I can't speak for Emory, but I suspect that's one of the benefits of any sizeable school -- something and someone for everyone.
I think this is more or less true--but how much more or how much less can really matter to some students, and that's what they're trying to find out in threads like this. Obviously, it's hard to quantify. The percentage of students who join fraternities and sororities is one factor, but that doesn't tell the whole story either.
Isn't that in 30% range here, this seems on par with many other schools. And there is a sufficient party scene here, however it does not dominate every aspect of the social scene here. A person who does not want to party will not be pressured into it, even if only by a bandwagon effect. The scene here is simply not that pervasive.
If the party scene exists and you choose not to partake in it than you will only be ostracized by people who think partying is essential (people you wouldn't like anyway)
But, if you decide you really enjoy going out and the party scene is nonexistent, then you will be miserable.
Emory essentially falls in the middle, thus nearly everyone wins. When it's at either end of the extrema, then many will lose. Emory has the correct balance in my opinion.
Qualitatively, I can tell you that Emory is the most diverse top-20 school both ethnically religiously. Quantitatively, it has been my experience that Emory is less cliquey and self-segregated than other colleges I've spent time at. Don't get me wrong-- there certainly are circles of friends and niches of students-- but I think students at Emory are very friendly and welcoming to others. This is in part due to Emory's fairly active and open Greek system which facilitates a lot of social mixing. But I think the larger reason for this is Emory's culture. Emory has a culture that emphasizes the importance of the community, and I think this manifests itself through Emory's relatively relaxed and casual atmosphere.
As far as socioeconomic status goes, sure there are a lot of wealthy people at Emory (it is after all, an elite institution), however, there are also a lot of people who come from very modest backgrounds. In fact, I think that Emory is less socioeconomically homogenous than most flagship public schools. The reason for this is that elite schools like Emory and its peer institutions are able to offer great merit and need based aid to students who ordinarily could not afford the cost of attendance. Over half of Emory's students qualify for some need-based financial aid. Comparatively, while top public schools are cheaper, they are still quite expensive, and are not able to offer anywhere near the levels of aid elite schools can. The result of this is that the few high-achivement students coming from underprivileged backgrounds are driven to attend elite institutions that can make the cost of education competitive to that of a public school. This leaves the top public universities with large pool of middle class and upper-middle class students who had the opportunities and background to succeed in high school, but relatively few lower-income students as a proportion of the student body.
What I'm trying to say is that you will find a very broad range of wealth at Emory from the very wealthy to the underprivileged. In addition, like bernie mentioned earlier, the wealthier students at Emory are snobbish and don't flaunt their wealth.
As a personal account, I've had serious conversations with some of my friends about how they're trying to make ends meet to pay for Emory. I myself am in that position.
As it relates to the party scene at Emory, people of all kinds of backgrounds party. It's certainly not anything where only the wealthy kids are out partying frequently.
Druid Hills is the wealthy community/suburb directly surrounding Emory (the extremely wealthy portion is runs from North Decatur east toward Ponce de Leon basically). While it has some "new money"(a household not really associated with generational wealth, and rose from ground up kind of) families, it has a lot of old money (money passed down in families, or families spawning from a wealthy predecessor). It's kind of like some of those neighborhoods in the northeast/mid-Atlantic, but is actually southern. It, I believe, is still the wealthiest neighborhood in Atlanta city (if I'm right, I'm sure new money Buckhead is close). Going trick-or-treating (that's right, my friends dragged me lol) last year, I realized that it has a great deal of conservatism (though many are still liberal as they can live there comfortably due in part to Emory), while Emory does not. Emory is isolated from this culture. Emory is also isolated from the "new south" culture that pervades throughout the rest of Atlanta. In essence, Atlanta is still the south. I'm tired of students not from here saying that Atlanta does not feel like the south (as if this is inherently bad.) as if they actually know what it's like outside of movies/media. Atlanta still has many/most of those characteristics left too. It's just more left leaning than the rest of the southeast b/c of the various social movements (most/all involving race) that took place here. Lefter leaning does not make a city less southern in my opinion. They should get out of Emory and look around and maybe they'd find that the south isn't horrible (some come in with this opinion) as if the Northeast does not have intolerance, shall we cite snobbery, or the ground zero Islamic community center controversy? NYC itself (the "great" city of the north) has racial tension aside from this incident (so do most large cities). Some students here are as ignorant and narrow-minded as the caricatured uneducated southern person. They've been blinded by their wealth and their surroundings. A person's wealth can allow them to go w/o seeing or caring about the problems up there. Unfortunately, this goes for students at every top school, including the privates. Luckily, like ic said, we have quite a spread in this area as the campus is economically diverse, so fortunately it'll be harder to run into such students.
