<p>Son will graduate from an SEC school in May, one with the best football team in the nation. He rarely attended football games, and was hoping to go to a school with different types of entertainment for the student body, like concerts and movies, rather than football and Greek life. I just realized that most of his grad school applications are to schools in the Big Ten. Since this is a big football conference, I was wondering if those schools will be similar in the predominant football culture, with little social life for those not involved in Greek life. Son was not Greek and will be a graduate student, so he will not be counting on Greek life to provide his entertainment. Thanks for any input.</p>
<p>I didn’t realize Florida State was in the SEC :)</p>
<p>Graduate school is totally different than undergrad. I live in a Big Ten college town, and graduate students tend to do different things than undergrads.They go to different bars and restaurants; low key places where you can talk with your fellow grad students. They go to different events on campus. tend to do a lot more outdoorsy things…hike, mountain bike, disc golf, etc. </p>
<p>Haystack is right. Grad school is completely different. Doesn’t matter what the undergrad’s culture is like, the social life of a grad student’s will largely depend on what his grad-class-mates are doing, and what’s available off-campus. Some grad programs seem to have students that are quite social…BBQs, bike trips, and get-togethers on weekends, meeting for drinks on a Friday night at a nice bar/restaurant, etc. </p>
<p>Echoing the above posters. Grad school is a new ballgame. This is not to say he can’t enjoy the same things as undergrads…it’s just different. More removed. </p>
<p>Agree grad school (in the Big Ten) is very different from undergrad. You are just in a totally different “head space” in grad school. Also many of your fellow classmates will be working, either as TAs or in the community businesses to afford grad school. Most are not living in a dorm-like situation. I never went to one football game to be honest. It was just a very busy span of years. My friends were working on law degees, MBAs, were in med school – really all over the place. The “change” to grad school for me was as different as the change between high school and undergrad. I also didn’t have any friends whose parents were paying so perhaps my friends represented where I was in the whole grand scheme of adulthood and someone else might have a difference experience.</p>
<p>Actually, to add–I went to a Big Ten school that had a huge football presence, which huge numbers of undergrads ignored. At least at my school, there was a world of student life which was not centered around the games. You had a choice if that was what you were into. I was there as a grad student as well, and it was even less so. My general, half-baked impression is that as much as sports are a big deal in the Big Ten, they don’t have the universal embrace they seem to have in some schools such as some SEC ones (don’t flame me–I’m only going by posts such as this one’s descriptions.)</p>
<p>Thanks, Garland. I noticed that a lot of these schools have fencing clubs, wrestling, hockey, so there are sports other than football during the winter. But they are also in “college towns”, so I was wondering if these colleges do spend the money to bring concerts, movies, to campus, or do they count on the Greek life to provide that sort of entertainment? </p>
<p>Any big research university will bring concerts, theatre, movies, speaker series, etc to campus; likely in their student union and/or performing arts center.</p>
<p>In addition, the local college town will also likely have their own theatre groups(my college town has multiple theatre groups), bars thAt host concerts, and their own performing arts center distinct from the university one. </p>
<p>Lots of guest speakers come to campus and talk on all sorts of things. Our local library also hosts a speaker series.</p>
<p>The city also hosts a Friday night free outdoor concert series.</p>
<p>Greeks do basically nothing on my Big Ten campus.</p>
<p>You are over thinking this. Grad students have nothing to do with the Greek system and finds plenty of things to do.</p>
<p>I have been involved in both the Big 10 and SEC and I think the sports culture in SEC is a level above that of Big 10. I happen to like that, but I’m now an adult fan! I agree with the above posters that grad school is a different deal. That said, my SEC grad school daughter really enjoyed the SEC sports scene at Vanderbilt. </p>
<p>Montegut, what Big 10 school(s) are you talking about? There is a huge range among them. Madison and Ann Arbor and Iowa City are great college towns. Evanston shares a border with the city of Chicago. Those are probably the best of the Big 10 locations, in my opinion, and I can’t even imagine a scenario in which a grad student would a) be bored or b) have any contact with undergraduate Greek life. </p>
<p>My H went to Big 10 schools for both undergrad and grad school. When he was a grad student, he didn’t pay the least attention to what his grad school’s team was doing. He never went to one of their football games. He still followed his undergrad’s team. That said, he spent his free time with his girlfriend, fellow grad students, studying and sleeping. </p>
