Grad Students Mixing with Undergraduates

MYOS1634
Wed, 19 Mar 2014 15:02:25 +0000

At my university, we were told rather bluntly to make our lives easier and not to socialize with undergrads, although the actual rule was that we couldn’t be friends with anyone we had in class (we could obviously be on friendly terms with undergrads but couldn’t hang out, chat, share personal stories, etc) and we absolutely couldn’t date or sleep with any undergrad for legal reasons (this was a blanket decision that had actual fine lines and differences depending on many things but once again under the “make your life easier” principle it was simpler to state it like that - and as far as I know it was followed.). Also, grad students didn’t live in fraternities although they belonged to honor societies and academic fraternities along with undergrads.
In most cases, grad students ARE adults working full time (and overtime and unpaid).
Overall though grad students didn’t want to socialize with undergrads. The two worlds are very different. Grad students have more low-key events like beer&barbecue or hiking&picnic, they can go to clubs and bars - many unviersity town bars cater to a specific age group (grad students I knew didn’t like the rowdy/let’s get drunk mentality of 21 year olds); many are involved and some are married/with children so they like to spend time with them obviously :).
However graduate students could enroll in clubs and participate in activities with undergrads, no problem.