I have heard from people that go to U Chicago and online that it is very intense and that it is only for specific types of students. I obviously understand that it would be intense as it is a top 5 school however I have heard that many students really struggle and are very stressed. Could any current students please comment on this?
Hello! I’m a physics major at uchicago currently doing some (paid) physics research on top of all the other extracurriculars I enjoy, so I think that my schedule/workload might be one of the more rigorous that you’ll see from this school. Honestly I’ve found that the people who complain about how stressful and hard the workload is are the people who want attention for one reason or another. Yes, the workload is hard. No, it is not as ridiculously stressful as people make it out to be. Everyone who chose to go to uchicago chose to come here knowing that it would be more difficult/rigorous than the other schools we got into, but we still chose this school because we wanted the challenge and we knew that it would make us more intelligent people in the long run. This school is for “specific types of students” in that it is for the type of student who is not looking to coast through college and who wants to be pushed because they know that it will benefit them in the long run.
I also happen to be in greek life so I can say that my social life has been great. I can go out and party and get stupid drunk with my friends if I so choose, but if I have to stay in and finish a pset no one is going to bug me about it. Believe it or not, we do love to party at this school. We just know that academics have to come first.
Thanks @tawsch
I’ve been thinking about an answer to this question ever since seeing [url=<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19416972/#Comment_19416972%5Dthis%5B/url”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19416972/#Comment_19416972]this[/url] reply on the applicants page. Everything that person said is completely correct. They didn’t even exaggerate. All of that is true.
It is disingenuous every time an admissions counselor brushes aside questions about the workload here and the tour guides are told to never, under any circumstance, say the word intense. Because the truth is that UChicago is hard, UChicago beats you down, UChicago is stressful, and UChicago is (as much as the admissions officers are scared to tell people) intense - just like every other elite school where you are thrown in with a subset of the highest achieving group in America.
But that’s such an incomplete view of the school. The view of UChicago as only a giant pressure cooker filled with unhappy people misses so many things about here that makes so many of us so happy we go here.
It doesn’t capture the professors who care about us enough to live up to even the most absurd brags by small liberal art schools. It misses the people you’ll meet here, in your house and classes, who care about literally every subject imaginable in that way that you always cared about whatever it is that got you in here and that you thought you would never meet someone like you in that way, let alone so many of them. It glosses over your classes themselves, where you learn more than you thought possible in 10 weeks. Sure, your grades might not be the best at the end, but you are sure you outlearned your friends at other schools. It doesn’t leave any room for the 2 am excursions to Clarke’s, 1 pm trips to Rajun Cajun, and noon romps to the Art Institute. It only sees the bad in the challenge, not the ecstasy of suddenly solving that problem on your p-set, the beauty of your essay congealing into something that makes sense and may even be insightful, and the simple joy of studying quietly with people you could not conceptualize existing before you got here.
The truth is there are many people here who regret coming here. If you are thinking about coming here because you want good grades to get into the medical school of your choice or because it has the best US News rank of any school you got into, I would stop and think very carefully about what you want out of the next few years of your life. Do you want to learn a lot about things that might appear useless, pointless, or simply a waste of time, spending hours learning for the sake of learning? Do you want to work a lot, like, a lot? As much as many people here enjoy it, for some people here it really is hell, like making a non-runner do a 5k every week with a marathon at the end. Do you mind being challenged, more challenged than you’ve ever been in your life, mostly by things that will probably never directly come up again in the rest of your life?
I absolutely think UChicago is only for certain kinds of people. It has nothing to do with partying vs not partying or life goals or personality or anything else. It’s simply for people who want to learn a lot for the sake of knowing more things and are willing to work hard for it. Come visit for the overnight and consider your choices carefully before committing.
First off, I think people do go through periods of stress at Harvard, Yale, and Stanford. They certainly did back in the day, when I spent time and knew lots of people at all three. And I think they still do now. My childhood best friend has a kid at Yale now, and she loves it, but there have definitely been periods when she has been freaking out because of the stress. I don’t know any current Harvard students, but as of a few years ago I think what I understood as the typical Harvard dynamic still applied – some people very oppressed by the idea of Harvard, and the idea that somehow they are not succeeding at Harvard the way they had hoped, and others oppressed by the fact that so many people around them are oppressed that way. And Stanford was, and still is, famous for the “duck” syndrome, where everyone tries to look like they are floating placidly on the pond, while underwater and out of sight their legs are paddling furiously. It took my sister two whole years at Stanford to figure out that people were really working hard, not succeeding effortlessly. She couldn’t understand why she was working so hard with only middling success.
