Loyola University Chicago Top Questions

Sports such as Rugby, Lacrosse, Volleyball and Soccer Rugby is the partying crowd on campus and are known as such. It depends what dorm you are in. For freshmen dorms mertz and simpson they do, regis most do not. Sophomore dorms are apartment style, but most people know their neighbors. Popular events at Loyola? Thats a joke Dating scene? A quarter of the students are guys and half of them are gay, there is barely any dating scene. I met my closest friends in sports and on my floor in mertz. I'm in the Information Commons working on homework There's the loyola all-nighter and the big basketball game against UIC Depends who you are, you have the people who party once a month, which is the majority of the students, and then you have the people who party more than once a week It seems like a pretty good number of people are in them, but they don't run the campus or anything like that Partied every night nothing, the library isn't even open on saturday night. Well I guess you could go up to evanston and catch dinner and a movie Go downtown and walk around, go to evanston and watch a movie. Catch dinner somewhere around chicago. Go to bars/clubs.

One of the biggest organizations is AMSA, the American Medical Student Association. That's because a lot of people are Loyola are pre-health. I think it's a great club that exposes students to medicine to show them what it is really about, while promoting social justice. For those not pre-health, Loyola4Chicago is a community service organization with the goal to promote social justice while impacting the city around you. Loyola is big on social justice. Dorm life is different depending on where you live. I lived in Mertz my freshmen year, so people that lived in the "nicer" dorms would probably react with "Oh." I loved it. Mertz was the typical college dorm experience you hear about with community bathrooms, 20 million fire alarms in the middle of the night and especially during finals week, and just pretty much getting rowdy. It was great. It really depends on the people whether the doors are left open or not. My floor was a quiet floor and no one ever did. Contrast that to one of our notorious boy floors where everyone practically had their door open, music playing, and just chilling in the lounge until quiet hours. Dating scene.. Well, I think Loyola is close to 70{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} girls? Something that's way too high. So that leaves not many guys left. Of those guys, a lot of them are homosexual, so if you're a girl, that sucks for you. Then it always seems like the ones that are left are taken or just not ones you want to be with. So, I can't say I've had the most positive dating experience. But hey, you can always take the optimistic approach and think more time to focus on school, right? If I'm awake at 2am on a Tuesday, I'm probably walking back from the library because they close at 2. Or, I'm in my room studying. Also, if you want to party, you can find a way to party. You just have to be smart about it. From what I hear, Chicago police are really chill about parties they happen to bust. I think I've seen Facebook groups where policemen take pictures with the people at parties. The punishment for getting caught in dorm rooms for drinking is either a fine, fine and community service hours (again the social justice thing), or just entirely community service. Not too bad, but better if you avoid it alltogether and be smart about partying. If you're not into drinking, there is plenty to do..you're in Chicago! Go see a musical like Wicked, or rent board games from the Student Union, go out to eat.. just explore Chicago!

While many students stay active at work out frequently, participation in athletics in general is low. Turnouts at basketball games are low, but this may be because of a lackluster year. The same is true for other sports-athletics aren't that popular. Many guest speakers visit, and the theater/fine arts department has performances that attract a large number of students. The overwhelming majority of students take college and their classes seriously; in fact the library is open 24 hours during finals week. Loyola is a fairly conservative school, so this limits the fraternity/sorority scene. In fact,there is only one fraternity house; the goals of the Greek system at Loyola are geared toward community service-this is reflective of Loyola's mission and identity as a Jesuit university. While bars such as Hamilton's and P.Co's are popular, non-drinkers do not feel left out on weekends. Simply being in Chicago provides a million things do to, explore and learn about; visits to Chicago's museums, neighborhoods, art galleries and countless other attractions provides alternatives to the drinking/bar scene.