Bernie, maybe I'm a bit confused, but I think your rendering of Emory as isolated from New South culture is anachronistic and really just doesn't make much sense to me. From what I understand - and please correct me if I'm wrong - the New South was a term coined just after the civil war that related to the introduction of progressive (though I'm not certain that term was even coined at that point) and post-agrarian economic ideas, including less focus on race (but certainly not ending racism), an increase in industry and economic development (with the North and Internationally), and, more recently, urbanized and increasingly cosmopolitan areas (Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville, etc.).
I think that's exactly what Emory is. It's a school in the South whose history is intimately linked with Atlanta and the South, but only recently has Emory grown from a position of limited influence as a regional school that educated wealthy whites into a truly national university that draws a diverse, intelligent student body. I think Emory is a great example of what the New South movement was attempting to build - a place which offers amenities and opportunity on par with most any in the country.
Also, by far, Tuxedo Hill is the wealthiest neighborhood in Atlanta proper. There are many nice houses in Druid Hills, but there ONLY beautiful mansions in Tuxedo Hill. Take a drive down West Paces Ferry and see. (Google probably knows the answer if anyone wants to be certain.)
I had the same issue when I thought about coming here.
IMO, it's really not that different from high school or any other colleges. Not everyone gets **** drunk all the time.
In fact, you have your fair share of oddballs and religious people. If you try, like everywhere else, you can ALWAYS find stuff to do here on weekends that don't involve drinking. And I can even guarantee you that you can find a decent sized group of people who will take part in this said non-alcoholic activity with you.
People here are really friendly and open towards one another. It can be a bit cliquey, but it's not THAT cliquey to a point where it's harmful to the social scene.
That is unless you are one of the international Korean students. But even so, it's not like they're going to be a**holes to you and ignore you.
Um, other than that, everyone tends to wear v-necks in the spring and Northface jackets in the fall. So.....yeah.
That's Buckhead, so I find it extremely believable. As for the new south, you could be right, perhaps I confused myself, but in generally I think Emory's rise indicates the "results" of the rise of the New South, but the culture of the school/student-body itself seems somewhat removed from the south as a whole. The only time it does truly come is when we host various debates regarding political offices in Atlanta The school differs quite a bit from places like Georgia Tech (screw rankings, the school is very solid. If it wasn't for the rigor, thus, grad. rate and retention, faculty-student ratio, they would be ranked higher. I also consider "selectivity" BS) and UGA. I'm trying to say that Emory has less of a southern feel/culture partially b/c of its student body. I think most of the "success" of elite southern schools such us Rice, Vandy, Duke, etc. is an embodiment of the new south, but the social/political atmosphere inside of the college itself says otherwise. Schools like UVA and Vandy (this is somewhat of a bubble, but not in the sense that it is devoid of the "southern" feel of the area) have such an atmosphere (I personally don't think this is particularly good, but..they just do). Even Tech, which is quite diverse, has a bit more of a southern spirit going on. For this case, I am viewing New South in more limited view. It's what you said (industrialization, economic development, more of a wealth-generator), but with some of the southern attitude/customs/mannerisms/spirit left (not all bad in this case). I think Emory is more or less devoid (okay, technically devoid can't have degree, but let's roll with it) of this latter part (doesn't have but so much spirit at all really), and this can and does have it's advantages and disadvantages. Unfortunately, being a more stereotypically southern school and having a meager thing such as a football team could have served Emory well in some aspects since everyone is so worried about prestige and whether people know about us or not (in actuality, being popular has drawbacks for the academics, but let's not go there now), it would help in this category, and thus generate more pride amongst such folks.
