<p>Greetings All,
I was admitted EA to Caltech and I am planning to attend. My question pertains to the ‘house’ system. During the telephone call that Tech students make to admittees, I learned that the houses are ‘isolationist’ and that there is a social structure based on your house ‘affiliation’, or something to that effect. Is this true? If so, why? I rather hate cliques and exclusionist attitudes. I would greatly appreciate any insight on this matter.</p>
<p>Thanks,
Serj T.</p>
<p>The houses do tend to be isolationist. During rotation, we try to match people with a house that fits their personality, so you end up with a ready-made social circle. Each house has a social team which organizes activities within the house, activities with other houses (my house has an annual even with each other house), and an interhouse party, which all the houses attend. So, you do end up spending a lot more time with people in your house than any other.</p>
<p>However, there’s definitely nothing to stop you from being friends with people from other houses and it’s definitely not looked down on. Even though I’m very active in my house, my closest friends are all in different houses from me (I’m a Lloydie, and my closet friends include 3 Lloydies, 2 Rudds, 1 Mole, 2 Flems, and a Darb). This is much more common in the upper classes (junior and senior) than in the frosh and smore classes, simply because you are in much smaller classes within your major, and these force you to meet and socialize with a different group of people, whereas you can always find people in your house in the core classes.</p>
<p>Everyone goes through rotation, so no one is left without a house. The only people who feel left out are those who aren’t happy with the house they end up in. At that point, they can still become social with the house they like better, though it is admittedly hard to become a full member. I really don’t think cliquish is the word to describe it – I hated cliques in high-school too. I think the biggest difference is that there isn’t really a “pecking order”. Obviously in high school, there are cliques which are more popular than others, and you want to be in the popular group. Here, however, it’s about finding the group of people your personality matches, and no house is considered better than the others (though there are interhouse rivalries). There are houses that tend to get rated higher than others by the Frosh, but I think that mentality goes away quickly as soon as they get to know their houses, and as soon as they realize the upperclassmen don’t view the other houses in any sort of popularity order.</p>
<p>Can you come for prefrosh weekend? You really can’t understand the housing system unless you come see it for yourself. Plus, this is definitely a topic you need a lot of different views on.</p>
<p>Can someone describe sort of the overarching characteristics of each house?</p>
<p>Thanks for your opinion, alleya. I actually did visit the campus last spring, but I only got a general overview of the school in the student-led and self-guided tour. I read some of the Caltech publications also, but these clearly don’t present the whole picture. So I definitely plan to attend pre-frosh weekend in order to learn more about what the students are like, etc. </p>
<p>The house system actually sounds sort of fun. It’s just that I was a little confused when this student (in previously mentioned phone discussion) described certain houses as being ‘friends’, which seemed to imply that some houses are not ‘friends’. The wording was a little odd. But as you say, different people probably have different perspectives about the situation. </p>
<p>Just curious; are there any general defining attributes for students in specific houses? For instance, do most of the uber-studious people reside in House X while most of the party-goers reside in House Y, etc.? That would seem to be a natural consequence of people gravitating toward the house that fits their personality best. I just think that if I am going to be spending a lot of time in one house, it might be sort of boring to be with people who are all like me. Specifically, I am very introverted most of the time and like to spend a lot of time studying alone. So I might lean toward a house with other studious introverts. But a lot of my friends are extroverted, so I’m not sure whether I would be happy in that environment. I guess what I’m trying to get at here is how diverse are the houses personality-wise?</p>
<p>Thanks,
Serj T.</p>
<p>Yes, sampson and serj, there are definitely stereotypes about certain houses which are true to some extent. However, I make it a policy (and many other current students do the same) to never tell prefrosh what these are. I really really think it’s important for you to form your own opinions of the houses. Plus, the stereotypes don’t do some of the houses justice. For instance, there’s one house which is half uber-studious and half major partiers (in my opinion), yet since the partiers are more visible, the house is stereotyped as a party house. This is also a great example of how a house can be filled with personalities that run the spectrum. There’s no way that there are just 7 personality types in the world, so you really don’t have to worry about everyone in the house being exactly alike. Plus, it’s not so much about pigeon-holing a frosh as finding a house that a frosh meshes with. I know I’ve definitely talked to frosh who I thought were introverted, but would be happiest and would fit best, in a more extroverted house. We try to take all that into consideration when placing frosh in a house, and you get an opportunity to voice your preferences for the houses as well. Do you understand how rotation (placing students in their house) works? If not, I can explain that as well.</p>