Two things are slightly different at Chicago vs. HYPS. First, at Chicago, the academics are completely central to people’s experience, and that’s not so true at Harvard or Stanford, and it’s not quite as true at Yale and Princeton. At Harvard, all but a handful of students seem really to focus on their extracurricular activities rather than their coursework. And the extracurriculars can be very competitive and very time-consuming. Harvard and Chicago are the same size; Yale is a little smaller. Read a couple of issues of the Crimson, the Yale Daily News, and the Maroon (and remember that the former two publish six issues per week 30+ weeks, while the Maroon publishes three per week 27 weeks). Or listen to a Yale a cappella group and then a Chicago one. It will be instantly clear that Harvard and Yale students work much harder on their newspapers and singing groups than Chicago students do. So at those other schools, a lot of the stress occurs around things other than academics, whereas at Chicago everything, including stress, attaches to school work.
Second, HYPS students are always being told what hot stuff they are, how wonderful, how extraordinary. They look in the mirror a lot and tell themselves that. That’s not the culture at Chicago at all. Mostly they are being told that they have a lot to learn before they can really do first-rate work, and they don’t spend a lot of time fending off tourists who want to gawk at their wonderfulness. So I think lots of HYPS students are confident that they will come out on top no matter what, while Chicago students are always thinking about how much better they could be doing, how far they are from real expertise and real intellectual rigor. And a side consequence of this is that HYPS students don’t like to complain much, or ask for help, because it makes them look weak and unsuccessful, while Chicago students enjoy complaining and looking to one another for support quite a bit.
MIT is a lot like Chicago in these regards, I think. There is a lot of IHTFP there, but students are also very proud to be there and not wishing they were someplace else much at all.
Of course, all of these points are caricatures and over-generalizations. All of these colleges have diverse students with diverse experiences, and they are much more similar to one another than they are different. The differences are matters of nuance, not fundamental differences.
My kids went out plenty at Chicago. One quarter, my daughter was actually working ~30 hours/week for the University in three different jobs until they cut her off because she had qualified as a full-time employee. Plus going out all over the city, plus extracurriculars, plus taking a full class load. She’s organized and efficient, and she didn’t get A+ in everything, and she was a third year, not a first year, but her experience shows it’s possible to go to the University of Chicago and not spend 50-60 hours/week on academics. (She was probably spending 30-40 hours/week on her courses.)
When I went to Harvard (many years ago), undergrads there wanted to be rich or famous or in positions of power or, most likely, some combination of the above. Ambition and self-confidence – not intellect – was what distinguished Harvard students. And/but, if you were intellectual, there were amazing resources and professors tended to notice/encourage you. (They talked me out of law school and into academia.). When I went to Princeton (a few years later, for grad school), people were already rich, expected to be in positions of power, and mostly wanted to get drunk, LOL – at least that was my perspective as a preceptor. There were some very smart students, but most kept that fact under wraps.
From what I’ve seen and heard since, Harvard’s the same and more so (although it has expanded its outreach to include more ambitious and self-confident kids who wouldn’t otherwise aspire to or be able to afford Harvard). Princeton has upped its academic game and changed its demographics to some extent (less exclusively the domain of an hereditary WASP elite). Both are schools that require students to have a certain amount of brains and academic ability, but neither is a school where most kids are obsessed with whether they can master a field and contribute new knowledge to it. That’s just a funny little game professors play with each other.
Chicago seems to fall more into that last category and that probably contributes to the hothouse effect (as does the lack of mainstream name recognition). Maybe taking professors seriously/caring what they think of your work is what makes college difficult. And/or seeing your admission to an elite college as a chance to prove yourself – rather than a sign that you HAVE proven yourself – is what make college stressful. Or having a cohort that shares these perspectives. I don’t know, but, whatever the reason, Chicago seems to attract/encourage kids who want academics to be hard and that becomes a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Thoughtful discussion. Appreciate that as I try to advise DD on her upcoming choice.
