<p>I know that Stanford is an excellent school, but I wanted to know if the university “babies” their students. (I have also heard about this from other people as well).</p>
<p>isn’t that good… as in easy classes?</p>
<p>I want to attend Stanford because I thought the classes would be difficult so that I can learn more.</p>
<p>Stanford is an amazing school regardless of whether certain students might need extra help or not. I highly doubt that you will be “too smart” for Stanford.</p>
<p>I’m not saying I’ll be too smart (believe me, I’m not). I just wanted to know whether it’s true or not. That’s all. lol.</p>
<p>Stanford has resources and support structures for those who need it. But you have to recognize the need, and seek help. They will not come looking for you.</p>
<p>I doubt any top level universities will seem too easy to most people.</p>
<p>Ok. I just wanted to know. Thanks for your responses. I agree with Goldfish. It just seemed really odd to me that Stanford would “baby” anyone, so that’s why I started the thread to clarify things.</p>
<p>What do you mean by that? Do you mean that we have resources on campus for struggling students like advisors, TAs, etc.? Or do you mean that Stanford offers a supportive environment for students were students tend to cooperate rather than compete with each other? If so, then you could say that Stanford “babies” the students. If not, please explain what you mean, or what you think people you talked to meant.</p>
<p>I’ve never heard about any of this before.</p>
<p>I think it’s called “handholding” when one of the “throw them in the deep end and see who survies” schools talks about it. <em>grin</em> </p>
<p>Here’s the deal. You can look up on line and find lists of the graduation rates of various colleges and universities. You’ll find that some schools consistently graduate a <em>much</em> lower percentage of students than others – that is, of the entering class, only say, 60 percent will graduate after 6 years. <em>Some</em> of the schools like that knowingly enroll more freshmen than they know they can support in higher division classes – there’s room for 500 EE majors at the freshman level, but only 300 EE majors in the required junior/senior level courses. Those schools <em>KNOW</em> this, and they plan accordingly. They offer intro courses and grading scales that are designed to fail out a percentage of students. </p>
<p>If you get accepted into a school like that, the school knows they’re admitting you but may very well never graduate you. They’re telling you “You have just gotten the opportunity to be thrown in our deep end. Whether you survive, that’s up to you. We’re not invested in seeing you survive to get a diploma.”</p>
<p>Some people like that – it appeals to their sense of competion. Some people like to feel that kind of challenge, to feel like at the end, they earned a diploma that everyone else didn’t.</p>
<p>On the other hand, there are schools that graduate a very high percentage of their admits. Some of those schools are explicitly, vocally committed to graduating who they admit. They feel strongly that admission is a sort of social contract – “We believe in you, we want you to succeed, and if you work hard, we’ll support you in attaining the goal of graduation”. Schools like that don’t admit more people than they can graduate. They often put a lot of thought and money behind support infrastructure, like tutoring, mentoring, support staff, etc. </p>
<p>My experience is that people who prefer type A (deep end), think of Type B schools as “babying”. People who prefer Type B think of Type A as “cutthroat” or cruel. </p>
<p>I’d say that Stanford is <em>very</em> much a supportive type school. If that sounds unappealing to you, that’s a good thing to know while you’re looking at prospective colleges. Some of the tech schools – MIT, GA Tech – are very much type A, in my opinion.</p>
<p>I’d second the above poster. And this ethos filters through to day-to-day interactions with profs. If you’re ill, your professor will not only give you an extension but explicitly tell you - take care of your body first, you can’t study if you’re dead.
