<p>Why did Stony Brook get number 4 on the princeton review for unhappiest students. Why did albany got a number 9 when it is such a big party school?</p>
<p>Are these numbers accurate?</p>
<p>I believe it was unhappiest students with FiNANCIAL AID lol??</p>
<p>No way is that accurate. The people here are pretty damn happy, though we like to complain about the administration as much as the next college student does.</p>
<p>I think it refers to those who used Stony as a safety and had stars in their eyes only to be rejected by top schools and forced to go there. Or it could also be referencing those who are going to Stony because it's all they can afford(one of my friends is doing that).</p>
<p>I hate to say this, but positive or negative, I hardly refer to the Princeton Review categories as "accurate." Stony Brook certainly has its share of positive and negative rankings, but I put a little more credence in ones that have a little more quantitative juice behind them.</p>
<p>I guarantee you that you can find a subset of students at just about every college campus in the country who are willing to refer to their school as a "party school," and just as many who are ready to complain about everything from the lines at the Bursar to the food to the parking. Don't believe everything you read; see for yourself.</p>
<p>Chris D'Orso
Assistant Director of Admissions, Stony Brook</p>
<p>Well I won't mention stonybrooksucks.com (but I guess I just did?) But PR also ranked CalTech as having the worst professors or something. Would that stop you from attending CalTech? Take PR with a grain of salt, IMO.</p>
<p>unhappiest with funincial aid is bing not stony</p>
<p>I'm glad a rep from Stony Brook chose to adress this rather ugly issue head-on, instead of ignoring it. + respect!</p>
<p>collegereap, I want to go to stony next year(spring 2008) as a freshman transfer with 13 credits, will the adcoms at stony brook look at my sat scores and hs transcript? I am from ny, but currently attend an oos state school.</p>
<p>Should have gone to stony brook all along...</p>
<p>I sort of agree with qygirl. The high achievers I knew from high school went to suny school like stony brook because it is larger university (rather than college, like cuny) and is among the only affordable choices; they all want to transfer within 3years or less. Also, there isn't a lot of school pride at stony brook and people aren't too delighted with the campus. I wondn't say that they chose stony brook as a safety, though. I think most people that go there are average, maybe lower, in terms of status,and wouldn't get into schools like nyu to begin with. I think the ivy-league reject theory is more the case with bing.</p>
<p>frasi-</p>
<p>I think that's been one of the great misconceptions about us the last few years. We're currently studying folks who withdraw from Stony Brook, and so far, overwhelmingly, it hasn't been because they're looking to transfer elsewhere; it's been because of personal issues. Stony Brook's retention rate is above the SUNY average these days, so again, don't believe everything that stonybrooksucks.com says. (Yes, we read it, and we laugh.) You're better off getting your news from some of the more reputable sites out there, like from the Statesman (our school newspaper) or even the Stony Brook Press.</p>
<p>In answer to your other question, if you're transferring with less than 24 credits, yes, we will require your final HS transcript and SAT scores. Once you've completed 24 credits, then we no longer look at your high school info.</p>
<p>And Hawkeye -- thanks for the thumbs up. I enjoy the Princeton Review surveys for their comic value; we college administrators joke with each other about how far we've fallen in the "party school" ratings and stuff like that. We don't take them seriously, and we hope students don't either. :)</p>
<p>Chris D'Orso
Assistant Director, Admissions
Stony Brook University</p>
<p>frasifrasi: the people I know who transferred to SB from NYU or turned it down would probably disagree with you on the not being able to get into NYU thing (and it's interesting you'd mention NYU in particular, since I know a lot of people who made that choice in favor of here). Just saying. And I really take issue with the idea that there's not a lot of school pride at Stony Brook... people may not really care what the football team is up to, but we're still incredibly proud of our school.</p>
<p>Oh, and the Statesman is kind of an administration buttmonkey, so take it with a grain of salt. The Independent is a better news source, though more sporadic (<a href="http://www.sbindependent.org%5B/url%5D">www.sbindependent.org</a>). The Press is amusing, but it's an "open forum" paper (read: they take a principled stance against editing), so take it with the Dead Sea.</p>
<p>I forgot about the Independent. We do have a startling number of news sources for a school who only just now opened up a School of Journalism. It'll be interesting to see how that impacts the Statesman. (And officially, I can't agree with your assessment, but I see where you're coming from.)</p>
<p>I like The Press for humor value too.</p>
<p>Chris at SBU Admissions-</p>
<p>My son was accepted to SB on early admission and was really excited to go until he was informed by past and present students about what happens (or does not happen) on the weekends. He is really concerned about the number of people that go home on weekends and the lack of activities for those that stay behind. We too read the posts on stonybrooksucks.com and felt that it was probably a small group of disenchanted students but sometimes when you peel the layers back there may be some truth in some of the comments. </p>
<p>The unfortunante part here is that he really likes the SB campus (we visited the campus back in Nov) and the strong sciences program (he is looking to major in chemistry) but the idea of being practically alone on the weekends was enough for him to consider the other SUNY schools that accepted him. Perhaps this is one of the reasons students are unhappy with SBU?</p>
<p>Rich-</p>
<p>Thanks for your note. We did a study on weekend campus life last year. On any given weekend, we found that 70-75% of our residential students stayed on campus. It was a little higher on big weekends (homecoming, stuff like that), a little lower on long weekends (Thanksgiving, Spring Break), but on average, pretty good.</p>
<p>The reason it seems so much quieter on the weekends is that you go from 40,000 people (including faculty, staff, everyone) on a random Tuesday afternoon to "only" six thousand or so on the weekend, so it seems a LOT quieter than it actually is.</p>
<p>I'm not saying we don't have any unhappy students; every campus does, it's just that ours have their own easily Googleable (is that a word?) Web site where they can voice it. I'm really impressed with the life on this campus, because I knew the reputation when I got here two years ago, and it's really surprised me.</p>
<p>Heck, just this coming weekend: tomorrow is Darwin Day, a program sponsored by one of our Undergraduate Colleges; tomorrow night is Stony Brook Night at Nassau Coliseum (I know, it's not "on campus," but we're sending buses to the Islanders game); Friday night, mentalist Robert Channing will be on campus; Saturday, the Staller Center for the Arts has two programs; we have a home men's basketball game at 2:00 on Sunday... and this is just a random weekend in February.</p>
<p>Know that it's impossible for over 9,000 students to live in one place and yet have "nothing ever happen on the weekend." If a student wants to stay in his or her room and not do anything, well, then that student's going to miss out on a lot. But if you're active, and you're involved, Stony Brook is a heck of a place to be.</p>
<p>Chris D'Orso
Stony Brook University</p>
<p>Rich: Okay, I know I'm starting to sound like a walking ad, but the information your son got? WRONG. DEAD WRONG. Dear god, I'm tired of people telling me my campus has nothing to do on the weekends when my life obviously contradicts this fact.</p>
<p>There are tons of things to do here unless you're completely antisocial and expect the universe to come to you and demand that you come out and play. I can assure you, if there were nothing to do my homework would get done much more easily and my parents would have a prayer of seeing me when I'm not sick or on break.</p>
<p>I'm not even a particularly outgoing person, and I know way more completely awesome, fascinating people here than I have time to see nearly as much as I'd like, and more fun things vying for my time than is at all healthy for my GPA.</p>
<p>People who give up on finding stuff to do the first time they're lonely their first semester? Would be lonely anywhere. People who expect everything to fall into their laps and go home and spend every weekend with mommy when it doesn't? Would be crying to mommy no matter where they went to school.</p>