blackhair

1) What are the main groups? (i.e. jocks, nerds, hippies) Hopefully indie-rock loving artsy people??

2) I hear Rice students are quirky. So what exactly does that mean? I mean, i love offbeat, creative people, but if quirky means not shaving for months and speaking in pig latin for kicks...

3) Does its size make it socially limiting. Do students get bored with other students?

4) And is it true that the residential college system makes meeting other people from other colleges annoyingly difficult?

thank you for taking the time

NYSkins1

1. I wouldn't say there are any main groups. Different social stereotypes tend to intermix quite nicely. You won't find one group of this type of person, or one group of this type of person. Except stoners. They tend to keep to themselves.

2. We just tend to have very irreverent senses of humor. For example, our homecoming king and queen this year were Borat and a Sid Rich male junior. I think Optimus Prime was the homecoming king one year. We like things that aren't quite normal, but we're still relatively down-to-earth.

3. Some students get bored with other students, but I find that those people are generally not worth associating with anyway. I figure that you're going to know the same number of people no matter what school you go to.

4. No, it doesn't. If you don't spend all of your time at your college (like I do), then you shouldn't have any trouble making friends at other colleges.

cobalt

i want to add to question #4: It still is a very real possibility of you only knowing people from your college if you do not make the effort. What I'm saying is, while it is not annoyingly difficult to meet people from other colleges, it is rare that they will just gravitate towards you without any effort on your part.

nightflarer

How large are the colleges? Will I feel a pressure to take part in dorm life activity? What if I just want to be alone for a couple hours and not really have to take a role in the dorm, but rather pretend I'm living in my own apartment in my own room. Can this happen? I suppose I'm worried I'll become "too" close with the people, or at least some of them, in my residential college if I choose to go to Rice.

And is knowing people only from your college an issue? I'm sure this would give you a good group of friends with whom you could do a lot of different activities.