take the intro course, unless the course you want to take/major has that specific prerequisite. There are things they'd reccomend you wait to take later in your career... but if you wanted you could take American History 195 first quarter, or whatever the class actually is, etc. And non-intro classes tend to be small, so you could have like 5-30 people in one of them easily. My classes this quarter not including IHUM lecture had 5, 10, 15 and 15 students in them.</p>

<p>how big are intro classes and gen ed classes?</p>

<p>There aren't designated general education requirement CLASSES except for IHUM and PWR. The former is like 200 in lecture and 15 in section and the latter is like 15-20. You can take a whole variety of classes to fulfill the GERs... from intro classes that are usually like 100-200 people to introsems and upper level classes that are 15-20.</p>

<p>How hard is it for people coming in from out of state? In terms, of plane tickets, etc. Also, can you describe Stanford's quarter system? When are you in/out of school?</p>

<p>There are two major airports (SFO and San Jose) not too far from campus, so I'd imagine (I'm local) flights should be easy to arrange. Many people take shuttles to get to and from school.</p>

<p>Classes start the last week of September, and frosh orientation takes place the week before. Each quarter is about 10 weeks, so fall quarter ends in early December. The current academic calendar is posted here <a href="http://www.stanford.edu/dept/registrar/calendar/04-05_acad_cal.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.stanford.edu/dept/registrar/calendar/04-05_acad_cal.html&lt;/a> as well as next year's start/end dates at the bottom.</p>