<p>As I understand it, CHP students can live in any hall; there likely isn't enough housing for all of the CHP freshmen in the designated halls. My kid is CHP, lives in non-CHP housing, but spends most free time in The Shire (Middle Earth CHP house). You won't feel left out if you join in the CHP activities, e.g. trips to shows, etc., as well.</p>
<p>ok thanks alot Fred's Mom
cuz i want to dorm with a friend who is not in CHP but i am afraid that i won't be able to know CHP people well enough.</p>
<p>thanks =]</p>
<p>hwama,</p>
<p>I know a few people that live in non CHP hall but are in CHP. You can still participate in CHP events, but there is no doubt that you will be out of the loop with other CHP freshmen. CHP activities are 2% of what it means to be a CHP student.</p>
<p>Those I know in CHP and non honors housing regret living in non honors housing. Honors housing means that you are around smarter and more hardworking people. People in honors halls all know each other, but people in non-CHP halls are usually more distant.</p>
<p>Meet new people. You probably won't get a bad roommate if you are in CHP. Do CHP housing. CHP housing is the best thing about CHP.</p>
<p>If you don't take my advice, you will regret it :)</p>
<p>btw, freds mom, there is enough housing for CHP, kinda. The spillover from loma/shire go to arroyo and Arroyo is half CHP half nonCHP.</p>
<p>@ShoeFactory: I am really very confused right now! :(</p>
<p>with what.</p>
<p>ShoeFactory:
Hi sorry i have a questionn is Arroyo the "AV" ppl r talking about? is it like in a really bad location?</p>
<p>thanks in advance=]</p>
<p>There is Arroyo in Mesa Court.</p>
<p>And there is Arroyo Vista (AV) which is a separate housing community. Mesa Court is only for freshmen, AV is for all undergrads.</p>
<p>I was talking about Arroyo in MC. MC is about 10-15 min away from campus. ME is about 3-10 min away. AV is about 20(?) minutes away. </p>
<p>There are honors houses in AV for 2nd thru 4th years (which is where I will be living next year), but you don't have to worry about that right now.</p>
<p>so if i live in Arroyo in mesa court it is about 50% CHP and 50 % non-CHP and they can dorm in the same room?
sorry for bothering u but i am just reallyy...nervous right now. haha</p>
<p>thx!</p>
<p>No, you can't choose to live in Arroyo. Only MC non honors or honors. (You can choose theme halls but its all luck based.) And there is no guarantee that there will be a CHP/non-CHP hall next year. </p>
<p>I really advise you to just tell your friend that you want to live in CHP. You'll have plenty of time to hang out with her.</p>
<p>okk i got it i will tell herrrrr</p>
<p>thanks for all the useful info! :)</p>
<p>uci was my backup as well. i got accepted to uc davis and uc irvine, REJECTED from ucla. it was a pretty clear choice to me between ucd and uci. i live like 30 minutes from uci and i don't think i can handle the weather of davis.</p>
<p>I can’t seem to grasp why UCI is a reject school to some people. For one, it’s at a nice location. How can there not be parties when it’s close to Newport Beach? Secondly, it’s a member of the American Association of Universities, mind you, Harvard and Stanford are also members, let alone Cal and UCLA. Not every UC is a member. Why would people stubornly only want to go to Cal and UCLA when they are so cut throat and crowded?</p>
<p>@trackprincess-Here are a few reasons why people might reject UCI:</p>
<p>UCI doesnt really have much going on, and nobody around here thinks of it much as far as school pride and Ive once never heard the phrase: ‘i love going to UCI’.
Everyone is just sort of unemotional about it or doesnt care about the school itself if you grew up in south orange county.
Its a great school as far as academics are concerned, but nothing really goes on because the city of Irvine is not fun at all (exception of the irvine spectrum really).
The city placed a lot of sanctions against the students as far as fun activities, college nonsense, etc.
