Hampshire College Top Questions

Druggies, Hippies, Hyper-liberal Activists, All Art and Gender studies, etc

Extremely liberal hippies who love nature, social change and challenging the status quo. Hampshire pretends to be radical but really just changes the mask worn over the exact same crap experienced by students at other "less radical" schools. Hampshire students are not very diverse. Everyone is an activist in a uniquely mass produced and common way. The truth is that Hampshire students are, or at least seem to be, almost entirely rich white suburban kids that are interested in "social change" but only so far as they can continue to buy their lattes and free trade skirts and vegan leather birkenstocks. Hampshire is an awesome place but not in the way they pretend to be. Hampshire is awesome because it first makes you hate your classes, then your teachers, then your friends, then yourself, then the school and then finally you come full circle and appreciate everything. Anyone who says Hampshire isn't cliquish has not taken part in the sick social experiment that is living in the on campus apartments known as "mods". Your first year you will meet a bunch of people and hang out in groups of ten and twenty people consistently. It is awesome and you feel loved. Then all your friends drop out because Hampshire can't retain it's original student body because it is such a weird and ridiculous place. Hampshire is also known for drugs and, truth is, drugs are well known to Hampshire. I would guess that nearly every student has smoked pot at least once and that 70{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} of students smoke at LEAST once or twice a week. Campus is a mecca for whatever tickles a person's fancy. Not everyone does drugs and most people don't go to class high but almost everyone knows how to have a good time.

Many people consider Hampshire a slacker or stoner school. I can see why this stereotype would arise about a college like this. There are no majors, no grades, no rules and it was established in 1970. Really, the truth is, that the fact that we lack majors and grades forces a student to make goals and standards for themselves. Most of the students that Hampshire accepts are overly ambitious students that do everything rather than just make the grade. So, I would argue, that Hampshire students often times end up doing more work in their undergraduate degree than many other students. But, it is also true that you can chose to make those standards and goals lax and not really do too much. But those are often the student that drop out. There are a lot of drugs at Hampshire. I have yet to see a keg on campus. But it is rare that I go a day without seeing some green.

That we are all dirty, hippies who smoke pot, drugs, etc. Also that Hampshire Halloween is huge and such a big deal. Also perhaps, that this is a pretty easy school.

There are a lot of stereotypes about Hampshire students, with both positive and negative connotations. There are the sort of stereotypes that the Admissions office tries to play up about Hampshire and the students: that Hampshire students are self motivated, passionate about their work, and fiercely independent. There are also the more negative stereotypes, perpetuated by people who know little else about the school other than they saw on the Saturday Night Live sketch "Jared's Room". These stereotypes usually talk about how Hampshire is a huge hippie school full of lazy drug-doing students who major in Frisbee and don't have to actually do any work.

Hampshire is just a bunch of rich liberal kids doing whatever they want. It's not a real school. They don't take test or have grades. It's a slackers school perfect for potheads.

We're all a bunch of pot smoking, liberal, open to anyone who wants to meander onto this campus, pretentious, hippies.

Generally? Fun-loving hippies that love to smoke weed. Liberal students, liberal professors. Lazy students, lazy professors.

a. pretentious, wealthy assholes who do a lot of cocaine and/or b. self-involved hippies who eat organic greens and tempeh every day and/or c. intellectuals, intellectuals, intellectuals who CANNOT stop talking about their taste in books, music, etc.

Stereotypes about college students are not indicative of what the college or its students are like. The type of stereotype that develop about the college are usually informed by personal experiences which, when shared with other in the college or outside of it, perpetuate these stereotypes.