Let me start off by stating that fraternities are not very common. At all. I think there might be ten at most (boys, girls or co-ed). If there aren't and I am way off, it just tells you how people around here don't really know or care about them. There are no "houses" for frats or sororities, so they are more like clubs than an actual fraternity/sorority. There are many clubs, but many people do not care about them. I was "in" a club that is like an honors society, but we didn't do anything at meetings and frankly, I found it quite pointless. The only point of having the club was to have a club, and that was it. Plus, if you live on the Water Tower campus, it sucks to have to go to the other campus for nightly meetings, especially since most of them are on the Lake Shore campus. Only in freshmen dorms do students leave their doors open, and only in Mertz is it really predominant. Regis, Simpson, and other freshmen dorms do not seem to have that unspoken open door policy, since people keep to themselves there. In the upperclass dorms, the isolation is predominant as well. In Baumhart, it is like a hotel, so no one leaves their doors open to the hallway, especially since every door on every floor either faces another person's room door or the length of the hallway or whatever, so it'd be like someone is watching you whenever your door is open. As for the other dorms, the people keep their doors closed and locked for the most part, since building communities on floors is more of a freshman thing. Basketball games I would say are the only obvious athletic event we have here, and not many people go to them. Rarely will you hear of someone saying "let's go to the game tonight." A lot of people don't even know when our basketball team plays. There is little school spirit, regarding rooting for a team/mascot. As a girl, I can tell you the dating pool is limited. If the guy is not gay, then he already has a girlfriend (either at Loyola or another school) and if he is still single, then it probably means something's wrong with him. I met my closest friends simply from housing (my neighbors frosh year), or I already knew them from high school. Since I am in the city near several other schools, I often visit my friends who go to neighboring universities like Colombia or Northwestern. If I were awake at 2am on a Tuesday, I would be wondering why I was up so late studying. I am not a drinker, so I don't go out to bars or anything. I guess any other person would say that they were up because they were at the bars, but I would be the one either up because I was studying, or because I was hooked on a DVD set of a TV series or because I was up chatting with roommates. People party on the weekends, and you will see people in their "going out" clothes. There are a few bars nearby that surprisingly let in underage students pretty easily. You wouldn't expect that in Chicago, but it is very common for students to go to PCo's (The pumping company) and Hamilton's. Thursday is unofficially Thirsty Thursday, so it isn't uncommon for students to head out to party on Thursday nights. Last weekend I went with some friends to Oven Grinder's (a pizza place by the location of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre), then rented a movie to watch with a friend in my dorm room. Saturday I did laundry and sunday I wrote a paper. It was a lame weekend, but for me (again, b/c I don't drink), it was pretty entertaining. Also, it is winter, so I don't really want to go out anywhere because it's too cold. Had it been springtime, I'd probably have been out walking Michigan Avenue or hanging out at a park playing wiffleball. As for something to do on a Saturday that doesn't involve drinking, I am the one to ask since this is my forte. I would either have a party at my dorm room (like a costume murder mystery party) or see a movie, go to a restaurant, etc. There really isn't much to do that doesn't cost a lot of money and doesn't require a fake ID (like clubs). Off campus, I hang out in the city, like shopping on Michigan avenue, or go to the park and take goofy pictures with friends. If it is nicer weather (above 65 degrees) I'll walk around and just hang. There are a lot of touristy places people are obsessed with seeing if they go to school in chicago, but the less-obvious places are fun too. This includes the Belmont shopping area (off the Red Line stop on the El train), or even taking the El to a random destination and walking around to see some funky shops. There is a coffee cafe in this park near the downtown campus called Whispers Cafe that is nice to hang out at when it is nicer outside.

Intramurals, AMSA, COPA, others. In most residence halls, there are always people hanging out in the lounges. The main stage productions bring pretty awesome bands and comedians. There are always great speakers and dances that are held in amazing places around Chicago. I met my closest friends from the dorms. Traditions each year include St. Patrick's Day, fun on the beach. People party Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Frats are fine, but not necessary. Last weekend I hung out with my friends at their apartment. Chicago provides so much stuff that doesn't involve drinking. You can go to a play, museum, go out to eat, concerts, and so on.

