I would add that for some kids the added benefit of being part of a small community of like minded students could make a huge difference in their freshman experience especially if they are coming to school not knowing any one. It is a huge school and not every kid is comfortable in diving into a massive group of kids to try to make friends. UMich does not do much in the way of welcoming the freshman, RA’s for the most part do not reach out and there are not many options for small groups to gather and connect. Once the clubs get going there are ways to find people but the Honors is a great way to have a small gang from the get go.
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I suppose, but I’m not a big fan of this phrase of “like-minded” students. This is Michigan. Be prepared to work hard.
You can find “like-minded” students in many parts of the school. My D18 found “like-minded” students in the CoE, Kinesiology and Nursing schools freshman year. And remain great friends today.
Maybe these “like-minded” individuals are found much quicker, although non-Honors freshman will have roommates and floormates to begin the semester. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that any student will bond with other “like-minded” students.
The other thing that I’m reminded of is that when my D18 was a freshman, Panhellenic Rush was held Fall semester. Rush is now held in the Winter semester, beginning right after the Holidays. Besides clubs, Rush is another way to meet new people, but Greek life is certainly not for everyone.
So I disagree with you on this. Sure, most students at Michigan are on a similar academic plane, but that doesn’t make them “like minded”. Just means they are smart students.
“like minded” is similar interests. My son didn’t like any of the over 1600 clubs /organizations on campus so he and a Ross student formed their own in Augmented Reality. https://www.altrealityinitiative.com/
The students that joined were definitely “like minded”. It was also a great way to make a large university small. Having weekly lecturers leading to the yearly conference etc.
But yes. As I say yearly. Be prepared to work hard. Michigan is a very hard school and students don’t realize this till they start. It’s just not said enough how challenging it can be.
Actually, I believe we do agree on this. You can find your posse anywhere (clubs, IM, Greek, UGLI, floormates, roommates, jobs, research, classes, sections, etc.). Michigan has lots and lots of hard working smart students.
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“Like-minded students” may be my entry on the current post about phrases that annoy us!
What do people even mean by it? In speaking about the honors college, there isn’t any common major or interest to unite students. If it means hard-working, serious, smart, involved, conscientious, innovative, high-achieving…you will find those kinds of kids in just about every nook and cranny on campus.
Also, the honors college isn’t super small. I think it’s between 500-600 students in each incoming class. The Residential College is much smaller, with about 250 in an incoming class.
Actually, I didn’t know how many are admitted to the Honors program, so I googled it. 
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Thanks for the correction!
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By “like minded” I am thinking that students who enter the honors program may be more focused on academics vs. those there to party every night. No judgement - it’s freshman year so have at it - but it’s not for everyone. The Honors students are made up of kids from all areas of studies and schools so it’s not a limiting group in that way at all.
Rush happens in the Fall - at least it did last year. Very much so. For my kid, that was not a help on the social front. To join in that scene you are expected to attend a party almost every night and that wasn’t how he wanted to spend his time. Not saying he didn’t go to parties but the nightly thing was not of interest to him. If anything the Greek life emphasis at UMich has been a negative and something we didn’t consider at all when we picked a school.
Every kid is different. In our case I think the honors program set up would have given him a better start. He’s now a happy sophomore and has made so many great friends, but that first semester was really hard.
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Now that I’ve bored everyone to death here about the Honors program at Michigan, they’ll probably receive their highest # of apps in history this cycle. 
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Registration is during the Fall. Primary recruitment starts after the Holidays.
https://fsl.umich.edu/content/panhellenic-primary-recruitment
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I’ll disagree. It’s not either: a) the Honors program student or b) students who party every night. There are thousands upon thousands of Michigan students who work very hard, but aren’t members of the Honors porgram.
The Honors program is for LSA only, unless a student is receiving two degrees in the MDDP (Multiple Dependent Degree Program):
Otherwise, you will not find a hard working highly intelligent engineering, nursing, architecture, SMTD, Kinesiology, Ross, etc. student in the LSA Honors program.
So, I don’t think there are only 350 freshmen who are all hard working intelligent students in the Honors program at Michigan and then there are 6,650 freshmen students who party every night (roughly 7,000 freshman).
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Hi! Did anyone receive an email from IT about setting up their Umich account and ultimately being able to login to Wolverine Access? I’m really confused because they make me seem like I’m a current student but my portal still says ‘decision postponed’, any clue?
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Aside from our state schools, Michigan is the largest university my son applied to. During the campus visit, I wasn’t a huge fan of it TBH. You only get to tour one portion of it and the four was confusing, making it clear how large it all was. Nevertheless, my son loved it and that’s what matters. He was thrilled when he was admitted so we want to make this work for him.
