Johns Hopkins University Top Questions

Hopkins students are often pegged as being addicted to studying, with no interest in having fun. The reality is that Hopkins students have a sort of "work hard play hard" mentality. While the week can be a lot of work, come the weekend Hopkins students really know how to relax and have a good time! All the things to do around campus make it easy to maintain a balance between work and play that fits each individual. For example, while a student may spend most week nights in the library, on Friday they will probably go to a party or hang out with friends, and have all weekend. Students find many ways to release the stress of the week during the weekend.

Hopkins students are often pegged as being addicted to studying, with no interest in having fun. The reality is that Hopkins students have a sort of "work hard play hard" mentality. While the week can be a lot of work, come the weekend Hopkins students really know how to relax and have a good time! All the things to do around campus make it easy to maintain a balance between work and play that fits each individual. For example, while a student may spend most week nights in the library, on Friday they will probably go to a party or hang out with friends, and have all weekend. Students find many ways to release the stress of the week during the weekend.

The stereotype of Johns Hopkins is that everyone is science driven and the social life is abysmal. However, that is not the case. Specifically, in my time at Hopkins I have met a variety of people whose academic interests vary along with their professional goals. An aspect of Hopkins that I didn't expect was the heavy presence of Greek life. Although a small percentage of the student population is involved in Greek life, most of the people involved on this campus are in Greek life.

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Everybody thinks that Hopkins is made up of competitive nerds that never crawl out of D-Level in the library. I think there are definitely a few of those, but for the most part, I've never come across too many. In fact, the majority of people I meet are friendly and happy to go out of their way to help out. It's a tough school--it'll be hard to pull through with your sanity, a social life, and good grades without a little camaraderie and late nights working on homework in your dorm common room.

One stereotype is that there is cut-throat competition at the school. This isn't accurate. Although, there is a little competition, it's certainly not cut-throat. It's very possible to find a person to partner up with for studying or to borrow notes from if you ever miss a class.

Stereotypes of Hopkins students usually characterize the student body as cutthroat and science-centric. I think that both stereotypes used to be true, but are no longer valid. Based on my experience, Hopkins students are motivated and ambitious, but not cutthroat. Students compete not with eachother but against their own expectations. Hopkins remains the best research institution in the US, but has vastly diversified its academic strengths in the past few decades. Many students come to Hopkins knowing only its science programs, but find once they are there that Public Health, Writing Seminars, International Relations or Economics is more interesting to them. As an undergrad, I see a huge range of majors and interests every day.

Most people think that Hopkins students are incredibly competitive and unfriendly. This is incredibly false and I have found the students to be one of the best attributes of the university.

Everyone is pre-med - totally false. International relations is a really popular major, and our Writing Seminars and Art History departments are among the best in the country. Most of my friends actually aren't pre-med and are very well rounded students.

A stereotype at Hopkins is that we are all cutthroat people that will do anything to succeed. Yes, we are dedicated and driven students. I have NEVER encountered anyone who tried to make me fail so that they could do better. In fact, I have done a lot of work in groups where people definitely try to help others understand the material.