avianjake

Bennington College was my first pick on colleges, but now that my deposit is in I feel like I still have only seen what they have on their website. So, I was wondering what bennington was like from the point of view of a student; Are the parties cool, are the classes cool, are there tons of radical people stoked about being friends?
Anyone who currently goes there or has gone there please help me!

-jake

walkthewalk

Try reading "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt or "The Rules of Attraction" by Bret Easton Ellis. Both authors attended Bennington and their novels are set there, although it is called different names to "hide" its identity. They're great reads.

allthosethings

You might be completely freaked out if you read those two books and think that that is what Bennington is like! Those books are both about people with no souls, and while good books, are pretty creepy. I have found the opposite to be true at Bennington, it is full of soul, very personal, and in a word--cozy, in both the good and the bad senses of the word.

I am a Senior at Bennington and would be happy to give you my perspective, which admittedly is getting a bit jaded, as I am pretty ready to be done with college at this point.

Like any college, some of the parties are cool and some are really lame. The pattern seems to be that in the first two years one goes to every party, big and small and some are really fun and some are....just not. By your third year, you have your real friends and it gets to be more fun to just hang out with them, going out to dinner, smaller parties in people's rooms, etc. This year my friends and I are doing a mixture of both (or will be, when we get back to campus, we are in our last week of FWT and so are all off campus and spread all over the place at the moment). We mostly hang out with friends, but are also realizing that we will be leaving soon and so are going back to some of the big parties, especially the traditional annual ones, and I have to say, they are really fun now, as we know so many people and know what to expect.

The classes are generally more cool than lame. You will figure out which professors you really like and don't like, but they are all really invested in what they do and that makes them good.

I have found the people to be really great and yes, very stoked to be friends. There are groups of friends, but you can always move in and out of them, make new friends, keep old ones. One's friends change over the years but is a pretty tight social scene and I, as cliched as it sounds, will not be surprised at all if I am friends with many of these people for a very long time.

avianjake

I do like cozy. Thank you so much for your response, I am a little less worried now that someone actually replied.

corinne_h

Walkthewalk's response made me smile! I read the Secret History a year or two ago and was dying to know which college it was in disguise. So when I realized it was Bennington I almost died laughing since it was my first choice when applying to colleges!