If you want to be social on campus/drink/go out and are under 21 Get a fake ID. The bar scene is the way to go. This is where Chicago becomes an issue. The man nights to go out at Loyola are Thursday and Saturdays. Popular places to go are the two bars closet to campus (Hamilton's and P-Cos (Pumping Company)). Pco's is mainly a freshmen bar now because it's cheap and they are very easy on ID's. The problem with Chicago is people spread out so to go to other bars in Chicago so it's a little tough but thursdays is a main night to go out if you don't have anything to do. House parties are horrid, which is why you need a fake. Most are 5 bucks to get in they are packed and they run around at about 1AM or earlier saying the cops are here and to get out either because they want to finish tapping the keg themselves or they want to go to the bar. So mainly you pay five bucks and never get your full 5 bucks worth of beer. In addition people we'll go down to Depaul to see there friends and go to the bars down there or downtown it just depends. If you do live downtown you mainly go out downtown it's just rough to continuously keep coming down to Lakeshore campus from the Downtown campus. They are tight on alcohol in the dorms which is horrid and do rounds even as an upper classman and you can get in trouble for that which is horrible. I mean I'm 18+ years old why should I be treated like I'm 12 and have parents again? I'd say a fair amount of kids don't drink which means that they think they can ruin other's parties which absolutely sucks. However, there are kids who like to socialize as much or more than they study so it's not to bad in the end. Athletic events are bad unless it's a huge game, however the basketball team is easily spotted on campus and out so all the girls flock to them. Speakers series are okay I don't really attend them, and theater is fairly popular but I'm not those kind of people so I don't usually attend unless it's to support a friend. There are a fair amount of those poeple up here, artsy free-spirited type. I met my friends through my dorm and just being out and socialable. I didn't know anyone coming in but most kids know people coming in and run around with them. 2AM on a Tuesday you're probably studying, you are definitely not out, if you are you're the minority. Frats are worthless on campus, you don't need to be in one to make friends here and I actually recommend you don't be in one. Soroities are pretty big here so if your a girl I recommend joining one to meet people. There are four frats, three of them are pretty reputable but don't have their own houses. The other one (ADG) is a horrible frat known for drugging girls and they are just overall creepy. They actually do have a house but I tell anyone thinking about going to a party there just to stay away they are just creeps and not worth the time. Outside of that there's business frats and ethnicity frats but on the social scene they don't do to much but are good for networking. I just don't feel like I should have to pay for my friends especially at Loyola, at any other school is probably way different. Outside of that every answer can be pretty much described by it's Chicago. Therefore there is an absolute ton you can do without drinking but it isn't a state school so don't get confused.

Dating is so difficult. Loyola is approximately 70{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} women, so the odds are already not in your favor. Moreover, a good number of the available men here are gay. There goes another 15{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c}. If you're an eligible, straight man, Loyola is like a gold mine. If you're an eligible, straight woman, get in line. Coming in as a freshman is very easy. You're Residant Adviser will help you meet people, you're forced to room with someone, share a bathroom, and often a communal study area. It's very easy to make friends because everyone is in the same awkward situation you are. You'll meet people quickly out of neccessity. Being a transfer student is going to be difficult. You'll be living with someone you don't know, who already has an established group of friends. My best advice is to get involved in lots of clubs. We have something for every interest and they are very inviting. Planned student activities are the best way to meet people, and if you're really outgoing we do have a small, but active greek life.

There is a severe lack of a party scene. There are no frat houses at Loyola, although many fraternities and sports teams do rent houses around the campus to hold parties. The Greek life is not very prominent on campus, and most students do not participate. House parties are fairly uncommon, and most under-classmen resort to partying in the dorms. These “dorm parties” consist of a small gathering of students drinking, attempting to play beer pong with stolen furniture from the floor lounge, guitar hero, and some throwing up. Oh, and probably a visit from the RA. There are also two bars, Hamiton’s and P Co’s, where the majority of students go to party. For those that are over 21, there are plenty of clubs and bars in downtown Chicago. Loyola is definitely not known for being a party school; there are many students who drink, and many students who don’t. So it’s not a big deal either way. “Thirsty Thursday” is probably the most popular night for partying. There are also many other things to do on campus besides drinking. Being in the city definitely has it perks, and Loyola gives huge discounted tickets for sports games, Blue Man Group, concerts, musical theater, and haunted houses during Halloween. There are also annual dances, like the President’s Ball which was at the Navy Pier ballroom last year. Also, many organizations on campus that provides fun things to do, and there are always Loyola performances to see. As for school spirit, its pretty much non-existent. We don’t have a football team, and the pep band at basketball games usually outweighs the amount of fans. Especially with commuters, the school lacks a strong sense of community.

Loyola isn't a huge state school. It isn't in a bubble in the middle of nowhere surrounded by corn like most so many colleges. It is in a major US city and that is one of Loyola's major selling points. There is always somewhere to go. There is always something to do. It may be freezing in the winter, but there are so many ways to keep warm it doesn't much matter. The El is a block away and to the south is all of Chicago. Students can take in a concert, museum, or sporting event. Since many students have their own apartments house parties are frequent destinations. Not only that but with Depaul, Truman, UIC, and IIT colleges all easily accessible off the red line train infinite party locations arise. Greek Life is present at Loyola, though it is not as dominant as it may be in the larger rural college scene. They organize several campus events, but they are but one niche in myriad opportunities.

Athletic events aren't popular at all here. It's usually a very small niche of students who go to the games regularly. From my freshman year experience people didn't leave their doors open at all. It was not a very traditional dorm living experience. Basically to meet people, you had to go out and join organizations or go to the different student or athletic events.