Professors will encourage you to come to office hours, happily work with you when you have trouble or fall behind, allow you to take incompletes etc…</p>
<p>This of course comes with the expectation that you not take advantage of it. Just about every student i have seen here is incredibly serious about doing all their work and doing it on time, regardless of how many hours of sleep you lose. Don’t feel that having a ‘handholding’ school means less work - because at a place like stanford we are intensely self-motivated. it simply means that you won’t get screwed when you fall forward onto your face, as inevitable happens to everyeone.</p>
<p>the other side note is that because of the quarter schedule, the system NEEDS to be more flexible to a degree, because one small error CAN put you far behind. Especially as a freshman, i’ve found it’s often tough adjusting to a fast-paced schedule like this, and we will often make stupid and broggadaccio-infused brash decisions - like taking a twenty unit course load.</p>
<p>And if you want handholding, nothing beats MIT: all the first term courses are pass/fail!</p>
<p>Before I went to Stanford, I heard something like that too, not exactly “babying” but that the professors and others are very supportive and helpful. Through my experience, I’ve found that to be very true. You’ll have to work very hard no doubt. It is just a helping hand to get you up on your feet again if you do fall. When I was at Stanford, I had slipped disks twice, and bronchitis once. The students (especially from the Chinese Christian Fellowship) helped me a lot. And the school allowed me to take a leave of absence too. If you like, you can read about such experiences in my memoirs at <a href=“Yahoo | Mail, Weather, Search, Politics, News, Finance, Sports & Videos”>Yahoo | Mail, Weather, Search, Politics, News, Finance, Sports & Videos;
Raymond</p>
<p>One of the things that attracted me to Stanford in the first place was the supportive atmosphere. I absolutely agree with TrinSF’s statement about how the “hand-holding” can be seen more as support for success - if they wanted you there in the first place, there’s no reason for them to suddenly start turning against you. This contrasts with one thing I HATE about Berkeley - it is VERY much so a competitive school. People are constantly worrying about the curve.</p>
<p>I have a friend here at Cal who was in Chem1A last year. This story is definitely on the extreme and rare end, but it still says something about the attitude of some people here. My friend was in lab and working with some sort of solvent. He left to use the restroom. He came back to his station to find that all his chemicals had been tampered with - all of his data was totally screwed, and in fact, some of his chemicals were even missing. He later found out from another labmate that some jerk in the station next to him had tampered with all his materials so that he would get a poor grade on the lab. Of course, the guy was reported and everything was dealt with accordingly, but this example, though rare, just goes to show how far some people are willing to go in a competitive atmosphere like Cal’s. At Cal, independence is very important. Nobody is there to hold your hand all the way through - if you don’t take responsibility for your work and studies, then you’re digging your own grave. Sure, that’s the same thing at Stanford and most other major universities, but at least at places like Stanford, there are resources to help you get through the tough times. Nada aqui.</p>
<p>Long story short, I still bear a great respect for Stanford and yet hate it at the same time. Maybe I’m just still sour for being rejected.</p>
<p>Whoa whoa whoa- let’s keep things straight here. Anything like what you said in your post could, if it’s to be found, in the science classes, maybe some pre-biz classes- they’re not all over campus, only in particular fields. I don’t have people in my philosophy classes tampering with my book when I go to the restroom.</p>
<p>You’re right, I should’ve thought about the differences of necessities in separate fields. Sorry.</p>
<p>When people use terms like hand-holding and babysitting, they suggest a negative tone or attitude.</p>
<p>Are these people suggesting that the services provided by [Stanford’s</a> Center for Teaching and Learning](<a href=“http://ctl.stanford.edu/Tutoring/]Stanford’s”>http://ctl.stanford.edu/Tutoring/) are babysitting? </p>
<p>Is offering [free</a> tutoring, learning skills and academic coaching](<a href=“http://ctl.stanford.edu/Student/]free”>http://ctl.stanford.edu/Student/) considered hand-holding?</p>
<p><em>I</em> don’t think it’s handholding or babysitting, but I am certainly aware that attitudes like those the original poster mentioned exist. There <em>are</em> people who think that offering any kind of assistance is “unfair”, and somehow means that the grades of those students at schools who provide such help aren’t as meaningful. </p>
<p>That’s not my opinion, as I stated above.</p>
<p>That’s why I mentioned in my post that it is “not exactly hand-holding”. I prefer to use words such as “supportive” and “helpful”. As I have mentioned, you still have to work very very hard. After my leave of absence because of 3 slipped disks, I had to return to Stanford and work doubly hard, earning my credits like everyone else.
Raymond</p>
<p>i think ‘baby-sitting’ means helping in a good and mature way. that doesn’t mean you get to be waited on hand and foot. i agree with the above post. you still have to work hard, especially in schools like Stanford.</p>