<p>“Well, love that dirty water, oh Boston, you’re my home”</p>
<p>Much like the song, my love for Northeastern University is with the awareness that it’s not because it is all wonderful and great. More that it’s ours, warts and all. </p>
<p>When you go to NU, one of the first things you notice is that upperclasswomen hold doors for you as you come up the steps. I don’t mean for a one count, they will hold the darn door for you. Every single one, every single time. There is a different dynamic at NU, partly because most of the campus has already entered the work force. The courtesy is contagious </p>
<p>Because of the most successful co-operative education system in the country, some of your friends will be working at a corporation while you are in school. The result is that NU kids make friends easy and are themselves approachable. At some schools, sitting down at a table of kids you don’t know can be stressful to say the least. At NU, it’s expected as everyone is in the same situation. Networking just starts earlier at NU than other places. Someone sitting alone will be joined or waved over to join others. The downside is that if you want to spend four years with the same close friends, NU is not the place to come. Sort of like real life, you’ll make a core of friends and make others as situations change. </p>
<p>NU is not a hand holding sort of place. More like the real-world where people are expected to hold their own weight if not more so. You will find students helping other students. Kids don’t leave other kids hanging in the wind - it is flat out not like that. </p>
<p>NU’s campus does not have large lawns and a beautiful classic quad and such. It is a city university where Boston is at your footsteps. Where once you leave Huntington Ave. nobody gives a dang where you go to school. That said, if there is another city university that has transformed its campus more than Northeastern over the last 30 years, I’d love to know of it. It is mouth gapingly different from my day, so much so it is hard to believe. Not just one or two buildings or a new complex of buildings, other than a few dorms that are unchanged it is all new or significantly different and expanded. Btw, the Back Bay area of Boston has also been transformed over the years and is a sought after residential area. It wasn’t always that way, so the area surrounding NU is pretty sweet and with Symphony Hall a block one way and the Museum of Fine Arts a block in the opposite direction, you don’t need to head far to experience a lot. Because Back Bay apartments are also quarters for lots of New England Conservatory of Music and Berkelee students, going out for a pizza and walking down Gainsborough Street in the spring is sweet with amazing music floating out of the buildings. </p>
<p>NU has one 10 of the last 13 Business School Beanpot competitions. MIT and BC used to compete but I guess they got tired of losing. NU is not a school where they offer an amazing variety of programs - more a school that focuses on doing well in what they offer. The result being that when you go on facebook and see the threads of ‘I turned down _____ to go to NU’ has a bunch of schools that would never have been listed 20 years back. NU engineering majors have a starting salary higher than MIT and yes that can be pulled off in four years not just five. </p>
<p>Still, parts of Huntington Ave. continue to look depressing and the invite for NU to join the Ivy League? It’s not in the mail. But, well, I love that dirty water, NU, you’re my school.</p>