I have to disagree with your assessment of the Druid Hills areas. There's no doubt that Druid Hills is an affluent area, but it is hardly an example of "old money," nor is it notably or ostentatiously wealthy.
Druid Hills has the 13th highest per capital income at $34,829, but this well behind Georgia's #1 location for per capital income, Sandy Springs with $70,504. Buckhead, which neighbors Sandy Springs to the south, is listed by Forbes as the nation's 9th wealthiest zip code.
And for further comparison, there are 62 locations in Illinois, 152 locations in New York, and and 137 locations in California that all have higher per capita incomes than Druid Hills.
I think Druid Hill's wealth is really more indicative of the people who live and work in the Druid Hills area: Emory professors. Many of the professors at any elite, highly-ranked college are going to fit into the upper/upper-middle class income range.
If you're trying to find "old wealth" in Atlanta, I think dgebll has it right Tuxedo Hill, Sandy Springs, Buckhead, etc.
I think we're straying a bit off topic though. The take-away point, I think, is that Atlanta is a very cosmopolitan place, with a lot of diversity, just like any other major U.S. city. Sure there are some cultural differences, but these differences are by no means pervasive. Furthermore, Emory, like any other elite college, is even more cosmopolitan with students and faculty coming from all around the U.S. and the world.
Dude, I didn't say it was wealthy with comparison to other places in the U.S. It is merely relatively wealthy (at least by my standards, I understand many that go here have completely different standards). A large portion of the Emory area is (mainly because it's surrounded by/close to Druid Hills, Buckhead, Virginia Highlands) And I was going to admit it was behind many others in metro Atlanta, but the editing time limit ran its course. Also, Sandy Springs is essentially a suburb. Buckhead also has had a huge influx of new money (though, yes, it still does have plenty old money), as indicated by all of the cookie cutter subdivisions. Both Druid Hills and Buckhead would be considered more historic than many/most parts of Sandy Springs. However, I will concede failure on this one, as Druid Hills is no longer old money, I was simply going by its historical reputation for it which ended several decades ago when the old money left(not shortly after Emory's move to Atlanta. I'd imagine there were other coincidences). You are correct, the old money now resides in Buckhead and Sandy Springs. However, you can tell by the design of the neighborhoods and the architecture of homes that the Hills once had this. The style is more pervasive throughout Buckhead than in Sandy Springs. All 3 areas are beautiful and are to more than a large extent, well-off.
I will, however, agree with everything else you said. My point addressing Emory, and its fits into Atlanta's overall culture was to basically say that the "cultural differences" (again this isn't necessarily a bad thing) that would be seen in Atlanta are not really reflected inside of Emory.
Also, as a person who is from Georgia and who has many family members residing in metro Atlanta (and thus ventures way outside of campus often, and not really into the more elite areas), the cultural differences are perhaps slightly more pervasive than you think. It's just not as pervasive as it would be if you were in say Nashville, Charlotte, or Birmingham. In these places, such differences would be easily noticeable if one were to go to the city center. Not as much the case in Atlanta, so the differences may seem less pervasive due to our location. Gwinett County also has kind of a "suburban cosmopolitan" (quite diverse, partial home of Buford Highway) thing going on. Go to other parts like Henry, Clayton, Dekalb (Southern Dekalb is so much different) , Cobb, Fulton (all 5 major counties of metro area, I think. These are most populous of about 28) or places outside of the perimeter, and boy will the differences become obvious if you don't already know.
Rambling aside, the campus is diverse enough so that the OP need not worry about an overly dominant party scene. That certainly isn't the case here. My 2.5 years experience tells me so.
My daughters' room mates party in varying degrees, from alot to every now and then. They go out of town on the weekend, do sports, attend local churches and events. If you haven't visited the campus, you should. The campus is a lively place with lots of diversity and the thing that I found when she moved in to her dorm that they had more students volunteer to help people move in than they needed. Many of them gave up their weekend to help those coming in and they started at 5am and didn't quit until around midnight that night. What I have seen is they look out for each other and are concerned for the collective group and not cliques. You could miss out on a great school if you keep such a narrow view.
