<p>It is easy to go into downtown Nashville on the weekends and do students do it often, or are the weekends more about frat parties? Does the school actually deserve the nickname the "vanderbubble"?</p>
<p>It is easy but somewhat expensive.
Most people don’t do it frequently (i.e. every weekend) but it is not a rare occurrence either
Frat parties / Greek life tends to dominate the social scene at Vanderbilt, but there are certainly many other things to do both on campus and in Nashville - if you were non greek, you could definitely still have tons of fun
As per the nickname, vanderbubble is certainly correct to an extent - you could never leave campus and survive - but it would definitely get very boring very quickly - and hence its advisable to do stuff off campus a couple times each month</p>
<p>hope this helps</p>
<p>zmoose,</p>
<p>What do you consider expensive? The cab ride will only be a couple dollars if you have more than yourself riding. Some places will have a cover but that’s nothing to scoff at either. And most people I knew went downtown every weekend or at least every Thursday. Frat parties aren’t what they used to be and there aren’t as many as there used to be.</p>
<p>One thing you may not be thinking about is housing. Vanderbilt more or less requires you to live on campus for all four years. My daughter will be a senior next year and really wanted to live off campus, but her application was denied. The cost of living on campus, including room, board, etc. is as high or higher than the costs of sharing a house or apartment off campus. Adding in the cost of sorority dues (which to me is really the cost of having a “home” to go to other than your shared dorm room) and living off campus could really save you significant amounts of money. And then there is the fact that at 21+ years old, she feels ready to try living more independently. Only one of her friends got permission to go off campus, and now this girl is reconsidering because she doesn’t want to be the only one. It is something to consider about Vandy that is quite different from a lot of schools that more or less push you into off campus housing after freshman or sophomore year. There are positives and negatives about this, but my daughter is pretty upset about it. She really has outgrown dorm life and is itching to live a more adult life. Virtually all her friends at other universities have been doing so for one or two years. This was an issue that maybe should have played a role in her decision of where to go to school that she didn’t appreciate at all when she was a high school senior.</p>