<p>Hello, I am going to apply for admission to NYU this fall. I am currently a senior. Even though NYU is one of my dream schools, my parents have not been very supportive of my desire to attend this university. Their two main reasons are that New York is a big and rough city (I am from the Midwest) and that since NYU is not laid out like a "traditional" college, it would be hard to find friends and I would feel alone and overwhelmed. How is the social life at NYU? Is it really as bad as my parents are anticipating?</p>
<p>There are a couple hundred…thousand…million threads on NYU’s social scene but okay. NYC consistently ranks as one of the safest metropolitan cities. Many people who are not familiar with the city think it’s rough and crime infested before many of the changes that have been made. Due to it’s popularity real estate prices have soared and old projects and broken neighborhoods have been completely renovated. Upper Manhattan is still iffy but the city is continuously pushing the crime rate lower by cleaning neighborhoods one by one.</p>
<p>Your parents are correct in it not being a non traditional college but it is not hard to make friends. Making friends is a process regardless of your environment, it depends on your personality and willingness to put yourself out there. Granted you might stick out if you have a white sheet on your head with a flaming stick in your hand but other than that you should be fine. There are hundreds of clubs, cohort groups that explore the city together, intramural sports, you will meet tons of people in your dorm and classes. It’s really the same process as any other college, meet people with similar interests and hang out.</p>
<p>Like your parents, we were initially very skeptical when our daughter put NYU near the top of her list, and for similar reasons. We agreed to check out the school/location by attending an NYU open house in September of her senior year, and by the end of the visit we were comfortable that the school was a great fit for her academically and socially and that the city was not at all what we had expected/feared. Manhattan, and particularly the Greenwich Village/Downtown area where NYU is located, has a very low crime rate, probably lower than any major midwest city (and MUCH lower than the southern city where we live). Can you talk your parents into visiting? NYU is one of those schools that are best experienced first hand to really know if it’s the right place for you.
As AO pointed out, you can make friends just about anywhere as long as you are willing to put yourself out there. Pretty much everyone is in the same situation when they arrive, so at least for those first few weeks college is a very fertile environment for making friends. My mom once told me that the best way to have a friend is to be a friend. Developing and expressing a genuine interest in other people is a guaranteed friendship magnet no matter where you go to school.</p>
<p>I’m going to tell you the things that you really couldn’t know unless you have gone there.</p>
<p>You will hear a lot of people saying that you can make friends if you really put yourself out there. What they don’t seem to be telling people is that NYU is weirdly cliquish. If you are in CAS (the general education school) you are not very likely to make friends in your classes. My experience with classes through CAS is that everyone is Twilight Zone-level distant. As someone in Tisch, I don’t recommend getting sucked into a group of friends exclusive to a specific school unless you want to hate yourself and what you do. Most of my friends are outside of Tisch; I have a couple very good friends in Tisch and many people I really get along with, but they all seem to complain about each other.</p>
<p>Having friends at NYU is like having friends while you’re living in the city, because it is so disjointed and clumped that you will undoubtedly have a main group of friends, and then a bunch of people you meet over and over again through the same people that you never really see because a. it’s the city and b. they probably spend more time with their own clump. I was lucky enough to have 6 of my best friends from high school and elementary school also at NYU. We met a lot of people through an outreach program that one of them did. If you do go, I highly recommend doing something like this.</p>
<p>People say they get really close with the people in their hall, but it is 100% possible, sometimes even probable, that your hall will suck. Plain and simple. Depending on where you live of course, but my hall did not hang out, they kind of just bickered about each other. I met a lot of people that had unjustified chips on their shoulder. There are a lot of spoiled narcissistic brats at NYU.</p>
<p>That being said, most of the coolest people I have ever met I have met at NYU. It’s just an insanely mixed bag. I got extremely lucky.</p>
<p>So regarding the social life, yes, if you’re outgoing, you can make lots of friends, but juggling them and keeping in touch with them is incredibly difficult. You will most likely clump and you better like everyone in your clump. If you meet someone one night, you better get their number, you better live close to them, and you better already have a reason for hanging out again, i.e. having to watch a certain DVD, owning a rare Super Nintendo game, hearing about a concert coming up, wanting to go to a certain restaurant; sometimes this is not even enough. Whether or not you intend to blow smoke, that’s what it winds up being from both parties, because you live in the most distracting place in the world and you’re probably already closer with other people you’ll be busy with. Just hope you run into them again; sometimes this is asking a lot.</p>
<p>I am probably transferring because film school is just something I want to save for Graduate school, and CAS and Gallatin are not really my thing. When I was taking my gen ed classes I felt like I was taking them in a vaccuum. I wasn’t going to see any of these people ever again. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that not only do the separate schools at NYU operate extremely independently from one another, but even the classes do. You could probably say this about the vast majority of colleges, but it’s just so much more noticeable at NYU. Even in Tisch I actually have teachers from one class telling me not to take other classes in my department. It’s just extremely disheartening, but that’s probably more of an undergraduate film school thing.</p>
<p>You’re taking classes in the city. NYU makes attempts at having events and bringing people together, but they’re legitimately depressing. The end of the year Strawberry Festival is pretty cool on its own. As the premier end of the year event for the largest private university in the nation, it’s pathetic in the least negative sense of the word. It’s just sad, really. The lack of college ambience wouldn’t bother me as much if it didn’t try so hard sometimes.</p>
<p>So come here for the city, because that’s its best asset. The fact that that is the main focus of the school is probably one of the biggest reasons I’m probably leaving. Don’t come here if you want people to be psyched about NYU, come here if you want a pretty incredible city-living experience and unique learning opportunities through firsthand experience with the resources the city has to offer.</p>
<p>In closing:
-Your parents should not be worried about you making friends. They should absolutely be worried about you making a good, dynamic group of friends.
