Cornell University

jchen · December 28, 2003 12:38AM

Well I've read several of those college student review websites and the general impression is that it's a very enjoyable experience (despite the workload), people are open and friendly for the most part, great food, and despite the campus being located in the middle of nowhere, there are still things to do in beautiful Ithaca, NY.

Would any AppleInsider Cornell graduates, friends of graduates, etc care to share experiences, fun facts, or anecdotes from their years?

Thanks.

(For those who read the MacNN Lounge and notice the similarities, I'm just trying to expand user input. Members of both forums seem to be intelligent and for the most part very helpful in questions I have asked in the past)

meaningless · December 28, 2003 12:49PM

Ithaca and its surrounding are what they are. If you are anticipating a more urban experience than you?ll be disappointed. That being said, Syracuse is 45 minutes away by car and the City (NYC) is about 4 to 5 hours away although I have friends who?ve claimed a 3 1/2 hours trip ? I wouldn?t recommend it. Ithaca being a college town for both Cornell and Ithaca College has quite a character. Being a college town, it will ?empty? during the winter and summer breaks. Winters are quiet and pretty but you can easily get case of cabin fever. Summers are rather laid back. Great place to get a summer job (depending on what you want) and enjoy the gorges and pools in the area. The Finger lakes region is dotted with wineries and that could come in handy if you choose to take the ?Wines? class offered at the Hotel school during your senior year ? hard class to get into.

A couple of campus highlights come to mind: The first is dragon day. That?s when those goofy architects bring up their dragon float and parade it around central campus. It?s made from materials donated, pillaged and primarily from proceeds made during the prior 2 weeks from dragon day T-shirt sales. At the end of the parade, the architects will haul the float into the middle of the arts quad and burn it. The engineers have traditionally on occasion tried to disrupt the parade by either ambushing the route or obstructing the path at the Engineering quad (one year, they built a fort). The Planning students got involved one year but making a cow and tossing it at the dragon as an offering; don?t know if this was a one time thing or not. Oh. If there is ice on the ground on that day, be prepared to duck a lot. For about 2 weeks the architects and the engineers will try to out prank each other too. The other highlight would be Slope day. This is basically the end of the academic year festivities. It can be a bit Woodstock-y with the bands (or DJ, depending). Alcohol, though not encouraged, will appear in massive quantities. If nothing else, you get a chance to see some people get stupid-drunk.

Well,, if BuonRotto stops by this thread he may have something else to say that may or may not negate what I have said.

If you go to Cornell, you will have a blast. Oh, wait. The food question. Yes. Let?s put it this way: If you are never to leave campus, you will never starve. I have had friend from other universities come visit and they had to pick their jaws up form the floor when I take them to the dining halls. The meal plan can be pricey but that depends on which option you choose. Though you?ll probably transition to making your on meals, nothing beats heading to Oakenshields at Willard Straight Hall for Sunday brunch (or Jansens on West Campus). Oakenshields opens for breakfast at 7 and is the best place to go after an all-nighter. Stop by the Greendragon at the AAP college for coffee. Oh, another thing. Twice a year, the dining halls will host an outside restuarant to provide the meals. Great time to compete with friends to see who will put away the most plates while your metabolism is still at its highest. LOL.

Damn. Hungry now? I?ll pop in once or twice if you have any other questions. There are a number of other Cornellians here. They?ll give you more info hopefully.

ibrowse · December 28, 2003 1:25PM

I live up near Rochester and every now and then head down to Ithaca. I absolutely love Ithaca, but all I've ever really gone down there for is to skateboard (which the whole area is amazing for) and to see local bands.

scott · December 28, 2003 1:49PM

Does it get slammed with lake effect snows there?

dmband0026 · December 28, 2003 2:41PM

I have an old work friend who goes there and loves it, but his #1 complaint is the insane amount of work he has to do. He is a smart guy, but he gets slammed by the huge workload. So if you are looking for an easy school, this would not be the one for you.

His second complaint is the lack of things to do. He says the most interesting thing is the one movie theater that they have in the 50 square miles surrounding Ithica. But I guess a lack of things to do will help you concentrate on your studies.

ibrowse · December 28, 2003 3:40PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Scott

Does it get slammed with lake effect snows there?

Not as bad as some parts of Western New York, but more than most of us would like to see.

stevegongrui · December 28, 2003 4:12PM

My Dad went to Cornell and he enjoyed the experience. I visited Ithaca and the school.

