<p>I'm happy to answer any questions you have about life at Stanford. Please no questions about your admissions chances, etc. </p>
<p>A bit about me: I'm from southern CA, potential physics major, not in any clubs (yet), in an all frosh dorm</p>
<p>how are you enjoying everything up there! i don't want to get into your stats or anything (unless you're cool with it) but was your acceptance a surprise? how was the whole admissions process like for you?</p>
<p>Which all frosh dorm are you in? Branner? That's my alma matter....lol</p>
<p>I'll take questions too. </p>
<p>I'm also from SoCal, involved with the political life, potential econ/polisci major, in SLE.</p>
<p>i'll be here whenever i have time</p>
<p>norcal, research (ubiquitin-proteosome system), human biology major with a concentration in health policy, SLE, involved in LGBT.</p>
<p>How are you liking Stanford? I know you're still a freshman and might not have taken enough courses to form an accurate judgement, but what do you think of the physics major? Is Stanford ridiculously huge like everyone makes it to be?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>What's the party scene like? =D</p>
<p>how often do students go to san francisco for fun?</p>
<p>how much school work are you getting? how many hours... spent in class or doing homework? is the workload a big jump up from high school? </p>
<p>what are your classes like? how many students? what are teachers like? that's a really broad question but anything you can say would be great</p>
<p>I can answer questions as well. I'm a current freshman living in Adams (one of the houses of FroSoCo). At this point, I'm being rather ambitious, considering a double-major in Econ & CS, but I might drop the CS if it becomes unmanageable. So far, I love it here; it's definitely a work-hard, play-hard mentality. I'm living in what's supposed to be one of the nerdiest dorms on campus, but the people here are extremely down-to-earth. As for the workload, it really depends on what you take. Most people take a fairly light load during their first quarter (14-16 units), although I know more than a few people (including myself) who are taking 20-21 units, which is the maximum. It's definitely a step (more like a leap) up from high school, but it's certainly doable. Just be sure to have good time management skills. If you have any more specific questions, go right ahead and ask.</p>
<p>This is a great thread idea, especially since we have so many on here answering questions.
I have a couple questions:
-As echoed before, how is the social/dating/party life on the whole? What exactly does work hard/play hard mean for you? How amiable are most people as a whole, and how easy was it to make friends for you?
-I guess this is kind of a general question: you guys seem to have already decided your majors as freshman from what I can tell. But are there any interdisciplinary majors/classes for those of us still thinking it out (seminars, programs, etc) that you have heard highly regarded? Sorry if that's a little vague; I can't remember the names of some the programs and associated dorms, but I know they exist.
-What's the difference between the different dorm options? How do you like yours, and how did you go about choosing it?
-Finally, this is kind of a specific question: I've heard a lot of horror stories about freshman intro level/calc-level etc math classes being incoherent or unnecessarily difficult because of a teacher that doesn't speak english well. What is your experience with this (in this field or out of it) or is this really just a myth?</p>
<p>Do you feel that it's too big or that you get lost in the crowd ever?</p>
<p>I didn't expect to get in to Stanford exactly but my admission wasn't a big surprise. My school is basically a feeder school (about 5% of the graduating class goes to stanford every year) and I was a very strong student plus a girl in math/physics plus I had a rec from a Stanford math prof who taught a summer program I did, etc. (Everyone from my summer program who applied early got in... so that alone gave me good reason to believe I probably would). Writing essays and all and waiting was still stressful. Applied early, got in, applied to a few more schools, down to Stanford and Swarthmore in the end, visited both schools, decided Stanford was definitely the right place for me. </p>
<p>I'm in Otero. </p>
<p>I'm in the honors physics series this quarter. It's hard but managable. The average on our last test was a 33/60 which gives you some sense of the difficulty of the course. I like the physics department so far and like my physics class. It seems like it's not easy to major in physics here but far from impossible. You just have to work hard. I've spent anywhere from 5 to 20 hours a week on problem sets. </p>
<p>There are always a few parties on Friday and Saturday, they're pretty fun, usually one or two big ones at frats or co-op houses with music and dancing and often alcohol plus smaller parties in dorms which are more or less just a bunch of people drinking together. I'm not really a party girl but I've had fun at the parties, I think I've gone to some party or another virtually every Friday and Saturday night this year. It's starting to get a little old but it's still fun. The parties are often pretty crowded, especially when only one frat/co-op has a party on a Friday or Saturday. </p>
<p>Students don't really go to San Fran all that often for fun. It takes about an hour by Caltrain and there's plenty to do on campus. If you want to go there you certainly can and I'm sure you could find some friends to go with you, but realistically you probably won't go that often. I've been there twice, once to visit a friend who's at college there and once for the Stanford scavenger hunt. </p>
