Rice v. WashU v. Vandy... convince me!

Tilgaham
Sun, 24 Apr 2011 18:31:18 +0000

To be honest, I wouldn’t call students at Rice that intellectual either. If you’re looking for a school where you will be inundated with academic debate or intellectual conversation on a daily basis, it’s going to be a small niche group you find here. While we do have intellectual conversations, the majority of people here aren’t aspiring intellectuals. It’s an Engineering school, and people tend to be more practically focused.

Intellectual does not mean intelligent. Students at Rice are BRILLIANT. I believe swimmer misinterpreted the meaning there. Vandy kids are no “dumber” than we are, nor is the aggregate at WUSTL. Speaking from experience (I go here, and have a friend who graduated from Vandy, as well as a close HS friend who is at WUSTL), Vanderbilt certainly has a more “southern gentry” type atmosphere. Students go to football games dressed up, pledge into the greek system, etc.

However, from the mouth of my friend who graduated: You’d be suprised that students at Vanderbilt and other “southern” schools will tend to be more politically interested. If this falls under your auspices of intellectualism, then they have us beat, because Rice is highly apathetic.

All of these comments are generalizations. I imagine there are plenty of apathetic kids at Vandy, and I know quite a few politically passionate students here at Rice. This is just the general population I speak of.