However, you should keep in mind that the weather is rather harsh and it is far away from major cities.

Ithaca is quite beautiful but I think you might get sick of it if you were to spend a lot of time there. (I would since I grew up in a big city)

Also to note is that Cornell has the highest suicide rate in us colleges, in fact, one of my dad's friends jumped off one of the water falls. Doesn't neccessarily mean anything though.

Cornell is a great school. What other schools did you get into? What are you planning to study?

Steve.

stevegongrui · December 28, 2003 4:20PM

Yeah, just another thing,

I confer with the fact that the work load is tremendous. You will probably not have much time to do anything else. Depends on what you want.

That was one of the reasons I decided to come to uva. Although studying is always a good thing, I figured that I needed to grow in a well rounded way. For example, I do fencing, ballroom dancing and a lot of biking. I am also in the Italian club, the European club and will be starting my mac user group next semester and I plan to find a job.

If I had gone to cornell, I probably wouldn't have much extracurricular time. It is my philosophy that university is an experience and studying is only one of the things of many.

Cornell is VERY expensive, keep in mind. the meal plan is very expensive and you have to pay for almost every little thing, for example, you have to pay for an internet connexion in the dorm, something provided free of charge in most other schools.

Also, while the campus is nice, it's nowhere near as beautiful as that of UVa (where a part of it was designed by Jefferson himself).

Again, what are your other choices?

buonrotto · December 28, 2003 4:30PM

I went to Cornell. Ithaca is fairly quiet, fairly small. Cornell is on the East hill, Ithaca College is other college on the South hill, downtown is in the valley, and Cayuga Lake is to the north. It does get dark and cold in the winter. It rains a lot in the summer, and in the winter it snows a lot, but it's not as snowy as Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse, etc. in the actual snow belt (Ithaca is just a bit outside the snow belt). Still it snows by Halloween and stops in maybe April. It's in the Finger Lakes region of the state, lots of gorges and rather amazing terrain and parks. When it's nice out, it's absolutely beautiful, but the gray in winter get to a lot of people. Spring and Fall can be spectacular -- fall foliage due to the rain is always nice though the colors tend to hit their peak when everyone is away on Fall break. If you stay late enough, usually just after final exams, the spring weather is almost perfect. I didn't mind the lack of sun in the winter so much though I am affected by that sort of thing because the sunsets frankly are always amazing, especially from the East Hill.

The city is about 15,000 people I think. The city's population doubles when classes are in session, and there are a lot more people living in the surrounding towns too. But it's obviously not a big city by any means, not what I would have called a city though technically it is. It is about 3 1/2 hours outside NYC, just depends on how you go and when.

The Cornell student life tends to center around Collegetown which is part way up the East Hill, while Ithaca College students and more public events are downtown. To get an idea of how life works up there, Wegman's downtown on Route 13 is a HUGE supermarket that's sort of a regional hub for people within a 30-45 minute radius of Ithaca. It's open 24 hours and probably has a bigger footprint than St. Peter's in Rome.

Despite being a small place, it's a fairly cultured place due to the 2 colleges and a close enough proximity to NYC to have some exchange. The blue-collar locals are friendly, if a bit rough around the edges. The other big industry in the region is mining (mostly salt). Ithaca Gun moved out of the area some time ago. There's a fairly good music scene. Cornell gets some good acts in town, and has most of the largest venues anyway, but there are some good bars and the State Theater (I think it holds 2,500) downtown and in Collegetown that get some good acts. The best place for movies is still Cornell Cinema, they do a great job with themed monthly movie showings, plus recent movies (a couple months later than commercial theaters but a hell of a lot cheaper too).

The food in the area reflects a fairly cosmopolitan population, some world famous restaurants in the area, everything from Vegetarian to Thai to big steak houses, etc. Cornell Dining is pretty good too, not amazing in itself but very competent at least. There are lots of different dining halls, with different themes, different student reresentation, snack bars/coffee stands, etc. They have theme nights and have annual events where restaurant chefs from all over come over and prepare the dinners at one dining hall per night for a week or two. Having the Hotel School and an Ag school is huge boon.