BUT I do know that one thing he loved about other colleges we visited that kept coming up in his “Why” essays was the residential house systems at some colleges like UChicago and Notre Dame. He would explain that he loved the idea of belonging to a residential community for all 4 years of college where he knew he belonged and would be accepted, etc. So I know it’s a concern of his to not fit in and to find his people and have “friends to sit with at lunch.” He has zero interest in fraternities, but are there living learning communities at Michigan? Where students with similar interests live? Purdue and IU have them.
Or perhaps fraternities that are nontraditional? I don’t mean with the drinking bc he does that, but more about the alpha male types that he feels have run his school and have not been very accepting of the smart quirky kids. (This is me paraphrasing, he’s never said this but basically this has been the issue at his hugely athletically focused school). As a result, we’ve been focused on colleges with kids like him and his small group of friends. When people describe a student body as weird and think they’re being negative by saying that, I perk up and say, actually that sounds good and look into that school!
Anyway, this is my long-winded way of asking how does a freshman from OOS who we already know will have trouble making friends find a good living arrangement at Michigan? How does he find his people in such a huge place if he’s not the outgoing type?
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We live only an hour from Ann Arbor, but my daughter’s entire group of friends are kids from other states and we are from a top 5 feeder school eith 50 kids from her high school at Umich. Sp many kids come alone from other states. It’s true what they say about putting yourself out there to find study groups, keeping your door open in your dorm, etc. So many kids are from far away and come alone that there really is a desire to meet new people and make friends.
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Michigan has many themed living and living learning communities:
https://housing.umich.edu/themes-mlcs/
That said, if he wants the kind of 4-year house community that some schools have, Michigan does not have that in really any form.
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But other programs like engineering have an honors program also.
https://bulletin.engin.umich.edu/ug-ed/honors/
Nursing honors.
So you can pretty much do an honors program in just about any field if you want to.
My son in engineering didn’t do honors but had to do a capstone project etc also. So if simime feels this is worthwhile there are many ways at Michigan to do it outside the 350 club of honors.
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Just a few… Lol.
https://housing.umich.edu/themes-mlcs/
So if my interverted kid can make friends, trust me yours can also 
.
They find their peeps. They just do… They do have to make an effort and they will be rewarded. We told our kids to go outside of their comfort zone and bet on themselves. Both did and were rewarded. The first two weeks were sorta challenging since they needed to find themselves first. There is something known as the “Michigan Effect”… You will see this maybe the second semester or end of the year or sophomore year. These kids get transformed. You won’t recognize your kid at that point. There’s a name for it for a reason.
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To further answer your question. Michigan has tons of quirky nerdy kids. Every type of child is there. Central campus where he will be mostly first year is not that large. Most of his classes are centrally located there. If he joins study groups, finds clubs /activities he wants to explore he will meet a lot of kids. He has to understand that “everyone” is in the same boat and they mostly want to meet someone also. This is like a hard concept for some kids. When he sits down in his first class just look to his right and left and say some inquisitive like “Whats up”… When he’s at the bus stop and someone is standing there say something crazy like “Heh” and nod … My son met someone that was always at the bus stop going to football games and they decided to sit together. That led to meeting more people at the games etc. Trust me… There is always a way and everyone wants to go and get a slice of pizza. He will need to open up in the dorms and talk a bit. My sons dorm mates was not where he made friends. But they were cordial. He met them after he started his own club and got together with the same 10-30 people like weekly. For him to even start the organization was the start of the “Michigan Effect”. Kids need the time to find themselves. Once they do just get out of their way. Your son will be fine. 
Thanks, he’ll definitely be coming alone if he chooses Michigan. He’s come a long way in terms of putting himself out there but then has periods of retreating and being more antisocial, especially since his older brother went to college this past fall. I’ve been trying to encourage him to be more outgoing, offering him our basement to have small parties and such.
This summer he went to Boston for a 2-week summer program and he started having anxiety about his potential roommate and the other kids right before going out there. Oh, we worried for the first few days that he’d call saying he hated it. It ended up being the “best experience of his life.” But those were his kind of people, a bunch of math kids who had similar hobbies and interests. Made us realize he really needs to find his people.
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Thank you. I didn’t realize that. I just looked over the different options. I’ll go over them with my son and see if he would consider something like this. Some of the academic ones may be of interest to him.
Yes, this has been very hard to get through to my kids over the years. I’m the outgoing one and my husband is the introvert. Somehow they ended up with all of his introverted genes! So it’s hard for me to understand how you can’t just make eye contact and talk to a stranger. But my older son is in college now and didn’t have a fantastic high school experience because he didn’t put himself out there. Pandemic didn’t help, but introverted kid, pandemic, and over reliance on video gaming makes a bad combo. I told him, freshman year, it’s now or never. Your dad and I met some of our closest friends (that our kids now know as Auntie so-and-so) from our freshman year dorms. So don’t shut that door, and when someone says, we’re all going to get some food, even if you’ve eaten, go with them. So far, he’s had a good experience. But he’s at a small-medium sized school and rooming with his best friend from HS. I’m going to hope for the best with my second son. Thanks for the great feedback and suggestions.
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