<p>@garland It really is the same at SEC schools. At SEC schools, you’ll have a segment of the school that wants to go to the games, a segment that will go to a few games, and a segment that never goes to any. Heck, the schools usually only have a few thousand student tixs for their 20k - 30k enrollments…so obviously many, many, many students aren’t going because there aren’t any tickets for most of them.</p>
<p>Montegut…depending on where your son ends up, much will depend on him…and his interests. If he is the type to get together with fellow grad students and enjoy a beer and good conversation at one of the off campus bars, then that’s what he’ll do. If he is the type to host a BBQ and invite his grad school classmates, then that’s what he’ll do. and so forth. Big schools will have various events, but whether the student attends them, will be up to the student. </p>
<p>many grad students have significant others or are even married with kids. So, that also will influence their social lives. </p>
<p>Much may also depend on his housing choice. </p>
<p>Take a look at today’s (and the future) calendar of events at UW-Madison and decide if there is enough going on outside of sports, which at this time of year would primarily be men’s bb and men’s and women’s hockey. <a href=“http://www.today.wisc.edu/”>http://www.today.wisc.edu/</a>. That doesn’t include activities in the city of Madison. </p>
<p>Athough football is a big thing at Umich, there are much much more going on everyday. You should not worry about it at all.</p>
<p>Hey M2CK…</p>
<p>Plenty of grad and professional school students hang out at ‘dive’ bars! Couldn’t afford too many “nice” bars and restaurants in my post-undergraduate days. Heh heh. Besides, we liked the crowd better at the dive bars and greasy spoons. And the “affordable” spirits.</p>
<p>I have a nephew who is at UMich. He’s athletic and loves school but he is not into going to the football games nor is Greek. He’s having a great time and has tons of things to do. </p>
<p>Some big ten schools are more into football than others. Some are more Greek than others but IMO neither dominates the campus culture. Except maybe Ohio State football…</p>
<p>One of my kids’ best friends, who is also the child of a good friend of mine, is a graduate student at Michigan now. I sincerely doubt she knows where the football stadium is, and she wouldn’t know a fraternity or sorority if it walked up to her and bit her. She has plenty to do. I can’t think of a Big 10 university that doesn’t offer lots of ways to spend time that aren’t sports- or fraternity-related. But, honestly, I would have thought the same about the SEC universities, too, with just a little less confidence.</p>
<p>@lakewashington</p>
<p>"Hey M2CK…</p>
<p>Plenty of grad and professional school students hang out at ‘dive’ bars! Couldn’t afford too many “nice” bars and restaurants in my post-undergraduate days. Heh heh. Besides, we liked the crowd better at the dive bars and greasy spoons. And the “affordable” spirits."</p>
<p>lol…yes that’s true…many of the off-campus hangout bars can be a bit divey, that’s for sure!</p>
<p>Some universities have Grad Bars and Grad Dining Halls on campus.</p>
<p>What my older son found was that the married ones seem to “do their own thing,” while the single ones made an effort to plan things to do on weekends. </p>
<p>So funny reading this, as before my son went to college, I didn’t even realize there were such things as SEC, much less Big 10. Having an NFL team in my city, I never followed college football. H and I both went to colleges in urban areas and had lots of culture on our campus, free concerts, theater, movies on campus. Though our colleges had football teams, the stadiums were off campus, so there was an effort to bring entertainment on campus for the students, who were mostly OOS as well. I notice many of the Big 10 schools are state schools, and probably draw from instate and regional OOS students, so I was wondering if there was less of an effort to have on campus activities. And I find that if Greek life is predominant, and the houses hire bands for entertainment, the university is not going to spend money to bring free concerts to the student body. Like Mom said, it will be up to my son to find those things, but being from the South, I have no idea what life is like up there.<br>
It will be interesting to see where he ends up. We’re just praying he gets accepted at this point.</p>
<p>One thing worth noting: A couple of years ago, the Wall St. Journal had an article and a chart sorting out the top football programs based on the percentage of their universities’ budgets they occupy. Leading everyone were LSU and Alabama, in both of which the football team represented more than 10% of the budget of the entire university. By contrast, the Michigan football team represented 1% of the university of Michigan budget. Football occupies a lot less of the overall available bandwidth in the Big 10.</p>
<p>When we were looking at schools, I would look at their budgets, I was surprised at how small U Alabama’s university total budget was…about $750 million. By contrast, Iowa State, which is the same size with a similar ranking, has a $1.2 billion dollar budget. </p>
<p>$75 million for the football program then sounds about right.</p>