One more thought (as an old alum of UC): The core likely increases stress level during the first 1-2 years. For the STEM kid, having to read ancient tomes and write a thoughtful, cogent paper every week or two (assuming 3 papers/Q for Hume and SocSci) can add massive stress. There were those, like my math genius friend, who didn’t care and put some word salad together for a paper and barely passed the classes, but for those of who cared, we spent a lot of time and energy staring at a blank page on a Smith-Corona. In the end, I loved the Common Core and greatly appreciate what it has done for me in my subsequent life, but I do believe it can significantly increase the misery index in the early years. I expect the upper classmen are significantly happier overall. We certainly were.
And the quarter system, which I also appreciate, drives a pretty relentless pace.
ihs76 may to have to explain what a “Smith-Corona” is to the younger posters.
Typewriter? I think I have one of those - it’s like a remote, but for VHS players.
To contribute a bit to the question of what makes Chicago more academically rigorous, so to speak, than other comparable schools…
I’ve come to believe that the supposed requirements of gaining admission to these top schools (high SATs, APs, etc.) are not an indication if the kind of workload a student will be facing. A school can say they only want the best and the brightest, but that does not guarantee that those brains will be exercised to great length. Chicago is one of the few schools, I believe, that accepts intelligent students because it is a school where those students will be truly tested. Other, less brainy, pupils would likely be unable to rise to academic challenges here. In contrast, schools like Harvard, Yale, Stanford, etc. accept such impressive students because they can (due to their reputation) and doing so improves their own reputation. The academics at those schools might not be any more difficult than another school in the United States with a good set of professors, but it’s the prestige and the alumni network that rakes in high achieving students. This is all my take in this stuff, and of course there are many schools like Chicago that accept intelligent students because of the high intensity workload (like MIT, Caltech, HMC, etc.). This leads to a student body at Chicago that cares less for prestige and wealth and more for intellectual challenge (with the exception of econ majors). And yes, we can be self-deprecating at times, but that is central to the UChicago culture and is rarely sincere. There’s a reason Chicago has one of the highest first year retention rates in the country, and it’s because we all want to be here and, deep down, know that we are gaining more than we are losing.
I don’t have a sense that UChicago is particularly strong in supporting students who are struggling. Some schools really encourage mentoring of younger students within a major, offer a lot of tutoring options and even extra small credit courses for students who have trouble in an area, pre-semester programs in a few subjects to get students off on the right foot, etc. I think in STEM subjects in particular this can be stressful for students. I think of it is somewhat Darwinian compared to some of the other more stressful schools (Mudd & Swarthmore come to mind as schools that also have a reputation for big workload, but I think they provide more student support).
Chicago was (is?) strikingly Darwinian at the grad level. The PhD programs I applied to (and later at the school where I taught) all guaranteed 4 years of funding. Don’t know if this is still the case, but back then, grad students at Chicago had to compete for funding anew each year. That seemed brutal.
Re Chicago being a school where intelligent students will be truly tested. I know my kid shares this impression (and it’s what made UofC her top choice), but it just strikes me as an odd mindset. If it’s intellectual challenge you want, there’s plenty of it at Harvard or Princeton. But it’s not forced upon you. (Except the senior thesis at P’ton). College is largely what you make of it at both schools and, in that respect, given the level or resources available, the sky’s the limit. There’s no core, but there are a dazzling range of classes there for the taking. To put this a different way, I don’t think there’s anything you can do as an undergrad at Chicago that you couldn’t do at HYPS. (Unless you’re a Prineton undergrad looking for medical research opportunities during the school year).
So what’s the appeal of the intellectual boot camp approach? Is it the search for a like-minded cohort? A desire to resist or postpone intellectual specialization? A recognition that you may follow the path of least resistance and end up regretting it unless that path is pretty damn steep and scenic? To me, “they will make you (and everyone else) do stuff you wouldn’t do voluntarily, they will expect you to do it well, and they will make it quite clear if you don’t live up to their exceptionally high standards” just doesn’t sound like a description of a “dream” school. What’s the allure of that aspect of Chicago? (For what it,'s worth, I totally get/share the belief that UofC is a first-rate university with amazing resources in a great city and I could certainly see it being choice-worthy compared to any other US school on those grounds. I’m just saying that, for me, as an undergrad, I’d be reaching that decision despite (rather than because of) the boot camp elements.)
