<p>I actually go to the U through my high school. I got accepted into IT. If I don't get into JHU ED, I am for sure going to Minnesota. My sister goes to Carlson, and my uncle went (where he invented microwave popcorn). There are usually planned activities via each dorm, otherwise on campus there are always events running. We even had a carnival once. Sports are really big, especially hockey. There is a movie theater in Coffman, which is free, and there is also one on the St. Paul Campus, which is also free. There once was a drag show in Coffman, which was quite entertaining. This coming weekend Cloud Cult, if you are familiar with them, is preforming at Coffman for like $5. Once you sort of figure out your clique of friends, Minneapolis has so much to offer. My friends like going salsa dancing at the famous daves in uptown, the giant sculpture garden, and getting chinese food at this great cheap place on campus.</p>
<p>I know Chicago has more to offer than the Twin Cities, but I prefer just the overall style to the Cities as opposed to Chicago. It just has that natural fill while still being a large metropolitan area.</p>
<p>I really don't understand the hype with state street. All that interesting is there is drunk people on weekends...</p>
<p>State Street seems like a more popular version of Dinkytown to me. </p>
<p>cwat, what are some of the nicer residence halls at the dorms for freshman?</p>
<p>well if you went to carlson, you would live in middlebrook, which is closest to carlson. both my sisters lived there and they really liked it. it is a mostly freshman dorm, and also contains the honors dorms. the bank that has the business school also has art and music kids, so you would be living with them. i've heard the drama kids can be a handful, but what can you expect. i've eaten there a couple of times and it was good. there is definitely variety. campus meals plans also contain flexdine which acts sort of as a giftcard to a bunch of restaurants on campus. the rooms are really quite nice, i feel like they are adequately sized. middlebrook is considered one of the nicest dorms on campus, and it is fairly obvious why. now if you were looking for more of a party lifestyle, you would live on the superblock, which contains more of the older dorms and IT and CBS kids. they have a rep of being a bit roudy, are just down the street from frat row, perpendicular to Washington(the main street), and a minutes walk from most classes and dinkytown. Someone apparently are known to be gross, but they are also significantly older than the other dorms. There is also Sanford hall, which is kind of in a world of its own outside of dinkytown, but also has a very good rep of being friendly and clean. Sanford has its own little bus system that takes kids around because it is sort of out of the way, but located near the human behavior sector of campus.</p>
<p>State Street also has dozens of restaurants, lots of local shops, and the new Madison Performing Arts Center that has dozens of major shows every month in a beautiful modern building you can walk to. There are many people out there during the day too and nobody is drinking except the homeless guys. On Saturday you have the awesome Farmers Market. To say State Street is just for drinking is to be uniformed. The street is busy Day and night.</p>
<p>Nobody from outside the campus area comes to Dinkytown to have fun. State Street attracts non-students as well as students.</p>
<p>I cannot deny that if your goal is to get a job in the Twin Cities, U of MN supports that goal better.</p>
<p>I never had problems having fun in Madtown without drinking. I knew people who did have such problems, but I didn't view their problems as endemic to UW and Madison, only to their own personalities.</p>