The colleges I am looking at are:
Stanford
Santa Clara
UC Berkeley
UC Davis
San Jose State
Not-so-long story short, I want to be involved as LITTLE as possible with sororities/partying/drugs/alcohol/etc. I understand that there are going to be people who do that sort of stuff wherever I go, and I can deal with other people doing that stuff when I’m not around.
My main question is: if I don’t actively look for parties/etc, how easy is it to avoid the party scene? Will I feel it at these colleges no matter what I do, or is it simple to avoid it if I try?
I really don’t think there’s a big party scene at any of the schools you listed except maybe San Jose (I don’t know enough about it to pass judgement). You would really be fine at any of those schools IMO. Some of them may have substance-free dorms- do some Google searching to see which ones do.
Good news for you those colleges are not known for party schools. Maybe Stanford is the exception. But it also has the duck syndrome.
I agree with ^^^ @Qwerty568, that the schools listed are not known for parties for the most part. SCU is in the top 100 of party schools #53 depending upon is doing the poll.
My older son attends UCD and has no problem avoiding parties since it is not his thing. He has many friends with the same attitude. I know UCD does have substance free floors in the dorms.
http://housing.ucdavis.edu/education/communities/sfc.asp
It is easy to avoid parties and just as easy to find parties.
Unless your have party animal roommates, it should not be difficult to avoid the party scene.
The good thing is that most party animals flunk out freshman year.