UR is one of 50 Most stressful Colleges?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Rochester
1

<p>I recently read a list of colleges that have been ranked as the top 50 most stressful Schools.</p>

<p>As a parent (who is stressed) of a D (who is stressed), do I want her to attend one of those schools that are already identified as being one of the 50 most stressful schools?</p>

<p>In particular, she is strongly considering both U of Rochester and Brandeis and am curious to any parent, student or Alum if they can address their experiences in terms of what they perceive as stress at either of those schools.</p>

<p>much thanks!</p>

2

<p>My d didn’t find it terribly stressful. Students didn’t talk grades, didn’t compare themselves to each other, and even the pre-meds studied collaboratively.</p>

<p>Of course, it’s not an easy school, so the stress my d felt was the stress she put on herself.</p>

3

<p>D2 was a pre-med double major at UR. </p>

<p>I think UR can be stressful place for science & engineering kids, especially if they are internally driven, competitive-type kids to start with</p>

<p>UR has alot of smart, highly competitive kids–most them in pre-med, engineering and econ. In those areas, while students do work cooperatively and aren’t cutthroat or nasty with each other, there is a keen awareness that there are only a limited number of As awarded and all these other smart kids are in direct competition with you for those As. There is an enormous weeding process in the first 2 years for all of those majors.</p>

<p>But this probably true at most colleges. It’s certainly true at Brandeis. (D2 has friends who attended Brandeis and they compared notes.)</p>

<p>I looked at Newsweek’s article about Stressful Colleges. Their methodology is highly suspect. They seemed to only look at US News ranking, COA, competitiveness of admissions and the on-campus crime stats. Not exactly a reasonable list of factors to measure student stress, IMO.</p>

4

<p>My guy isn’t finding it stressful. He enjoys his study groups and they actually do root for each other wanting all to do well. It is definitely a more rigorous school than many, but probably similar to Brandeis and other top schools.</p>

5

<p>There’s a parent on CC who’s had a child at Rochester and at Brandeis. Those two schools are compared a lot - do a search using Rochester and Brandeis as keywords and you’ll get several threads to read through.</p>

<p>I have two sons at UR and they both love it. Neither is stressed, although one became much happier sophomore year once he had his own room in a suite instead of a shared double - loved his roommate, but is a guy who needs privacy. </p>

<p>It may depend on what triggers stress for your D. As others have mentioned, courses can be very difficult, but the vibe among students is collaborative and the vibe with faculty is supportive. There’s lots of help with academic stress - approachable faculty, TA’s, study groups, etc.</p>

<p>If she gets stressed about comparing herself to other smart students, at least there isn’t overt competition, and to be honest, there really do seem to be enough opportunities for any student who wants to get into some research, so the fact that there’s enough to go around eases the stress.</p>

<p>Administratively, I can’t imagine a school doing a better job at not being stressful. Science and math classes don’t fill up, pre-requisites are easy to get, and if a student feels prepared, skipping a pre-req or co-registering in the same semester is easy. They have a very late drop/add deadline (4 weeks into classes, compared to most schools being a week or 10 days), and a very late deadline to switch a class to pass/fail, so there’s a feeling of limiting the risk in trying a hard class or overloading. The philosophy of the school seems to be to allow students to take on as much as they can or want to, and make it possible to extricate themselves if they get in a little too deep. </p>

<p>I can say, my kids and I would all feel stress if registration was a panicked mess trying to get into classes they need and getting on waitlists, etc. I’d also feel a lot of stress if it were difficult to find on campus housing (or off campus, if that’s what they wanted), or if there were frustrating bureaucratic red tape at every turn. The courses themselves being difficult is not a source of stress for my sons.</p>

6

<p>thanks for all the valuable replies!</p>

7

<p>My take is somewhat different than posted so far.</p>

<p>UR seems to be a place of good stresses. To explain, some schools tend to be impersonal or dominated by social groups - e.g., frats - in which you don’t fit and that is stressful. UR is not like that. </p>

<p>But UR is a place where, it seems, kids get involved in a lot of stuff. That stuff includes all sorts of groups and academic related work like research internships. Both take time. Groups take time and add a social component that takes time. Everything takes time, but it’s time that you commit to because you want to commit to it. That is what I call “good stress”; you choose to extend yourself and choose to take on the cost associated with that. And it means you’ve taken on the job of deciding what comes first when, which is somewhat stressful as well. </p>

<p>My kid has sworn me to secrecy regarding details, but each week is crammed with stuff. Some is schoolwork, some is group stuff, some is job stuff. I imagine, for example, that a fundraiser one group held last week took a lot of time to organize and that put stress on the rest of the week. But that’s what those kids chose to do.</p>

8

<p>We specifically avoided applying to schools with an uber competitive vibe amongst students because my son does not deal with that kind of stress well.</p>

<p>I can say it feels like they are really looking out for the kids. And that they get they’re young adults, not adults. You meet with an advisor at least once a semester if not more. My son has not had any huge classes this year. He has not felt competition or pressure amongst friends/classmates - the thing he was truly trying to avoid. You’ve heard the horror stories about certain schools only handing out so many A’s, B’s, etc. He didn’t want that.</p>

<p>Anytime he was confused or needed help at all, he has always gotten it. His professors reach out to him, have been very encouraging and the kids in Rochester kind of remind me of the friendly vibe you find in the mid-west. </p>

<p>I wonder if the top 50 top stressed schools are also the top 50 schools.</p>

9

<p>I wonder what puts Washington University in the top 5??</p>

10

<p>I just saw one of my son’s very best friends and her boyfriend who were in town this weekend-both sophomores at UR. They looked very happy to me! They both love the school-as I am sure my son would have if he had gone! </p>

<p>We had a nice chat about school and they are both very happy there. I know she is a smart hardworking young lady and I am sure she is working hard but she really does seem happy. We talked about how surprised we were that my son didn’t go too-she told me about all the things they planned on doing when they went there together. I didn’t know all of that and I did look over at her BF and was impressed that her obvious closeness to my son didn’t faze him in the least!</p>

<p>They visited him in Boston yesterday before they headed back to Rochester. I just wanted to share that when I saw this topic-I continue to have a very high impression of this school and am still surprised my son isn’t there!</p>

11

<p>Their methodology is more than suspect, it’s idiotic. If part of their criteria for stressfulness is admissions and the selectivity, that shouldn’t apply to current students because they already have been admitted. They passed that phase of waiting for the ‘thick envelope’ or more apt, the congratulatory e-mail.
Count the size of classes, the admission rate to professional schools or the non retention rate but don’t consider past events for current rankings…</p>

<p>Edit- i write as UR grad many moons ago and while it was competitive then, it was a healthy competition in a collaborative sense and apparently still is today.</p>