Irvine is a huge planned community and has the nickname “university of chinese immigrants” due to its high asian population. </p>
<p>basically, as my friend who is now a current UCI senior once said to me: “its UCI dude, nothing ever happens here.”</p>
<p>This post two years old, so I’m not sure why you decided to dig this one up…</p>
<p>but as the original creator of this thread, I have to say I don’t even remember creating this thread 
Obviously since this was posted two years ago, my mind has definitely been changed. It’s time I put out an update for you guys. I’ll post a few opinions I have formulated over the past two years:</p>
<p>UCI has good academics. As with anywhere, you WILL find geniuses and compete with smart people. If you want research, the UROP program, yes, is very good to get you started. If you want an awesome location, yes we are smack dab in the middle of it all. The school has wonderful new buildings/facilities and they are always looking towards the future. If you want school spirit, will you know what? UCI has it, too. I have learned one other thing while being here at UCI. The dorm friends I made were just like me, we were all once skeptical of this school at one point. But we made the best of things, opened up our minds, went out to have some fun, and now we don’t regret any of our choices for attending UCI. If you talk to commuters, I am sure many will tell you UCI sucks. But that’s because being a commuter sucks with all the time you must spend in traffic and just going straight home. It’s like high school again, where you just come to go to school and that’s it. Maybe hang out with some old high school friends and then go home. But if you make an effort to go to events where other people are just as enthusiastic and make new friends it’s almost impossible to not grow some school spirit and love being here.</p>
<p>I am sick of UCI being labeled a “reject school.” People really need to grow up and stop bashing schools. If you like it, great, come here. If you don’t like it, go somewhere else or transfer. Come on, people. Don’t waste your time being somewhere you don’t want to be. But here’s the thing. If you are not a student and do not attend the school, you have no right to speak badly about it because you have never been a part of it. Would YOU listen to someone who bashes a certain city even though they don’t even live there? There’s this wonderful advice that has been floating around, and it’s this: “College is what you make it.” No matter where you go, whether it’s a community college or a small private college or a public university, it’s up to you to make it how you want it.</p>
<p>“Nothing happens in Irvine” is such a sad misconception. Yes, it’s true places in Irvine tend to be lights out and closed very early, but that shouldn’t stop you from starting up some fun here or going somewhere else to party your night away. If you want to keep busy with events, make some friends with connections, or join a club. If “nothing ever happens” it’s because you made the mistake of not doing anything. Protests, parties, volunteering events, talent shows, the possibilities are endless.</p>
<p>Academics-wise, UCI is not on the top of the list, but we are pretty high up there. Is that not good enough? If you want to get a job just because of a name, then yes, you should go to UCLA or Berkeley. But as far as undergrad goes for getting into grad school and etcetc, the name itself really shouldn’t concern you that much if you are a hard worker. If someone is worried about the name and write off UCI for being too easy, why don’t they just get a 4.0 GPA if it’s so easy here at UCI? A good GPA is just as important if not more than just being able to say you went to a well-known school with a crappy GPA, I’m sure. People make it sound like being an undergrad here is a breeze. What a misconception. It’s tough here too, depending on how demanding your major is, and you gotta work your way up there. </p>
<p>And finally, to address “too many Asians.” I was a kid back then, and I can immediately see it through reading my old posts. Come on. Are you really going to devalue a university because there are “too many Asians”? The reality of it is, California is a great place to immigrants to go to from overseas. California is a huge melting pot and there HAS to be a ton of Asians. No matter what UC you go to here in California, you WILL find a large population of Asians. We are all mature college students here (okay, so maybe not, but we SHOULD be) and it’s time to grow out of that racist mentality. Yes, there are a lot of Asians here at UCI, but what difference does it make? We are all human beings and we all have our own personalities. You want to find the “typical” nerdy Asian, yes you will find him/her. You want to find the party girls and guys, yes you’ll find those too. We all have different backgrounds and different likes. Of all the people you will meet in college, you should be noticing their personalities before you think to yourself “damn, another Asian.” From the moment I went to SPOP (orientation) to this very day, I do NOT notice how many Asians I meet and how many Asian friends I made. I notice how funny someone was, or how cool this person seemed, I first noticed how nice this girl is, etc etc etc. That’s where you can feel like you have grown up a little and things like whether this person is white or indian or black or asian should not matter anymore.</p>
