No one gets blow jobs in the hall.
Really, where do parents get these things from?
Sheesh, lay off the judgment, folks! The OP isn’t looking for a school to keep her precious pumpkin safe from all the bad drinkers and hedonists–she’s looking for one where that’s not all the majority of kids do for fun. Yes, you can avoid partying at any school, but you may not want to attend a school where the majority of kids do that for fun.
My son and I visited a very good northeast LAC. I loved it and would totally have applied there, but it was definitely party central. Would he have found friends there that didn’t party? Of course, but he wasn’t interested in the school precisely because it was a major party school. And that’s okay.
I feel a lot of this stuff just comes down to luck. Having a roommate from hell is a lot more disruptive to college life than having lots of parties on campus or off campus. The immediate space around your daughter is most important and which you have little control over. Even an honor dorm or drug free dorm can be hell if the roommate or neighbors are boorish.
You basically just have to “punt” and hope for the best.
Perhaps from anecdotal stories of such from other parents who remember those instances from their own college dorm experiences. But perhaps those are memorable enough to be told because they are so unusual.
Actually, i am told by my friends who are current freshman who are enrolled at various colleges this fall, romani. Personally, I really don’t care what college students do in their sex lives so long as they leave children and animals out of it, but I do think it is reasonable to insist intimate activities occur in private. There appears to be by some, less concern about privacy in this regard than there used to be in the dark ages, such as 2007. Perhaps it is related to the smartphone or the internet or changing mores or online porn or whatever. It isn’t the end of the world to have to put up with it, but life is more pleasant without some of the things that can occur in dorms, so I can understand the interest in searching for the right one.
We all know that college students never lie or embellish 
Whatever. I maintain that that is absolutely not typical. It doesn’t even make sense since you have dorm rooms.
BJs in the hallway are not typical behaviors in college dorms.
Hi, HS senior here. Could someone explain the influence of greek life? I just want to study and get my degree done and don’t want to deal with the “drama” that I’d get daily from some party schools. Or is it possible to avoid the majority of the partying at most schools at all?
Also, do the guys end up doing the stupid things (Party hosting and getting wasted) most of the time or the girls (I’d assume it’s us guys cause we have a greater standard deviation in IQ)?
Just studying and getting your degree done is perfectly possible even at a party school. Do your own thing and get involved in the activities that interest you.
Recklessness does not discriminate.
@DragonofChangban The problems I’ve seen have been primarily related to fraternity houses. On campus, in the dorms, there are RAs and RDs who are charged with keeping the peace. College is sample of life in the rest of the world. As a young adult, you will have to decide to follow your own path. It is easy to avoid partying if you have a roommate who doesn’t bring it to your room. When you sign up for housing, you state your preferences and they try to match you.
look at what happened at Wesleyan a few years ago with ecstasy. We teach our DD18 how to behave around drugs and alcohol and try to teach her judgment. We also teach her never to drink something someone else gives her and always take a trusted friend to any party or meet-up.
Being a graduate of the #1 party school at the time – it only influences you to the extent you let it. I had a network of music friends and never went to a frat party or rush. The previous post about dorms and RAs is correct – there’s a network of support there. The Frats are less supervised. However, frats have some good sides too – they can be a support group. It depends on the school and frat. If there are a lot of sororities, looks and wealth tend to be more obvious and more divisive.
“I feel a lot of this stuff just comes down to luck. Having a roommate from hell is a lot more disruptive to college life than having lots of parties on campus or off campus.”
“It is easy to avoid partying if you have a roommate who doesn’t bring it to your room. When you sign up for housing, you state your preferences and they try to match you.”
Many schools have some sort of matching process for roommates. If so, that’s another tool you can use.
My kid’s school had a sort of an online dating system for finding a roommate which was very helpful. You may not find a lifelong friend, but you probably can go a long way to avoid a disasterous match for frosh year.
@klbmom18 Its not just Wesleyan. MIT shut down an entire undergraduate living group called Senior House, in 2017,
that had some drug issues and other social issues. The made it into graduate housing. . MIT also shut down and tore down Bexley Hall, years ago, which had drug problems and building structural problems. Because the newer college administrators are more wise to student drug use, now finally, after all these years, private east coast colleges are finally cleaning up the drug sales on campus. Wesleyan had drug problems in the 1970s, for certain, a very heavy drug use school for years and years now. MIT too, but some of it was hidden at off campus fraternity apartments that MIT had no real legal reason to police and no actual way to police them. Recently fraternities all over have been shut down for alcohol deaths, lots of women accusing brothers of rape, and women falling out second story windows, drunk. I am kind of glad, since I lived through the 1970s, that we are cleaning up our college campuses !
If you are able to get into one of the top schools (I think the CC abbreviation is HYPSM), everyone will be well behaved and just so gosh darn awesome! You may get tired or seeing so many rainbows and bunnies and unicorns and floating smiling face emojis every day. But you won’t have to deal with any partying or icky people or naughty language. But only at those five schools. Everyone at every other school sucks. (Phew…sarcasm pill wearing off.)
I really disagree with this. There may be a “behavior pledge” but Baylor has its share of issues. Definitely review the long list of unresolved Title IX infractions before pursuing this school based on hopes for good behavior.
just find a college that has the option for quiet/substance free dorms. also look to see if their are single sex dorms. i wouldn’t deprive my child of the residential experience. it’s the best part of college
Someone made this point up thread and I’m sorry I don’t remember who but I want to reiterate that schools that make students sign behavior pledges also carry a risk.
Yes, chances are there will be heavy policing on campus to keep drinking and sex out of the dorms as much as possible and many if not most students will honor their pledges even off campus, but at any school no matter how conservative some students will drink. They will just do it much less safely.
Here’s a true example. An off campus party with drinking out in the countryside. The police get called and kids are diving out the windows and running off in below freezing conditions to avoid getting caught. If they are reported to the school officials they will be kicked out of school and sent home. So they hide in the woods, no coats, some no shoes. Thankfully there was no actual frostbite or freezing to death involved but there could have been.
@klbmom18 Refresh my memory, please; what happened at Wesleyan a few years ago?
@mom23travelers post made me think of Penn State. The main reason the fraternity brothers didn’t get help for Tim Piazza is because they were supposed to be dry (as a temporary punishment) and hazing is against the rules. If they were found to be hazing - with alcohol - it’s very likely their fraternity would have been suspended or more.
Colleges put good Samaritan rules in place but those don’t cover frats breaking the rules, only criminal prosecution or school penalties.
A year ago or so there was a religious school - Baylor? BYU? - where alcohol had to be hidden, everyone had signed a pledge, and it put women in sketchy off campus parties where they didn’t report sexual assault because they’d get in trouble for being where there was alcohol.