-You should not come here if you feel the lack of college atmosphere is something that would bother you. If it even bothers you a little, you will not be able to get past it for about a semester. The start of college is disillusioning for everyone, but I think NYU might have one of the lowest recovery rates in the country.
-Come here for the city and whatever that means to you, be it educational opportunities (they are pretty incredible at NYU, not to mention the study abroad program may be the best in the country) or the nightlife or just learning to live in the city. Even though I plan on transferring, I wouldn’t trade the last year for anything. You will seriously grow if you come here, and there’s something to be said for that. But this is also your one chance to have an undergraduate college experience. Some people are fine with letting that go and some people aren’t.
-WARNING: your social experience at NYU is a huge gamble. If you’re a friendly outgoing person, like I said, you’ll make friends, but it can be a lot harder based on whether or not you like people on your floor, because calling most of the extracurricular clubs and activities at NYU half-baked would be the wildest of understatements.</p>
<p>Keep in mind this is as brutally honest as a post on NYU will get. Every school has its flaws. I just told you everything that people don’t seem to figure out until they get here. Understanding this is a huge advantage.</p>
<p>Following up with michael’s post, the Study Abroad program is one of the best ways to make lasting friends. You’re in a foreign country, you’re in classes with the same people and you probably live with them. I transferred TO NYU and I had trouble making friends until I went abroad. I think I also opened up, as a person. </p>
<p>Freshmen always ask questions about “the social dorm” or “the party dorm” but it absolutely comes down to THE PEOPLE YOU’RE WITH. I know people who went abroad with their freshmen year roommates, and I also know people who never want to see their freshmen year roommates ever again. </p>
<p>Come to NYU if you’re more self-sufficient and outgoing and you’re reasonably certain you can step outside of your comfort zone. Don’t come to NYU if you want school spirit and school community handed to you. As much school spirit as I have, I’m not the norm here. The best ways to make friends are doing things where you’re forced to hang out with people outside of your classes or your NYU division. Sports, school clubs, etc. I know these probably aren’t the things that you wanted to hear, but it’s the reality of the situation.</p>
<p>to tack on to the last few posts, I noticed a lot of the time social experiences are based upon what you look like/what you like to do. Underground shows in Brooklyn? You’ll find a group of people that really fiend on that. Clubbing in the Meatpacking District? You will find groups of girls that thrive on that as well. Going to a dive bar and getting hammered ever night of the week? You will find them too. In terms of looks, like it or not, the people here can be discriminatory. I know people that won’t invite others out at night time because they aren’t good looking enough, or don’t dress well enough, etc. It sucks, but it is very apparent at NYU. One thing that bothered me that Michael said was the half baked clubs. I am at Stern, and our clubs are RIDICULOUSLY legit. I am a part of 3 of them, and we have very prominent speakers come in, great food, prestigious professors giving auxiliary lectures on interesting topics [there was an amazing lecture that Professor Whitelaw gave to The Finance Society entitled “*** are Hedge Fund?”, my friend ended up getting an internship offer after he went to hear a speaker from a big Private Equity firm talk], as well as sponsor outings, and have great food. That might also be because we have a separate budget for clubs XD. So I definitely don’t think Stern clubs are half baked in the least bit. As for the general club, I was only in one, and it was relatively small. We got awesome pizza at every meeting, which kept people going, and went on all expense paid trips to other parts of the country [chicago, boston, dc, and miami] for competitions [although we never did very well LOL]. That club seemed that it was functioning more to provide perks than anything else.</p>
<p>the *** is supposed to read [phonetically] doubleyou, tee, eff [without the commas]</p>
<p>I’m not saying all clubs are half-baked, I mean most of them, most being the endless sea of outside-interest clubs; places you can go to meet people outside of your program with a common interest. Theater stuff, exploration-based and cultural-based organizations. Common-interest stuff. It tends to be very hard to keep one together and interested, at least enough to be worth your time/friend-making experience.</p>
<p>I had trouble making friends at NYU at first because:</p>
<ul>
<li>I transferred from another college and didn’t know anyone here</li>
<li>Everyone seemed to have made friends freshmen year and had their little cliques</li>
<li>People here were not as friendly as my old college or hometown</li>
<li>My classes had 200 - 600 students each</li>
<li>I was placed into the 26th St dorm, which is mostly for medical and dental students</li>
<li>People would literally ignore me if I said Hi in my dorm hall - that’s how unfriendly the atmosphere was</li>
<li>I’m naturally quiet</li>
<li>I’m poor and I can’t afford to go out a lot - social life revolves around going out to bars and clubs here</li>
</ul>
<p>But eventually I made friends. I learned to be more outgoing and strike up conversations with people in classes and clubs more. Remember that freshmen year, everyone else is in the same position as you - most people don’t know anyone. Even if you’re a quiet person, try to be more outgoing your first semester here since that’s the best time to make friends.
I had the opposite experience. I’m in CAS, all my friends are in CAS, 90% of them are in my major or similar majors as me - that’s because I made most of my friends in classes, and because I’m very behind in my requirements so I’ve only been able to take CAS classes so far. Whenever I meet someone in a different school, I feel like I never see them again. I agree with you NYU is cliquish and for that reason it’s easier to make friends in your own school. </p>
<p>I agree with your opinion about Tisch kids.Tisch seems to attract a certain type of personality - not saying there’s anything wrong with that - but I quickly figured I didn’t mesh well them. It’s not worth the constant drama :)</p>