Frankly, you won't have much time to do stuff off campus with any frequency. Cornell does a good job of having lots of stuff happening right on campus anyway, and you have to like nature -- visit the various gorge parks (Treman, Buttermilk, etc.) while you're there. There's some excellent wine in the region, mostly by Lake Seneca, so make a long weekend some time to drive out and visit the wineries. Cornell has its own orchards, the Plantations, the dairy farm (ice cream!), and it's pinned between two large gorges manmade laes, creeks, Cayuga Lake of course, and has lots of athletic facilities for you. Ice Hockey is [i]the[i]sport and involves much spectator participation. Go to some home games, especially the Harvard game. Learn some cheers. Throw some fish.

Cornell is a large university, split into many smaller ones. For undergrads, there are seven colleges in the University umbrella. I think the smallest one is the College of Human Ecology (formerly the College of Home Economics), followed by Architecture, Art and Planning (AAP). They're each about 500 students total, including grad students. Arts & sciences and Engineering are the big ones. So it's huge place with HUGE quads and usually much smaller groups and classes, though the university is known for some giant courses like Psych 101 (2,000 students each semester, but really worth it) and of course the wine tasting course (400 students). Most of my classes ranged from 15 people to 40-ish for in-college required courses. For people in Arts & Sciences or Engineering, you probably take more courses that have 100-200 people in them in your early years. Later classes are very small and usually involve research, projects, dissertations and grad-level study. We were rather close (probably too close) to our professors, but that probably depends on how quickly you find a focus and where you concentrate your study. There's a HUGE library system there, and undergrads can access the grad libraries without some of their privileges. Its easy to sign up for out of college courses, but you have to manage your course load carefully, and it can be hard to keep up when it's elective for you and a core course for others. Try to take AP exams, and even some local community college courses and transfer the credits if you can for some requirements like Calculas, a natural science, CS and so forth if you're not into those things. A lot of the intro courses at Cornell are killer. (Actually, Astronomy 101 is manageable). You will usually meet some people in your first week at your dorm, and over the next year find a closer group of friends in your major or college. Your closest friends tend to be classmates in your major in my experience.

I have many anecdotes, some which shouldn't be repeated. Dragon Day is a blast if sometimes some people get out of hand. Slope day is an interesting if sloppy event. Slope Day is the last day of classes when students gather on Libe Slope (a huge hill the drops from the Arts Quad to the West Campus dorms) and get sloshed. Generally, the ambulances wait at the bottom of the hill and catch people who roll down.

As I said, hockey games are a ton of fun. Midnight Wegman's runs, pizza and studying at 2 am, etc. But studying does take up the vast majority of your time. Don't stress prelims or finals too much, but plan carefully, do the reading when you're supposed to (you will never catch up otherwise) and find the quiet spots on or off campus, especially for finals. And for God's sake, don't jump!

applenut · December 28, 2003 4:42PM

Quote:

Originally posted by stevegongrui

Yeah, just another thing,

I confer with the fact that the work load is tremendous. You will probably not have much time to do anything else. Depends on what you want.

That was one of the reasons I decided to come to uva. Although studying is always a good thing, I figured that I needed to grow in a well rounded way. For example, I do fencing, ballroom dancing and a lot of biking. I am also in the Italian club, the European club and will be starting my mac user group next semester and I plan to find a job.

If I had gone to cornell, I probably wouldn't have much extracurricular time. It is my philosophy that university is an experience and studying is only one of the things of many.

Cornell is VERY expensive, keep in mind. the meal plan is very expensive and you have to pay for almost every little thing, for example, you have to pay for an internet connexion in the dorm, something provided free of charge in most other schools.

Also, while the campus is nice, it's nowhere near as beautiful as that of UVa (where a part of it was designed by Jefferson himself).

Again, what are your other choices?

1.) So you chose the easier school? That's something to be proud of

2.) Cornell and any other school of its caliber offers far and beyond any amount of extracurriculars anyone may want to participate in. Italian and European club? Sounds like a high school extracurricular list

3.) Going to Cornell you will see a lot more diversity in where people are from than UVA. That's my biggest problem with Cal.... too many californians.

