<p>I’m a rising junior, and I’ve always looked toward Stanford as my place to be, so I want the values of Stanford to shape me. </p>
<p>What is Stanford about? Someone once told me that the people at Stanford could be summed up into 3 values: Ambitious, smart, and chill. Is this right? For those of you at Stanford, what values really set Stanford apart from others? What’s the vibe there?</p>
<p>Sorry to burst your bubble…but, Stanford"s values SHOULD NOT be shaping you…rather, YOU should be shaping YOUR values…you, along with your FAMILY UNIT, along with the ENVIRONMENT you grow up in and INTERACT with on a daily basis… how you react to adversity, how you develop integrity by choosing to do the right thing when no one is looking, how you become the peacemaker when no one dares to step in to stop a fight, how you stand up for people being bullied, how you choose to lead when others cower, how you challenge the status quo if the status quo is WRONG, how you admit to making mistakes and learning from them, how you grow each day to become a better person…</p>
<p>…Stanford or any other school does not define you…YOU DO. </p>
<p>…If you take a moment and think about what I just wrote…you will be one step closer to understanding what it takes to get into schools like Stanford and what they LOOK for…you will become a better human being for it…</p>
<p>Agree completely with what gravitas2 said, and I’d also like to address one thing you said:</p>
<p>“so I want the values of Stanford to shape me.”</p>
<p>This is not how you should go about a college search. When you become a senior, you will have become a specific person based on your passions, experiences, resources, ambitions, upbringing, diligence, etc. At that point, you’ll identify colleges that are good “fits” for you based on the type of person you’ve become and what you hope to do in the future. This is a “bottom-up” approach. Your sentence takes a “top-down” approach…you begin with a goal and try to “package” yourself to achieve it. Highly selective colleges (Stanford in particular) don’t like people who “package” themselves or who seem like they’re trying very hard to get into a specific school. Just be yourself and the right doors will open. </p>
<p>To actually answer your question, though, Stanford and its students cannot be summed up or labeled in any way aside from saying that almost everyone is smart and passionate. Admissions does a great job of creating classes that are diverse in every way possible…I’m always surprised by how many different types of people I meet here. What most of them have in common is intelligence and passion. The latter refers to the fact that they arrive at Stanford caring deeply about something and use the University’s resources to further engage/develop their passion. </p>
<p>Compared to its academic peers (HYPM), Stanford is commonly thought of as being more “laid-back.” But many people say that Stanford students just look this way on the outside and are actually “paddling” very hard under the surface to stay “afloat.” This is called the Stanford Duck Syndrome (Google it). In addition, Silicon Valley has a huge impact on the environment, as evidenced by the fact that a lot of people are interested in entrepreneurship. Furthermore, Computer Science is the largest major. </p>
<p>Having said that, it’s also worth noting that Stanford has Humanities programs which are (like all of its programs) top-5 in the country.</p>