If you're a big party person you won't like Emory. We don't have a football team and the frats aren't allowed to have Kegs at parties. But I guess you could say it is a party school compared to other top 20 schools. There is a lot of drinking and pot smoking. There are some people who don't party, but I would say most do. You're kind of in an awkward minority if you don't drink at all.
We're not pretentious about physical appearance at ALL. You can dres however you want and nobody is going to judge you, Emory has a reputation for being snotty but it's really not like that at all.
I can't speak about the other schools you named but my best friend goes to Hopkins and it's practically a brothel. Those kids are having parties all the time, sex non-stop, clubbing all the time. I went to visit last Sunday and I saw so many girls getting dressed up and ready to go out, I was shocked because my friends and I would never consider going out a Sunday before classes. Is this the norm? Maybe, maybe not, just simple observations.
That's got to be a joke. I have a good friend who was in a fraternity at Hopkins. It's a similar culture to Emory. You have people who go out a lot and people who don't. At some point at Emory, you'll probably go out on each of the seven days. When you don't have class til 1 and no exams coming up, why not go out on a Sunday/Monday/Tuesday/any night? It's the only time in your life where you can do things like that with absolutely no consequences. If it's not for you, then great. But you have to expect similar things at practically every school in the country. Most people are in the library on Sunday nights, but those of us that got our work done early were probably in the highlands enjoying the drink specials. Try it, you might like!
Replies to: Is Emory a party school?
But, if you decide you really enjoy going out and the party scene is nonexistent, then you will be miserable.
Qualitatively, I can tell you that Emory is the most diverse top-20 school both ethnically religiously. Quantitatively, it has been my experience that Emory is less cliquey and self-segregated than other colleges I've spent time at. Don't get me wrong-- there certainly are circles of friends and niches of students-- but I think students at Emory are very friendly and welcoming to others. This is in part due to Emory's fairly active and open Greek system which facilitates a lot of social mixing. But I think the larger reason for this is Emory's culture. Emory has a culture that emphasizes the importance of the community, and I think this manifests itself through Emory's relatively relaxed and casual atmosphere.
As far as socioeconomic status goes, sure there are a lot of wealthy people at Emory (it is after all, an elite institution), however, there are also a lot of people who come from very modest backgrounds. In fact, I think that Emory is less socioeconomically homogenous than most flagship public schools. The reason for this is that elite schools like Emory and its peer institutions are able to offer great merit and need based aid to students who ordinarily could not afford the cost of attendance. Over half of Emory's students qualify for some need-based financial aid. Comparatively, while top public schools are cheaper, they are still quite expensive, and are not able to offer anywhere near the levels of aid elite schools can. The result of this is that the few high-achivement students coming from underprivileged backgrounds are driven to attend elite institutions that can make the cost of education competitive to that of a public school. This leaves the top public universities with large pool of middle class and upper-middle class students who had the opportunities and background to succeed in high school, but relatively few lower-income students as a proportion of the student body.
What I'm trying to say is that you will find a very broad range of wealth at Emory from the very wealthy to the underprivileged. In addition, like bernie mentioned earlier, the wealthier students at Emory are snobbish and don't flaunt their wealth.
As a personal account, I've had serious conversations with some of my friends about how they're trying to make ends meet to pay for Emory. I myself am in that position.
As it relates to the party scene at Emory, people of all kinds of backgrounds party. It's certainly not anything where only the wealthy kids are out partying frequently.
I think that's exactly what Emory is. It's a school in the South whose history is intimately linked with Atlanta and the South, but only recently has Emory grown from a position of limited influence as a regional school that educated wealthy whites into a truly national university that draws a diverse, intelligent student body. I think Emory is a great example of what the New South movement was attempting to build - a place which offers amenities and opportunity on par with most any in the country.
Also, by far, Tuxedo Hill is the wealthiest neighborhood in Atlanta proper. There are many nice houses in Druid Hills, but there ONLY beautiful mansions in Tuxedo Hill. Take a drive down West Paces Ferry and see. (Google probably knows the answer if anyone wants to be certain.)
