Please help me choose: JHU vs. Vanderbilt

imsobored
Fri, 29 Mar 2013 17:23:49 +0000

I’d say JHU is slightly better than Vanderbilt in terms of academics/name recognition. However, Vanderbilt’s social environment/atmosphere is significantly better than JHU’s. As an Asian dude from NJ, I’m going to address your “cons” regarding Vandy’s social life:

*Heavily Greek (probably not joining a frat)

Yeah Vandy is pretty Greek, but there is a lot of interaction between the Greek and non-Greek community. This is unlike at a lot other schools, where there is a clear divide between Greeks and independents. Plus, there’s tons of stuff to do if you’re not Greek; it’s absolutely not true that you can’t have a social life if you’re independent.

*Predominantly white student body

Vandy’s around 70% white, which could be a large or small percentage depending on what the demographics were like at your HS. As an Asian guy here, I had some reservations about the demographics here before school started. However, I found out it’s actually not that bad; you won’t stand out if you’re a minority.

*Extremely preppy/Southern?

This is also something I was worried about before I came here, but in reality the environment’s pretty chill. Many people like to dress better than the average New Jersey kid, but nothing’s too over the top and you won’t feel out of place if you don’t dress nicely.

And overall, there really isn’t that big of a difference between Vandy culture/atmosphere and NJ culture/atmosphere, except for the fact that people here tend to be a lot nicer :)

In the end though, both JHU and Vandy are great choices, and you can’t go wrong with either of them.