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<p>Join clubs, get involved. That is the easiest and best way to get yourself a close-knit group of friends.</p>
<p>As for the rest of your post, Grinnell is obviously an excellent school, but do they even have computer science? I would imagine that for economics and physics, despite UIUC’s excellent reputation, that the difference wouldn’t be too important, but for computer science it very well might be given the vast resources that go into UIUC’s CS program.</p>