@TimeUpJunior : Uhmm, I don’t think merely it being the Commons does that. I think when you throw a diverse crowd of freshmen together in a single cohort, that is what happens. Only in later years may some self-segregation develop as cliques and friend groups are somewhat solidified. That sort of living situation or different variations of it is very common at private colleges (especially elite privates) now. What matters more than the robustness of the programs is the buy in to said programs and what students choose to do with their time. Any student at these selective schools who wants a diverse group of friends will easily find it regardless of the housing situation. I feel as though a lot of the connections start to form during the orientation programs which can sometimes function independently of reshalls.
@srk2017 : “It all comes down to how you approach college life”
This…is very important. Yes, there are definitely factions/clubs (w/e) that could play a large role on a campus that are not particularly diverse in demographics/ideas, but you don’t have to be a part of them, and if you are, you can do things differently. No one can stop you. It is the students life and happiness.
I think all this concern over “culture being different” and stuff is too prevalent and overblown and people should start looking into other reasons that they may select one school over another. While there are some cultural differences among these selective schools (that may be governed by: Are there D-1 sports? Are they important to the student body? is it a super STEM heavy or engineering school?), they are actually alike in many ways. But generally “extremely beautiful campus and politically liberal” will not do much to narrow things down. Basically all of them meet such a criteria
@northwesty : While not a “southern” country club, let us keep it real and recognize that most of these top public and private schools are very much like country club like regardless of all of the SES diversity they market. All the money spent on landscaping, new buildings, and amenities are students’ and parents’ monies going towards living a very comfortable lifestyle while there (slightly understandable given their costs). When new buildings are constructed outside of dorms (some schools will claim re-organization of reshalls and new construction here is supposed to impact educational mission, and it may. But let us be honest and recognize that one of the main reasons is to simply have shinier accommodations for marketing purposes), stadiums, gymnasiums, and dining halls, they hardly have much different in store for undergraduate education. For that reason and my own experience with one, I get a largely country club vibe from virtually all of these places. Do they value UG education more than most places? Of course. Can most do much better? Yes. It is just more convenient and easier to focus on the comfort and happiness of students in other areas and it has a much bigger return in things like rankings USNWR as well (like you don’t have to change or improve academic programming to move up or down in those rankings. If you focus on brand and comfort building, this will positively impact most of the scoring criteria more than other things that I find important)
I feel as if every student at these very expensive privates and publics should be writing articles or reflecting like this:
http://vanderbilthustler.com/featured/looking-inwards.html
It is nice to have a great time and “love” a place, but sometimes, students and parents can afford to set the bar a little higher for the institutions in terms of the product provided and produced. As far as I am concerned VU’s culture looks pretty much like everywhere else’s (its peers that is).
The only annoying part of that article to me is this strange talk about a lack of competition and abundance of cooperation comes up when students at elite schools are bragging about or trying to sell their school as if it is an exceptional characteristic. This is not uncommon. In fact, it seems that schools known to be overly competitive are exceptional. I feel as if he did a good job except for that cliche.
The OP should really find alternative criteria and stop worrying about this stuff which I find a little petty considering the commonalities among high ranked privates. There will be many weaknesses and strengths that they pretty much all share IMHO.
@ChiliEnchiladas “Vanderbilt because it seems like a really awesome place to study and has programs in all of the areas that I’m interested in…”
Go a little deeper and instead explore if these are areas of strength for VU undergraduate education. Many places will be great places to study that “have” your programs of interests, but do they have programs within those programs that draw you or set them apart from similar programs. You want to look for such places. Set the bar higher and go back and research what the departments of interest offer.