<p>I've been reading a lot of stuff about Princeton, through their own newspaper, through student reviews on other sites, college confidential, etc. There's no doubt that it's an amazing place to be. That said, one recurring complaint I see is that Princeton students feel very stressed and are always busy every minute with either academic work (thanks grade deflation!), big-commitment extracurriculars, or partying on the Street. </p>
<p>Princeton students, be honest - how true is this? How stressed do you guys feel? I'd like to go to a college where it's a little laid back, somewhere that kids don't mind sitting on the grass for an hour and just reveling in the happiness of being there. Is Princeton too intense?</p>
<p>I thought the same thing before I got here–that I wanted to stop and smell the roses now and again in college–and it’s worked out okay, though sometimes it’s hard to distinguish “chilling” from “working” because I frequently find that the two are intermingled. I’m a physics major, so I might spend 10 or 15 hours working on one problem set each week, but those aren’t necessarily 10 or 15 totally productive hours. I’ll goof off with the friends I’m working with to add some levity to the process and maybe make a cookie run in the middle.</p>
<p>It’s definitely stressful around exam times for me, but I find that I don’t mind it so much because I feel like I’m getting the most out of my time here that I could hope for. It’s also not as bad when you feel like everyone else around you is equally freaked out. I’d compare it to a sort of academic high–it seems like everything’s going a little too fast, but when you finish and take a step back to observe what you done, you think, “wow, I just accomplished something I never thought I could. And now i’m going to sleep for 24 hours straight.”</p>
<p>Routine days and weeks are not stressful at all. When you have a paper due…stress. Midterms and finals weeks…stress. I don’t think Princeton’s any different from any of its peers in terms of stress. </p>
<p>However, for Princeton and other universities, STEM classes are more stressful than other classes because you usually have psets, lab reports, multiple tests (in addition to midterms and finals), and more class/lab time. So it’ll seem that you’re more stressed out than other people if you’re a STEM major …but this is most likely true at any school.</p>
<p>The reason I’m also asking this is that when I visited Princeton back in October on a regular weekday, temperature around 60 degrees and cloudy. There weren’t too many kids walking around campus. The majority of students I saw were all in the Frist Center, intently working. It just seemed like less of a relaxed atmosphere than all of the other colleges I’ve been to.</p>
<p>I feel like we also tend to relax/hang out in the places where prospective students don’t go…dorms are downcampus, eating clubs are not open to rando passersby.</p>
<p>I think that to get a good feel for this kind of thing, you should probably try to come to Preview and talk to as many current students as possible, and also observe it during the odd hours of the day. Your personal standards for “stressed” will vary.</p>
<p>Personally speaking, yes, I am relatively stressed on a day to day basis – it comes with the weekly HW assignments. OTOH I love it here and I definitely take the time to “sit on the grass for an hour” and talk with friends on a regular basis. Well, maybe not the grass – it did snow just a few days ago! But just about every day I find the time for long, lazy conversation.</p>
<p>“I feel like we also tend to relax/hang out in the places where prospective students don’t go…dorms are downcampus, eating clubs are not open to rando passersby.”</p>
<p>Truth. Tourists usually hang around up campus esp. because of Orange Key tours and the better architecture.</p>
<p>“Wait… so as a student I won’t be spending most of my time near the picaresque buildings that attracted me to Princeton in the first place?”</p>
<p>You’lll definitely be spending a lot of time in or around these buildings, because that’s where a lot of classes are. Anyway, there’s undoubtably a lot to do here - class work, clubs, sports, events, etc… But level of stress varies from person to person, depending on how well you manage your time. That’s really all it comes down to.</p>
<p>In light of the recently posted news article that about half of the kids at princeton claim to be depressed, I’d like to bump this thread. Can any other Princeton students comment on their experience at Princeton in regards to levels of stress, business, competition and the impact of these factors on student culture?</p>
<p>We’re stressed because we’ve always had high expectations for ourselves. We’re stressed because we’ve always been at the top. We’re stressed because Princeton was supposed to be a reward for four years of hard work in high school, and now we’re finding that it’s hard work too. We’re stressed because we choose classes beyond our comfort level. We’re stressed because we collect leadership roles like stamps. </p>
<p>But I’m not sure we’re stressed for institutional reasons. Take Princeton’s student body and move them to Providence, and I don’t think a thing would change.</p>
<p>I like to think that Princeton is the most academically demanding university in the country. I would say in terms of just workload, stress, expectations, and the ambition that the students have here, coupled with our grading policy (which really only affects the humanities, because as a premed I would have to detail with grade cut-offs and weed out classes anywhere).</p>
<p>Lol, you can’t honestly tell me that you went into Princeton thinking it wouldn’t be hard work because it was a “reward” for your high school years, can you?</p>
But just about every day I find the time for long, lazy conversation.</p>