<p>I like this question. I’ll try to keep my points brief, with the disclaimer that other students may have had vastly different experiences.</p>
<p>MIT has a very large and complicated administration at the helm of the university. It’s sometimes difficult for students to effectively communicate with the people in charge, and even if the people in charge are really trying to help students, it’s not always easy. Consequently, it can often feel like the administration is “not listening” to the students, especially in the realm of student life (dining, athletics, etc.), but even sometimes in the world of academic policy. Similarly, there is a continuing trend of hiring new administration officials who have absolutely no previous experience at MIT. It is sometimes difficult for these people to understand the MIT culture, and there policy choices sometimes reflect that lack of understanding.</p>
<p>Some people at MIT think they’re more like what an MIT student “should” be than other people who are just as real and legitimate students. When it comes with student-administration interactions, those kinds of people tend to be the louder, more obnoxious ones. They can sometimes convince the administration that a minority viewpoint is a majority viewpoint, and that’s usually not good when the administration needs to decide on important policy. </p>
<p>I think there’s enormous pressure to take on lots of classes and activities and research when it’s really unhealthy for some people. Everyone is trying to be really “hard core” and I get the sense that the mentality is, “If you’re not super-busy all the time, you’re doing something wrong.” Students should be free to do as much or as little (within the bounds of reason) as they want, and there shouldn’t be social coercion to push those limits to unhealthy degrees.</p>
<p>Up-and-coming faculty members face much more pressure to do outstanding research than to be outstanding teachers. Assistant/associate professors without tenure who turn out to be great professors but whose research doesn’t make the cut are denied tenure and leave MIT. You can read about this history of this process and get some current perspectives on it from this article in The Tech: [Unraveling</a> tenure at MIT - The Tech](<a href=“http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N28/tenure.html]Unraveling”>http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N28/tenure.html)
This phenomenon is not specific to MIT, but it’s still something that many students are unhappy about.</p>
<p>The Greek system can be overwhelming for many freshmen. In many ways, Rush is designed to convince new students they’re ready to make choices that they may not be comfortable making. Fraternities and sororities can exert a lot of social pressure on freshmen (even if they mean well!) to “Go Greek.” There doesn’t seem to be enough balancing pressure from the non-Greek people (a slight majority of campus) to help frosh realize that they shouldn’t rush into a decision to pledge just because a lot of other people are doing it.</p>