Northwestern University Top Questions

Unique.

My classmates are a concoction of a multitude of well-educated but often overly driven people.

Great LGBT crowd on campus. A student from low SES might feel out of place at NU unfortunately. I wish there were more diversity when it came to that. Predominately liberal campus. Awesome College Democrats events. They bring great speakers.

The people surrounding you care about their school work, but every night of the week kids go out...sometimes even when they have a test the next day. The best part is kids at northwestern can afford to go out and still ace their test. There are some many different kinds of people at NU: theatre/music, greek, athletes, ect...and honestly anyone can find a place here. It is nice that everyone can find their place and an awesome group of friends/support system because Northwestern is diverse but the diversity is very segregated. I do not mean their is obnoxious cliques, but there are definite groups of friends and not a whole lot of mixing. Football players are friends with each other, frat boys with each other, certain ethnicities, ect. but that is only because they have so much in common. There is a certain calibir of person at NU that enables people to say smart things in normal conversation. People read the paper, are aware of whats going on, interested in their studies and have amazing plans for their future. Every student has goals, achievable means to attaining them and are working towards them!

There are a lot of campus groups that provide a place for people to express and assert their racial, religious, political, or LGBT views, beliefs, and identities. The campus is, generally, very open to anyone wanting to organize a group around a particular identity or belief. Predominantly, the campus is liberal, and many conservatives dislike the automatic assumption of most students that everyone shares their liberal viewpoints. Though the campus tends to be very open, students of the same nationality or ethnic identity tend to coalesce to form strong groups. This becomes at once an asset and a drawback because those who follow this tendency can assert their identity and be comfortable with others like them, yet they lose a more diversified array of friends they could gain if social groups on campus were slightly less homogenous. Many students derive from upper-middle class, wealthy backgrounds. Consequently, fashion on campus is often very stylish, especially for girls. Those who are less wealthy can feel a bit out of place when friends talk about their expensive iphone or Blackberry they've just purchased, or the years of travelling they've done in Europe. Less wealthy students are not lacking on campus, but their lack of wealth tends to be taken for granted. Additionally, many seem to consider a future job that makes them wealthy the pinnacle of their careers.

Most of the students that go to Northwestern went to a private high school, prep school, or affluent suburban high school and you can really notice this if you are a middle class kid like myself. So unless you're rich, expect to feel kind of out of place. Because of this, a lot of students are really wrapped up in all the sorority and fraternity drama because that's what they are used to (social climbing and all that).

northwestern is a 33{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} white, 33{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} asian, 33{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} indian, and 1{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} other. everyone generally is upper-middle class and generally nice. a little lame, but nice.

Students of the same ethnic background, such as Asian and African-American, do tend to form close bonds, perhaps because of the student groups on campus. However, there's a lot of mixing of groups as well. The 4 tables . . . would be mixed. Most American students are from the Midwest or the East Coast. There are a lot of international students also, especially from Asia. Students are very politically aware. I think they're mostly liberal, though there's a mix of other political views as well. I've never heard them talk about how much they'll earn one day.

A lot of kids feel the need to prove that they party like a big ten school, which is a little ridiculous to me. A lot of rich, at times stuck up kids. Some people are down-to-earth though, and I love them for it! But you have to look. It's definitely a bubble...not a lot of diversity, unfortunately. Again, some are high-strung, but everyone is smart here. Politically a bit diverse, but mostly liberal. Students do talk about making money and also, a lot about how much money northwestern is taking from them!

There is no 'type' of student that would feel out of place at Northwestern--every socio-economic/racial/sexual group is represented, and in my experience, there is no overt discrimination... I believe that most gay men would love it at NU--there are tons of gay men. Most students at NU are from upper or upper-middle class families, but that shouldn't surprise anyone--that's the way it is at most prestigious, private colleges in America. Politically, NU leans (slightly) left, but not radically by any means. There's a large contingent of right-wing students as well, mostly on the North-side of campus. At NU, there's good mixture of students who are learning vocations, and students who are learning liberal arts.