<p>That’s great that you’re able to come prefrosh weekend. The student-led tours and the information online are definitely not set up to give an overview of the house personalities. When the student told you some houses are not friends with other houses, that is true in a sense, but it’s a lot more complicated than that. There are definitely houses that I’ve said I hate, but I also have many friends in these houses. Usually houses are disliked because they’re considered annoying or obnoxious as a GROUP, but individuals from the house are liked. By this, I don’t mean specific people I can make a list of – I mean almost any one person is liked when they’re not surrounded by a bunch of others from the house. For example, I can’t stand my little brother when he’s around one of his friends. As a group I dislike them, but when I’m just with my brother or just with his friend, I have no problem with them. There are just some personalities that are great alone, but when mixed create a combination that some people don’t like. Does that make sense? I can try to give more examples if not.</p>
<p>The important thing is that no house is universally liked, no house is universally disliked, and people are never automatically liked or disliked because of their house.</p>
<p>Wow, this thread confirms many of the suspicions I’ve had about CalTech and its students. Thanks much!</p>
<p>I thought of a better way to explain it…</p>
<p>Obviously there are pros and cons of living in a structured social environment like we have here. There’s more support, but rivalries do develop. These are rivalries, not animosities – they’re between houses, not between individuals, and it’s all in fun. I really think that anyone you talk to here would say the same thing – that the rivalries are harmless and no one takes them very seriously. That’s why I can’t encourage you enough to come to prefrosh weekend – you really can’t understand unless you see it for yourself.</p>
<p>joemama, I’m worried that you might be misinterpreting what I’m saying – could you say what your “suspicions” were?</p>
<p>Alleya: No problem. It’s cool.</p>
<p>Alleya, I think your wording was overly cautious. It seems more concerned about not stepping over anyone’s toes than telling the prefrosh what it’s like.</p>
<p>I think the easiest way to describe the houses: this is Caltech and they’re all fairly nerdy. One of them, however, is noticeably louder and may be considered more obnoxious. Sometimes they organize festiviites on Thursday nights which involve some alcoholic beverages and then they go around chanting through the other houses. I initially found this activity annoying (oddly, they haven’t come around yet tonight but I saw some other herd stomping and yelling outside; perhaps that’s the same house, and they’re still getting ready for their houses-wide march).</p>
<p>alleya–
I think I understand what you mean by the group vs. individual behavior; it’s an interesting psychological phenomenon. The whole house situation still strikes me as somewhat strange, but it’s good to know that I won’t be stuck with a bunch of like-minded individuals in any one house. After all, I guess that does follow logically from the pigeonhole principle (as you said) given the hypothesis that the number of personality types of students exceeds the number of houses. I think I am still trying to break free of my tendency to view Caltech students as all belonging to a single stereotype, which obviously is wrong. At any rate, I will be coming to pre-frosh weekend, so I won’t base my decisions on any pre-conceived notions about Tech. I would be interested in a description of the rotation process, would you mind explaining it?</p>
<p>webhappy–
I used to believe that idiotic behavior and Caltech were mutually exclusive, but this idea was quickly corrected when I visited last spring (as a junior). Coincidentally, I was there during pre-frosh weekend and so many of the students were acting out and pretending (it was rather obvious) to be drunken party animals. One student even sat slumped against the wall with a bottle in the hallway of one of the houses as our student-led tour group passed through. So your story of weekly drunken marches doesn’t surprise me too much. I guess there are bound to be some morons no matter where you go.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t call them “morons.”</p>
<p>I think some people view college differently. When I first brought up my views on the lack of enforcement in regards to the alcohol policy, one response I would hear was, “It’s college.”</p>
<p>joemama is just ■■■■■■■■ in a soemwhat creative way, alleya. As in, " <em>knowing hrmph</em> ahh, right, right, that confirms what I suspected."</p>
<p>Nothing you said “confirms” any of the common stereotypes, but you do give a pretty good outline of the house system.</p>
<p>For the record, I pretty much ignore the existence of the houses. Some people are very happy having a tight-knit house-centered social group, but I treat them as a bunch of places where people live. I hang out with a group that is extremely diverse – there’s at least one person from each house.</p>
<p>So the houses can be separated from your point of view if you want them to be, or a meaningless piece of nomenclature if you don’t.</p>
<p>I think I’d rather view the houses as a ‘meaningless piece of nomenclature’. I’m just interested in learning how the system works. Could someone please explain the rotation process?</p>
<p>OK, this is how rotation has worked in the past, but keep in mind that since next year the South Houses are moving to South Park, there might be some changes.</p>
<p>You arrive on campus about a week before classes start. You’re assigned to a random house and a random roommate which you’ll live with for about 2-3 weeks. Rotation is the first week of classes. During rotation week, you visit every house for dinner and for lunch once, except the house you’re living in which you only get a lunch at. You are required to attend these dinners and lunches – if you don’t, you loose your privledge to rate the houses. After each dinner, the house holds a reception (with food!) which you’re welcome to attend (but not required to). Basically, you’re supposed to use the dinners, lunches, and receptions to get to know the people in the house AND let them get to know you. (This is a two sided process – we’re working with you to help you choose a house, and we can’t do that if we don’t know who you are). At the end of the week, you submit ratings of the houses. You have to rate at least 4 houses (you’re welcome to rate more). You will NOT be placed in a house you don’t rate (so you can basically specify up to 3 houses that you absolutely do not want to live in). The ratings are on a scale of 1-10, and basically to indicate how much you’d enjoy living in a house. You turn in those ratings on Saturday and on Sunday you’ll be told which house you’re in. A few days later, you move into your house.</p>