IMO, it's really not that different from high school or any other colleges. Not everyone gets **** drunk all the time.
In fact, you have your fair share of oddballs and religious people. If you try, like everywhere else, you can ALWAYS find stuff to do here on weekends that don't involve drinking. And I can even guarantee you that you can find a decent sized group of people who will take part in this said non-alcoholic activity with you.
People here are really friendly and open towards one another. It can be a bit cliquey, but it's not THAT cliquey to a point where it's harmful to the social scene.
That is unless you are one of the international Korean students. But even so, it's not like they're going to be a**holes to you and ignore you.
Um, other than that, everyone tends to wear v-necks in the spring and Northface jackets in the fall. So.....yeah.
I have to disagree with your assessment of the Druid Hills areas. There's no doubt that Druid Hills is an affluent area, but it is hardly an example of "old money," nor is it notably or ostentatiously wealthy.
Druid Hills has the 13th highest per capital income at $34,829, but this well behind Georgia's #1 location for per capital income, Sandy Springs with $70,504. Buckhead, which neighbors Sandy Springs to the south, is listed by Forbes as the nation's 9th wealthiest zip code.
And for further comparison, there are 62 locations in Illinois, 152 locations in New York, and and 137 locations in California that all have higher per capita incomes than Druid Hills.
I think Druid Hill's wealth is really more indicative of the people who live and work in the Druid Hills area: Emory professors. Many of the professors at any elite, highly-ranked college are going to fit into the upper/upper-middle class income range.
If you're trying to find "old wealth" in Atlanta, I think dgebll has it right Tuxedo Hill, Sandy Springs, Buckhead, etc.
I think we're straying a bit off topic though. The take-away point, I think, is that Atlanta is a very cosmopolitan place, with a lot of diversity, just like any other major U.S. city. Sure there are some cultural differences, but these differences are by no means pervasive. Furthermore, Emory, like any other elite college, is even more cosmopolitan with students and faculty coming from all around the U.S. and the world.
I will, however, agree with everything else you said. My point addressing Emory, and its fits into Atlanta's overall culture was to basically say that the "cultural differences" (again this isn't necessarily a bad thing) that would be seen in Atlanta are not really reflected inside of Emory.
Also, as a person who is from Georgia and who has many family members residing in metro Atlanta (and thus ventures way outside of campus often, and not really into the more elite areas), the cultural differences are perhaps slightly more pervasive than you think. It's just not as pervasive as it would be if you were in say Nashville, Charlotte, or Birmingham. In these places, such differences would be easily noticeable if one were to go to the city center. Not as much the case in Atlanta, so the differences may seem less pervasive due to our location. Gwinett County also has kind of a "suburban cosmopolitan" (quite diverse, partial home of Buford Highway) thing going on. Go to other parts like Henry, Clayton, Dekalb (Southern Dekalb is so much different) , Cobb, Fulton (all 5 major counties of metro area, I think. These are most populous of about 28) or places outside of the perimeter, and boy will the differences become obvious if you don't already know.
Rambling aside, the campus is diverse enough so that the OP need not worry about an overly dominant party scene. That certainly isn't the case here. My 2.5 years experience tells me so.
I can't speak about the other schools you named but my best friend goes to Hopkins and it's practically a brothel. Those kids are having parties all the time, sex non-stop, clubbing all the time. I went to visit last Sunday and I saw so many girls getting dressed up and ready to go out, I was shocked because my friends and I would never consider going out a Sunday before classes. Is this the norm? Maybe, maybe not, just simple observations.
That's got to be a joke. I have a good friend who was in a fraternity at Hopkins. It's a similar culture to Emory. You have people who go out a lot and people who don't. At some point at Emory, you'll probably go out on each of the seven days. When you don't have class til 1 and no exams coming up, why not go out on a Sunday/Monday/Tuesday/any night? It's the only time in your life where you can do things like that with absolutely no consequences. If it's not for you, then great. But you have to expect similar things at practically every school in the country. Most people are in the library on Sunday nights, but those of us that got our work done early were probably in the highlands enjoying the drink specials. Try it, you might like!