<p>well said PoorCookie. u definitely made me feel mote confident as an incoming freshman</p>
<p>I can see that this started a long time ago but it is still relevant for people considering UCI this year so I will add my 2 cents since I live in the immediate area.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I don’t thgink that anyone could argue that academically this is not a very strong school. It is- In fact, many of the tutors I have used are UCI students.</p></li>
<li><p>Yes, it is heavily asian as is the city of Irvine and as are many of the other UC schools. I don;t think that would be a problem for me. Irvine, by the way has the largest Chinese population of all cities in the US.</p></li>
<li><p>Irvine is a great place to iive, very clean and safe. It’s right next door to Newport Beach, Disneyland is not far- there is so much to do!</p></li>
</ol>
<p>All that being said, there is no way I would encourage my kids to go to school there primarily because of all the conflicts with Muslim Student Union and the Freedom of Speech issues which are covered both locally and nationally. I think the university has a huge PR issue right now and many local business leaders are pulling back on their support. Until that gets resolved one way or another, I think UCIs reputation is tainted and it won’t have the respect of that the other Universities in the system have. </p>
<p>That’s just my take on it- and I’m not offering any opinion as to how it should be resolved only that right now it is viewed as a hot bed of unrest and if you can avoid being associated with that why wouldn;t you?</p>
<p>I don’t agree with you, 2flipper2 - There aren’t big issues with MSU on campus. I hear about them maybe once a year at most. I actually forget about their existence on campus 95% of the time. Admittedly, they do seem to make a lot of noise when they ARE in the news.</p>
<p>I heard about one Jewish group encouraging individuals to stop donating to UCI, but that was months ago and it hasn’t seemed to affect anything. In any case, I don’t think it’s hurt UCI’s reputation at all. And why would it? This is just one group of hundreds on campus. In fact, the university administration condemned the behavior of MSU protesters at the Oren speech.</p>
<p>2flipper2,</p>
<p>Irvine does not have the largest Chinese population of all US cities. In fact, Irvine only has a 10.5% Chinese population. Compare to other cities:
Monterey Park (41.2%), San Marino (40.6%), Arcadia (34%), San Gabriel (33.6%), Alhambra (33.1%), Rosemead (29.3%), Cupertino (23.8%), San Francisco (19.6%)…</p>
<p>The list goes on and on…</p>
<p>Also, the proper way to contract “not” is “n’t” NOT “n;t”.</p>
<p>lol. typo dude</p>
<p>This is what I have to say on the Asian issue with UCI.</p>
<p>I go to a liberal arts school which is quite “diverse.” The admissions committee has magically achieved that perfect ratio of something like 55% white, 20% Asian, 12.5% black, 12.5% Hispanic. It’s also - magically - 50% male, 50% female. There’s probably a person from every state in the United States. There are a certain amount of athletes, a certain amount of nerds, a certain amount of rich people, a certain amount of poor people, ad infinitum.</p>
<p>So sure, there’s “diversity.” If you look at the skin color of the campus, the range is all over.</p>
<p>Yet the actual character of these people is very homogeneous. If you talk to a person in my college, they’ll probably respond in a certain way. If you give them a problem, they’ll all come to the same answer. If you ask them about their political beliefs, they’ll inevitably say that gay marriage is a wonderful thing and that the tea-partiers are crazy. On the outside they may look different, but on the inside they’re all the same.</p>
<p>When I stayed at UC Irvine a while ago, things were completely different. Sure, there were more people with yellow skin compared to the national average. Yet the personalities of people at UCI were very, very diverse.</p>
<p>People at UCI were so much more normal than at my college. They were more like the people you’d talk to everyday on the street - not the generic highbrowed intellectual which composes 90% of my college’s population.</p>
<p>There were studious nerds who spent all day cramming. There were frat boys and sorority girls. There were “emo” groups, computer geeks, skateboarders, and everything else. I had dinner with a genki girl who laughed (and caused me to laugh with her) constantly and a graduate student who had no problem puncturing political correctness. You’d find not a single student of either personality at my campus.</p>
<p>So look past the surface. Look past the 50% Asian, 25% white, 15% Hispanic stats (which one could argue actually is quite diverse on the surface). UCI is very diverse in what really matters - the character of its student body.</p>