<p>Thanks for the explanation, alleya. One more question: How are roommates assigned after students are assigned to a house? Do the students get to choose who they want to room with?</p>
<p>You definitely get to choose who you want to room with, but how you do so varies by house. In some houses, you get a roommate and a permanent room before you even move in. In others, you move into a second temporary room (with a temporary roommate) for a few days so you can get to know other frosh in your house, and then you pick a roommate and a room. The trailers in South Park will have some single rooms, but very few frosh will get them.</p>
<p>There’s a lot of FUD about the House system. So far, I’ve logged nearly five terms in this hellhole, and the most important contributor to any House-related social isolation seems to be that the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.</p>
<p>Take Webhappy up there, for example, and his tales of drunken chanting on Thursdays. I’m a member of the House that does things on Thursdays, call it Animal House, and I’m willing to bet cold hard yen that he’s never actually taken a second look to ascertain what’s going on. This thing on Thursdays has been an Animal House tradition for a long time and the purpose of the event is to get loaded (in strict accordance with the alcohol policy, of course. HEIL BALTIMORE!) and hang out with friends. I very much enjoy this: people from all seven Houses show up, there’s usually music, it’s relaxing, et cetera. Like a small Interhouse party but without the desperate and frustrating attempts to get laid. It’s fun, capisce?</p>
<p>Now, it will occasionally happen that some people form up and march through the Houses and sometimes even Avery Correctional Facility, roaring, thumping closed doors, and singing obscene carols at the top of their lungs, and in “people” I include myself. But this isn’t what Thursday nights are about, it’s just something that happens once in a while. It’s not like we spend a lot of time in any given alley, because the last thing you want to do on a House tour is run out of roar before you go through all of them. And if it happens to remind some of the occupants of the rooms we go past that there’s an outside world, maybe that’s a good thing. God knows enough of them spend their free time alone in darkened rooms, furiously manipulating their Rubik’s Cubes with steamy, explicit cubing diagrams on their monitors.</p>
<p>I personally think the House system is awesome. I was pretty timid and antisocial when I got here. I actually didn’t rank Animal House on my Rotation thingamajig because I was scared I wouldn’t get any work done, and was chosen by one of my first choices, Booty House, and I wasn’t a very good Booty Houser either. But exposure to this kind of thing in both Booty and Animal House cured me and now I’m just lazy and bitter.</p>
<p>The key thing about making the House system work for you is to really probe each House during Prefrosh Weekend and Rotation. If you can find the House that’s right for you, you will be much less likely to make yourself a cyanide sandwich one day. Hanging out with people who think like me doesn’t get old or wear on the nerves, it actually gets better as time goes on, because of the shared experiences. You’ll be like, “Dude, remember that time when we did that thing?” and your Housemates will be like, “Yeah, that thing! Rock!”</p>
<p>But it only works if you can find the House that’s right for you personally. If you’re not happy in a House, or even just blah, you have a pretty good chance of going ■■■■■ or burning out. So go to all your Rotation events, but remember that Rotation isn’t going to magically tell you what Houses you should rank for maximun happiness just by your attendance at dinner. You have to talk to everyone and spend time in the Houses that you’re interested in. Remember, you’re on pass/fail, so you have no reason to do your homework. If you must do homework, do it in a courtyard or common area, it’s a good way to catch the feel of a House.</p>
<p>In conclusion, if you come here and you’re boring, I will kill you and bury your body in the parking garage construction site. Thank you, goodnight, and don’t eat the “beef stuff” at Prefrosh Weekend.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, my actual point was that House-related isolationism is only a factor if you’re antisocial, and that the House system is designed to mitigate the effects of antisociality. Trust me, it works if you make a small effort to let it. It’s like rolling a keg downhill: one push and gravity does the rest.</p>
<p>I’m not the most social person in the world, but I think this is largely due to the fact that I don’t relate to the people in my school. Being with other bright and slightly wacky people at Caltech will probably be a great experience for me. I’ve read both good and bad things about the Houses, but I for one am willing to give them a chance.</p>
<p>Serj T. made a post that prompted me to reply to this thread:</p>
<p>Since my last post, my feelings about the House system have changed quite a bit. First off, I actually started to talk to the upperclassmen on my alley. The main thing is that I realized what great people they tend to be. So I started talking with them some more, we had some great times in the house computer lab over the summer (LAN parties and such), and I feel fairly positively towards the house now.</p>
<p>On the note of alcohol, I also started drinking the mixed stuff (when someone’s paying for expensive drinks, I thought I might as well try some).</p>