<p>The amount of work you have depends on a lot of things including which classes you choose to take, how hard you work, if you go to class, how thoroughly you try to learn the subject, etc. My physics class takes about 15 hours/week probably, maybe takes maybe 4-7 or so, and IHUM takes 3-9 plus 13 hours of class/section a week. Overall it's not to bad, actually easier than my high school I think. In my IHUM there are about 150 students in lecture, about 15 in my section, about 40 in both my math and physics lectures, 20 in math section and maybe 10-15 in physics section. You don't really ask questions in IHUM lecture so the size doesn't matter much, the bulk of the class is section which is far smaller. I came from a school with really small classes, but I still feel like I get the benefits of small classes in my math/physics lectures as the profs often ask if we have any questions. My profs are pretty good. I have one really awesome IHUM lecturer, a couple less interesting ones, my TF for IHUM section is awesome, my physics prof is good and my math prof is good. You can shop around for teachers if there are more than one teacher who teaches the particular class. For Math 51 there are I think 5 teachers so I just went to a few different lectures on different days to see who I liked best. The quality of profs varies but that's the great thing about shopping period. You have two weeks to see which classes you want to take and drop ones that don't interest you so it's pretty easy to just take classes with profs you like (with the exception of classes required for your major only taught by one prof).</p>
<p>It's true that the dating scene here doesn't really exist. There are single people some of whom are cool with random hookups and there are like 3 year relationships and not much in between. People here seem to work pretty much all week and then have fun on the weekends. I don't really party hard and my friends don't either. </p>
<p>There are tons of freshman who don't know what they want to major in and even more who will change their mind again and again. There are intro seminars that are great for exploring different fields as well as basic intro classes to get a sense of what's out there. You have to fulfill your distribution requirements at some point, so you could easily explore different areas as you fulfill that requirement. </p>
<p>Everyone seems to like their dorms. Freshman dorms are nice because they offer a really close knit community, but that seems to be true of four class dorms too. I love that everyone in my dorm is going through more or less the same thing and there's a lot of dorm spirit, less dorm spirit in the four class dorms. SLE and FroSoCo are different options that many people in my dorm consider to be social suicide, but often people who decide to do SLE or live in FroSoCo are really happy there. I talked to one grad student who said that living in FroSoCo is one of the best things that happened to him as an undergrad here so go figure. Maybe the people in those dorms can describe their experiences. Everyone in my dorm really looks out for each other and there is a LOT of spirit. We have a good time, but it's not really ever too loud/crazy on week nights to study and people are generally respectful of different sleep patterns and such. At admit weekend I talked to a bunch of different people and decided that I should be in an all frosh dorm because I thought it would force me to be a bit more social which I suppose it kinda has. We have a good time. </p>
<p>There are plenty of profs/TAs with strong accents here. Once more there is the shopping period so you can almost always avoid this. I'm in Math 51 (Linear Algebra and Differential Calculus) and it's not so bad, less difficult than my AP Calculus BC course in high school. </p>
<p>I'm surprised that I don't feel that Stanford is too big. Swarthmore, the other school I was strongly considering, has a total population of about 1600 students whereas Stanford has 1600 in the freshman class alone. It seems that I see someone I know wherever I go and I don't think I've been to a party where I haven't seen at least several people I know. You get to know everyone in your dorm pretty well, so that's about 80 people or so that you know on campus. Then you meet people in classes, in clubs, friends of friends, etc. and pretty soon you know a whole lot of people. I came from a small high school and I'm surprised how easy of a transition that's been. </p>
<p>I love it here and so does everyone I know. I can't imagine any school being nearly as awesome at Stanford, yet I know on some level that I'd probably say the same thing about whatever college I ended up at. You just make the best of what you have. Come visit Stanford if you have a chance and not just during admit weekend as I don't think that really shows what Stanford is like. Also when choosing schools, especially if you can't visit them, think about more than just the numbers and descriptions in the view books and try to get a sense of what your day-to-day experience will be like. Things like the dorms, the food, the graduation requirements, the weather, etc. aren't nearly as trivial as I assumed when I was going through this process myself. </p>
<p>Hope that helps.</p>
<p>Simply awesome- now I really really wanna get in</p>
<p>thanks for the great reply, margirl</p>
<p>In response to marlgirl's post, stanford is genuinely awesome. One doesn't always say that about whatever college they go to. This is my opinion as well as every other transfer ive met here.</p>
<p>To all: how well did your hs experience prepare you for life at Stanford (both academically and socially)? </p>
<p>If you had to do it all over again, what would you do differently in hs to prepare yourself for the real world of freshman year at Stanford?</p>
<p>What do you do/where do you go off campus? How often do you get off campus? I'm trying to get a sense of what is there around Stanford/Palo Alto for a freshman (underage with no car) to do? I do know that students can use the Marguerite shuttle and/or CalTrain to get away, but where have you gone and what have you done?</p>
<p>It's still pretty early in your freshman year experience, but if you had to do it all over again, would Stanford still be your choice for undergraduate studies?</p>
<p>How much are your weekly living expenses? Not tuition, room & board, books, etc., but misc. food & drink, clothing, movies and other entertainment, other personal expenses?</p>
<p>Most of you sound like you're from in-state. If from out-of-state, will you be going home for Thanksgiving or trying to survive on a very empty campus that weekend?</p>
<p>This year Thanksgiving break is a whole week, so probably more people will go home. Generally, I think, most people (especially freshmen) leave, but there are enough people left on campus that you will not be lonely if you don't.</p>
<p>For those that this applies to, how does Stanford's financial aid offer compare to other schools? (MIT for example...) How are you financing them? How much loans will you graduate with? I keep hearing that HYP are more generous with their aid, but everyone uses Institutional Methodology, so why the consistent variation? Thanks =)</p>