4.) UVA is very expensive for out of staters. So is Cal. Cornell also has a shitload more money to give in scholarships and grants than UVA does so you can't predict what it will cost at all. I have to pay for my internet connection and most people do, and if you think you don't, I'd investigate that housing bill a bit further. bandwidth doesn't come for free

5.) UVA may have been gorgeous in the 1700s...... I'd take Cornell over it though.

jchen · December 28, 2003 4:52PM

How difficult is it to establish New York State residency for in-state tuition at the public colleges at Cornell?

rick1138 · December 28, 2003 4:54PM

5-08-77

Great mathematicians. The arXiv server is now hosted at Cornell.

anders · December 28, 2003 4:55PM

Quote:

Originally posted by applenut

1.) So you chose the easier school? That's something to be proud of

How hard the work load is at the college doesn´t decide entirely how good an education you get. Depends entirely on what you are studying and what you do besides your studies. Not that I think you disagrees with it but I justt thought your comment is a bit misleading.

applenut · December 28, 2003 4:59PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jchen

How difficult is it to establish New York State residency for in-state tuition at the public colleges at Cornell?

sorry, you're question confuses me..... Cornell is a private university. Being in-state offers you no financial benefit there.

applenut · December 28, 2003 5:00PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Anders

How hard the work load is at the college doesn´t decide entirely how good an education you get. Depends entirely on what you are studying and what you do besides your studies. Not that I think you disagrees with it but I justt thought your comment is a bit misleading.

sure, but we are talking Cornell here. it's not like its some kind of community college with 40 hours of homework a week

splinemodel · December 28, 2003 5:20PM

Quote:

Originally posted by DMBand0026

So if you are looking for an easy school, this would not be the one for you.

Really, none of the top schools -- ivy league or not -- are easy. There are departments that don't take too much effort, but if you care about your education, it's difficult.

BTW, Princeton is the best.

stevegongrui · December 28, 2003 5:24PM

Applenut,

Why are you such an eternal pain in the ass? Do you have to argue and try to discredit everything I say?

And I find it very offensive how you have tried to say that UVa is a shit school on several occasions.

stevegongrui · December 28, 2003 5:26PM

And shut the f uck up about the clubs I'm in. You have no way of knowing what we do in them. How much do you know about Italy or Europe? Where have you been to outside of the US?

buonrotto · December 28, 2003 5:34PM

Quote:

Originally posted by applenut

sorry, you're question confuses me..... Cornell is a private university. Being in-state offers you no financial benefit there.

Actually, Cornell is treated as a private institution, but it is also the land grant college of New York state, like Texas A&M is to the state of Texas. The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell was founded for New York state. Other Ivy Leaguers (sorry, Spline, I've lived in P'ton too long to think much of the place

) joke about Cornell being SUNY (State University of New York) Ithaca. The state money doesn't go directly the the Ag School though. What really happens is that the public and private money goes into one central pool with exception to specific private donations/endowments to the respective schools. Then the money gets redistributed by the University as needed. The University presents how they distribute the money from the State every year to be accountable for the tax payer money. Actually, the University has to go to Albany every year to "beg" for money. The result of the state funds is a double-edged sword. The public money gets Cornell on the inside track for a lot of research, and obviously having an Ag College near ILR, Engineering and the Grad School has its own advantages too. But at times like these when the state education money has dried up, it places a lot more burden on the private endowed colleges because they have to pick up some of the load. The University is scrambling to keep their head above water because it doesn't have the endowment of a Princeton, Yale or Harvard and has a need-blind and affirmative action admissions policy. Students of the Ag School still have to pass general admissions, no "weaker" policy or quotas, but state residents do pay less for admissions if they are enrolled in the Ag School (not other colleges though). I don't know how easy or hard it is to satisfy in-state residency requirements for the Ag School though.

BTW, Meaningless and I both went to the architecture school, so if our perspectives sounds pretty homogenous, it's because we were basically living and working in the same building for 5 years.

applenut · December 28, 2003 5:59PM

Quote:

Originally posted by stevegongrui

Applenut,

Why are you such an eternal pain in the ass? Do you have to argue and try to discredit everything I say?

And I find it very offensive how you have tried to say that UVa is a shit school on several occasions.

don't post blatant BS that I feel the need to discredit.

Quote:

Where have you been to outside of the US?

I've been to Canada. if you'd like to pay to send me to Italy and the rest of Europe I'd be more than happy to accept. I'm sure you can afford it since you save so much money going to UVA.

BuonRotto,

Thanks for the info. Never knew that. I have a bunch of friends at Cornell and they all love it. Although they all agree it's frickin freezing at this time of the year.

stevegongrui · December 28, 2003 6:32PM

So much money for UVa?

If I told you how much I pay for UVa you'd be so jealous.

Cornell University

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