Boston College Top Questions

BC is a great place to go to school. There are so many opportunities to do fun things both on campus and off campus. You not only are in the suburbs which makes you feel safe but you also are so close to the city, so you have the chance to go out and explore the things that make you feel like you fit in. There is a lot of school pride on campus at BC but unfortunately the people in the surrounding communities do not feel the same. The size of the school is great because you have the chance to meet new people everyday, but you also see a lot of familiar faces walking to and from class. The overall big picture is that there are a lot of great kids here with a great future ahead of them, and the faculty and staff are appreciate that they are working with some bright students with booming personalities.

I think that BC is the perfect balance of a lot of things. It is not too big, but definitely not too small. I can still go out at night and meet tons of new people, yet a have a large group of really good friends. Though the school is in the suburbs of Boston, access to the city is so easy that we get all of the benefits of being a city school without actually having to deal with the city daily. BC has its own campus, which is beautiful all year (though some people don't know how to appreciate the winter). There are so many things for people to get involved in, that if anyone complains about being bored it's because they clearly aren't trying to be a part of anything. Though athletics sometimes seem to be help on a higher level than academics, going to a school with a strong and enthusiastic athletic program is awesome. The school comes together and you really feel like something. I think that my favorite thing about the school is that for the most part, students know how to take their education very seriously and work hard, but they also definitely know how to kick back and have fun.

BC is an unreal place to be for the best four years of your life. There are tons of colleges, large and small, within a taxi ride away, so any time you want a different scene, you can get one. The best thing about BC is its location and the feel of a real college campus. 15 minutes from Fenway and the North End or Fanuiel Hall... yet you could think the campus was in the middle of a small town. A gorgeous campus with great architecture and layout. The worst part is probably the way housing works. Not that it's a life or death situation, but the housing lottery is a stressful time of year, and the sheer lack of space makes some living situations less enjoyable than others. I was stuck in "bad" freshmen housing, then "bad" sophomore housing, and then "bad" senior housing, but I loved every experience that came from each year. If you are good at making the best of situations, and not worrying about status or location of housing, you're going to have a great time wherever you are. The school spirit is not a real high-point of BC and its athletics. Everyone loves the college, but we travel TERRIBLY to away football games, and even have home games where the weather or too much tailgating takes away from the student section. Its sad when a big football game is on campus and there are empty seats around the stadium.

BC is a school who is so concentrated with trying to be recognized with the ivy league and prestigious schools of the country, that they are killing the student school spirit. Students are too worried about classes and work to have any free time other than to go to the plex let a lone have a job. The police on campus are terrible and break every decent party up that the school has. The bus system is pathetic and the worst is the housing situation. I understand the school want more students, but try building more dorms first instead of forcing students to live in shit hole dorms or off campus apartments. The dorms here are worse then any of the schools i've visited all over the country. Theres no parking anywhere, and if you find a spot you get towed. The athletic teams are all very good but nobody gives two shits because they are too concerned with getting their homework done on a saturday. People think they have school spirit but they dont. At a school with real spirit, professors dont even assign work because there are big games coming up. And when the football team goes to a bowl game, or the hockey team to a national championship, students actually go! The big picture is that the schoo is more concerned with itself than its students. It basically uses its students by pulling in the smartest ones out of highschool feeding them with religious experiance crap so that they can leave, make money, and then come back to BC and donate all the money. The football team funds all other athletics because they cant raise enough money on their own to self support. Yet we only sell student tickets for a couple months before the season and only to so many students because we want to save the rest of the seats for the alumni assholes who donate money and sit down the entire game. Our opposing fans section is as big as our superfan section.

BC is a cool school to go to. The school spirit here is amazing something that I had never experienced until this year, coming from a very small highschool that didn'e even have a football team. The campus is beautiful too, lots of grass, and the city is only a 20 minute t-ride away. When I have time in-between classes, I usually hang out in the rat, its almost impossible not to see someone you know there. The dorms are fairly nice, some of course, nicer than others. I got the shaft this year and got stuck over on Newton. Everyone told me that I would learn to like, like the "going home" feeling but it really just proved to be a pain in the ass, especially being on a team where practice takes 5 hours out of your day. I was never here and since in the beginning, all my friends were on the team and they all lived on main campus, I spent all my time over there. The bus pain is awful, unreliable, especially on weekends, ive waited upwards of 30 minutes for a bus which is just ridiculous. Forced triples on upper get money for being inconvenienced...hello? Newton sucks and I didn't ask for it. But I guess its the luck of the draw, some people got shafted again next year though and have to live on upper with the new freshman because of an unlucky lottery number. I think if people are going to be forced to live a 10 min bus ride away from main campus one year, they should at least be guaranteed lower the next. Sorry for ranting about the housing situation, I just really hate it and think its a shitty system.

