I’m the parent of a son who qualifies for the generous merit scholarships on offer at the University of Alabama and University of Mississippi. While getting him through to an undergraduate degree in an economical fashion is appealing, I have been cautioned by others that Southern schools are so culturally different from their Northern counterparts that Northerners are often very unhappy there, and transfer out. For one, my perception is that “going Greek” is everything at those schools, and my son has reservations in that regard. For another, my understanding is that many of these kids matriculate with pre-existing social connections, such as membership at the same country clubs and attendance at the same debutante balls, and that it can be difficult for an outsider to break through into the social milieu.
It’s not as if we’re hard-core Yankees; we live in an Appalachian-influenced area of southern Ohio. Still, I’m not under any illusions that our area shares too much in common with the Deep South. I welcome any information and comments that can help us grapple with this issue.
I personally think it’s harder to go from the south to the north than vice versa. Even after 30 years, I’m still taken by surprise at how, ahem, “reserved” most people are. Really, smiling at strangers is that painful?
I went to UT-Austin, a huge Greek school but had no problems making friends as an “independent.” There are LOTS of kids who don’t join fraternities or sororities. And being able to go swimming starting in late February was quite nice.
In Texas, if you accidentally bump someone in the store and say, “Excuse me,” the other person usually says, “That’s OK!” and smiles at you. Up here, when that happens, the person usually glares at me like I did it on purpose. It gets old.
^^Oh, yes, I smile, and I’ve been told I have a very nice smile.
I think if you have always lived up north, you might not notice the difference until you spend a little time in the south. For example, when my kids were younger, I took them on a tour of the UT campus. Things have changed since I went there, so we were consulting a campus map. A couple stopped to see if they could help us find our way. And then a guard at an entrance booth called us over as we were crossing the street. I thought we had done something wrong, but he wanted to give the boys a photo of the UT football team and show us pictures of his granddaughter. At the end of the day, my older son said, “Mom, people are so friendly here!” He later had the same experience as a freshman at UT - he couldn’t believe how friendly everyone was.
(My running partner is another transplanted southerner who has lived here more than 40 years. She comments on the same thing fairly often.)
Any big public flagship is going to have a group of kids who know each other from high school or being from the same city. My nephew goes to our flagship and I’d say he probably knew 400 or so kids before he went to college - high school (and the kids from the years ahead of him), youth sports, his neighborhood swim club, etc. But 400 out of 27,000 isn’t that many. He still has room in his life for new friends.
I went to high school right in Austin. Quite a few of my classmates attended UT. One of my closest HS friends lived in a dorm right down the street. But once school started, I never saw her once. I made friends in my dorm and in my classes.
However, having highly segregated sororities/fraternities is not particular to southern universities; a quick look at some photos on some Ohio State fraternities’ web sites indicates that they are still much more racially segregated than one would expect if students there joined in a race-agnostic manner.
I think we may well visit, but I want to tread gingerly. S knows resources are limited, and I don’t want him to feel as if he is obligated to go to a place that doesn’t suit him solely on account of financial considerations.
My D went to state U (SEC) in hometown. Didn’t do sororities and had plenty of friends both greek and non-greek. One of best friends from OOS got in “good” (I hate that term) sorority with no connections of any kind. My D1 was a deb, D2 wasn’t. You will find pockets of this at schools and find well connected people, but let’s be real - there is also some real connected circles at schools in the north as well. When big schools like you mentioned are said to have big Greek influence, still have % participation of 30-40%. That’s a lot of kids that don’t go greek, especially in terms of numbers at large school.
I think bringing along your own social circle might be more obvious at small school. I was struck visiting school with oldest where she was only one on tour not from a boarding school. At large school lots of that is diluted. Again, would expect to see this in small schools in north as well.
OP, I’ve long thought the friendliness of south v north is somewhat influenced by town size. I would bet most small towns all over are more friendly.
@BasicOhioParent I think you will be pleasantly surprised. It is a nice campus. What is his major? You might also want to apply to and visit University of Alabama Huntsville. Especially if he is in a tech field.
True story, I went to a brand new Chili’s in Philly. Waitress gets to our table, starts her “I’m ____. Welcome to Chili’s!” Everyone else at the table looks at the menu without responding…I smile and say, “Hi! I’d like a diet coke, please.”
She responds, “Oh, you’re from Texas, too!”
Friend says, “Ha, it’s your accent!”
Waitress: “She doesn’t have an accent, but she smiled real big!”
This is a side tangent on culture just for fun so sorry in advance that I don’t have anything helpful to add for the OP.
As someone who grew up in FL (an odd mix of northern and southern culture) but always knew I was a northern soul, for me the coldness of people is a convenience thing. I believe in being nice in human interactions (smile at your wait staff, cashiers, etc) but hate when interactions are unnecessarily required. It becomes exhausting socially for no purpose other than appearances, convention, etc. I think there’s a line that many northerners cross into rudeness that doesn’t have to be crossed in order to still get the same benefits of the coldness. I want to limit my interactions as much as possible, but when I am in them, I do try to be nice to people.
Oh, and speed up the walking please - more time to spend on people and things you enjoy! Plus, it’s good exercise!