Of the factors you mention, the like-minded cohort is first and foremost in my mind. While it’s true that students can find “their people” at any school, I prefer a university where focusing on academics before extraneous concerns won’t put you in the minority. I’m less interested in a student body where many gained acceptance because their parents are wealthy and influential, or where eating clubs/finals clubs/frats/Silicon Valley jobs are key concerns for a large subset of the class. Not that Chicago won’t have a Rockefeller or two get in that way, or the occasional frat boy (as recent events have reminded us), but the sons of Middle Eastern sheikhs or senators tend to choose other schools.
I also do find the boot-camp aspect appealing, to the extent you’ll know you really earned an A at the U of C. Princeton, minus the eating clubs and “Ivy for Southern gentlemen” aspect, matched what I’m looking for quite closely before they joined the rest of the Ivies in doling out As 60% of the time.
Finally, there’s something to be said for having classes taught by professors, and some people I talked to (including recent grads of two schools you mentioned) advised against their alma maters on this basis.
So there you have it. There’s no wrong choice when Chicago and a top-notch school on the East/West coast are the options, but I chose Chicago based on these factors.
Completely agree. My dorm-mate turned apartment-mate arrived very academically intense, having turned down Harvard to come to U of C. Remained intense, PhD at Princeton, now the president of a well known University. I don’t think U of C did anything for her academically that she would not have been able to do at any excellent U. Sounds like your daughter may be cut of the same cloth.
The difference for my friend may have been that by the end of the second year, pretty much everyone around her, even the bio majors like me, had read ‘Democracy in America’ and ‘The Republic’; that while the dinner conversation at the cafeteria did not often revolve around those topics, it was not uncommon for our shared reading to creep into a variety of conversations; that she could ask a bio major to take an off the record reading course on Jacob Burckhardt with one of the top profs at the College and the bio major would agree. That said, there were also plenty that would have said “Who’s that?”
I agree with the first part on this sentence only, and that only to the extent that eating broccoli is good for you in the end. Given the Darwinian tendencies of the U as a whole (although I hear the College is trying to smooth this out a bit), not everyone will be above average. If you get good grades, you make the Dean’s List and maybe PBK. If you don’t get good grades, you don’t. If you get bad grades, I expect they kick you out. I never felt any need/pressure to live up to anyone’s standards aside from my own.
Re wanting classes taught by professors.
Is there any evidence that the typical undergrad has fewer courses “taught” by grad students at Chicago vs. peer universities? I understand why LACs claim this as a comparative advantage – but Chicago is a major research university with very strong grad programs, and teaching experience is usually an important component of grad training and funding (in humanities and social sciences, at least).
@Intparent There are tons of free tutoring services. Professors are nothing but helpful during office hours. If you ask an upperclassmen for help, they will help. The 130s Calculus sequence is the exact same class as normal calculus with a grad student or upperclass math major assigned to give a special tutoring section once a week to answer any questions anyone has, and it isn’t the only class structured like that. UChicago does a fine job supporting the students.
The unhappiness of the students here has very little to do with people feeling like they can’t handle the work. It comes from people feeling like they’re taking classes they don’t care about for the core, people really wanting to just major in something practical (business, management, marketing, etc.) and have to settle for some subject they barely care about, or simply just wanting an environment where people work less.
Not as much as some of the other schools I listed offer. Undergrad teaching isn’t going to be the strength of UChicago anyway. I have talked to students there in the STEM majors in particular who feel like they aren’t well supported academically.
I disagree completely. Undergraduate teaching is a strength of UChicago. The professors are really good, available, committed to teaching, and don’t put as as an afterthought.
I don’t know any STEM students who feel unsupported academically. What you’re describing has not been my experience here at all, and not what I see from other students.
So I’m cool with hard classes and low grades, but are future employers? Do people in most professional fields know of UChicago’s reputation in that regard?