The best thing about BC, for me, is the sports. Some of my best memories involve BC Athletics, whether its football, hockey or basketball. The size of the school is ideal, it's big, but not so big that you feel like a brick in the wall. It's big enough, however, that you never stop meeting new people. The administration is a bit strict, but it's always easy to find something going on, especially since you are so close to the city.

bc is really the perfect combination of academic difficulty and a great social scene. It's pretty well-known that bc has great academics, but a lot of internships and business companies who come here talk about the fact that although many see bc as a level below the ivy leaguers, bc grads often get jobs that the ivy's can't because of the combo of smarts and social skills where many ivy kids are just nerds. there is a lot of work on the weekdays, but bc is greatly underestimated when it comes to parties. friday and saturday are always lively, both on and off campus, and most thursdays too are bc party nights. also, on low work weeks for many students and/or big events, many students will go out over a night in the library. for example, red sox games, celtics, concerts, bc sporting events. sports are Awesome at bc, not only at the varsity level, but throughout. the club teams are all really good, and the intramurals are even really competitive. becasue bc admissions puts so much emphasis on extracurriculars, tons of the students played varsity sports in high school, so the fan base gets really into it, and also turns into a good-looking campus. i would guess about 75 percent of guys were captain of a sport in their high school, and about 40 percent of the gals. so football games are an entire day of tailgating, and all the sporting events have a great atmosphere.

BC is just the right size and has great opportunities for everything you want to do. Everyone is really involved and people are encouraged to become better people, not just good students.

Chestnut Hill is not a college town at all. Almost all students live off campus junior year, and almost all of them get in severe trouble with the police. It is impossible to have a party without the cops/off campus RA coming, this is especially true because most of them are under 21. BC wants to expand its campus, but to do so, it must have the support of the neighbors. Therefore, they want to stop all off campus partying, so that the neighbors are happy and will let BC grow. Thus the student body suffers. College students drink a lot, there's nothing that you can do about that, but BC tries to get us in unnecessary amounts of trouble. The Mods are the greatest part of BC. I live in the Mods as a senior, and I could not be happier with them. They are a small townhouse community on campus made up of 78 townhouses, with six seniors in each. They are great for throwing parties and especially great for tailgating before football games. The Mods are one of the most important part's of BC campus. Almost all seniors move back on campus senior year, and I think that is one of the things that makes BC so special. As I mentioned earlier, it is very hard to have fun living off campus because the cops break up almost every party. Thus, spending senior year on campus is great because it allows all of the seniors to enjoy their last year in college without any threats of getting in trouble with the law. It's also nice because all of your friends live relatively close to one another, making it easier to stay in touch with all of the friends you've made over the last four years. I think BC is just the right size, at about 2,000 per grade. One thing that was very difficult about my adjustment to college was living on the Newton Campus freshman year. The Newton Campus houses approximately half of the freshman class and is located a little over a mile from campus. Students must take a bus to and from campus for classes and any other events. Making the adjustment to college was very hard to begin with, but having to wake up extra earlier and wait in the freezing cold for a bus every morning, made it even more difficult. Needless to say, my attendance in class and my GPA suffered freshman year as a result. Looking back as a senior, I have a tremendous amount of "Newton Pride." However, I was not nearly as happy to be there when I was a freshman. Living so far away from the rest of BC made it very hard to have a social life (aka go to parties, make friends with upper classmen, make friends with the other half of the freshman class, etc). I joined the frisbee team my junior year, and that was probably the best decision I made in college. I became friends with a bunch of BC student's with the same fun loving sense of humor that I have. It has been a great opportunity for me to get into the best shape of my life, all the while playing a game that I absolutely love. The friends I have made from the frisbee team are some of my best friends in college and will definitely stay with me for years to come. I think it is very important for students to get involved in college in order to make friends who have similar interests. BC does not have any greek life, so it is hard for a lot of students to find a good group of friends. The frisbee team has been that group for me. Not to mention, we're absolutely nasty at frisbee and finished 18th out of 80 teams at a national tournament in Las Vegas last month.

BC is awesome in that is is right outside of the city so it still has that closed campus feel while Boston is a t-ride away. While at first the size of the school may seem overwhelming, you soon see the same people all the time and it begins to feel more personal. When not at classes most student spend time at the Plex working out, hanging out with friends, going out to eat, shopping, and of course going out on weekends. Having D1 sports is awesome because there is usually a game to look forward to and football games are a ton of fun. There is usually somewhere to go on the weekends, however it can be difficult at times to find plans. Once you get to BC, you realize that partying usually takes a backseat to studying.