Warning about LSE

I loved it there. I know two people that went on to PhD's at top US unis. I know people who went to hedge funds. I know people that went to work for the government. I know people that studied like mad. I know people that partied like mad.

At the end of the day, the following points have a key impact on all this debate:

1. English - I had one lecturer there whose English was not perfect, but it was a small class and he was happy to discuss. The real problem are classes, which are not done by lecturers (usually) but postgrads. I got largely lucky on these ones again, too, but even if not, LSE is full of people that like to complain but not do anything. If you have trouble understanding, make them repeat it, make them speak slower. And in the end, you can always go to office hours - one of the most woefully underused aspects.

2. London - I guarantee you if LSE were on some campus somewhere outside London, it would get a lot better reviews.

All the rest is ******** and up to you. As I said, you wanna study, there will be people you can study with. You wanna party, you will find people. You want to join many societies, there are cool ones, and there is the entire UoL to explore. It is what you make of it, except point 2. above makes it a lot easier to make something of it.

I NEVER accused LSE of being poor academically - it's clearly one of the best unis in the world. But my issue lies with everything else - the way the campus and socials are set up, it's almost impossible to get to know people and make friends. It's very cliquey and people honestly don't have as much fun as other London unis.
Yes, they could just hang out with people from UoL but if you're in an LSE hall (God forbid) then that's a lot harder to do. LSE halls are DEAD from what I've heard and it certianly does not have the reputation of a party school.
As I said, it's fantastic academically but pathetic socially. Of all the unis to go to it's not number one by any means.

I have heard that people who have heard things don't know jack ****.

On a serious note, that would be a reflection of the type of student attending. Does that mean everyone is like that? Well maybe you can hear something about that again.

It sounds to me a lot more like these people dissing it are socially awkward and think a campus uni with a party atmosphere would have enabled them more. Could have joined in without any initiative on their part. If you now read my previous post, that is more or less what I wrote.

Seriously go **** yourself. I know many people there as I AM FROM LONDON - a family friend went to LSE and graduated recently, some people I knew in the year above who I kept in contact with, and my sister's best friend, who I also know incredibly well, is a current student and all of them can't stop talking about how **** it is for multiple reasons:
1. No community
2. Full of people who take academics so seriously that it doesn't become enjoyable
3. Too small
4. Professors who spoke poor English (yes your comment too)
5. Cliqueness
6. Bad societies

These seem very familiar to the OP's complaints... literally all I said at the very beginning was that this only confirms once again what I have already been told about LSE.

Also go **** yourself again - seriously. You're basically saying the people I know are socially awkward and thus have a **** time and it's all their fault. NOT TRUE. They are incredibly sociable, not awkward in the slightest and super nice. They were led to believe this uni would be somewhat fun, yes they had heard the negative things but went regardless as it was part of UoL and thought in the worst case scenario they could hang out with others - which proved to be much harder said than done.

I would add point 7 to this list of complaints - you go there. Definitely not applying now.

I'm going to have to disagree with you. I think that the Fabians would be turning in the graves if they could see what the LSE has become. It hasn't improved social mobility or offered working/ middle class students the opportunity to make UK society equal at all. Instead, it has become a place where the international elite descend upon to fuel their capitalistic dreams. The LSE is nothing more than a brand. Unfortunately, the vast majority only attend the school to realise their ambition of becoming investment bankers instead of having a genuine interest in social science so yh I don't think the Fabians would be best pleased.

The rare home students that you’ll meet are either ‘rahs’

I am not going there...

Your points all ring true. The LSE is indeed, for the most part, full of international students with ridiculously wealthy parents who could afford their UK boarding school or international school education, as well as the extortionary international fees. If you look at the home students at LSE, however, most of them are not the 'rah' type and come from a middle-class or lower background. True, most people attend the LSE just for the name on their degree certificate as that is a nice piece of paper to flaunt around Canary Wharf. Indeed, their lack of concern for the subjects they are studying (unless they are on Accounting & Finance or Management) and their disregard for the fascinating work of the LSE's research faculties is one of the most depressing things about the university and makes the campus environment much less enjoyable than it could be. Yet, the LSE, even if just by virtue of signalling and brand-name, allows those people to access high paid jobs in investment banking they wouldn't otherwise. Even if an admittedly small part of the LSE cohort is the demographic the Fabians were targeting, in a convoluted way, this is a sort of realisation of the Fabian aims. After all, had the LSE not been there they may well not have had the opportunities they got.

I do agree with you that the focus of LSE admissions is now overwhelmingly on international fee-paying students for reasons no other than financial ones, and this clearly comes at the expense of academic considerations. Such tuition fee milking combined with cutting costs on education in many ways this means that the LSE often fails to realise its potential as the "world's best social science university" when it comes to undergraduate education. Yet, its research output remains world-leading and the opportunities it offers to motivated students are endless.

Out of curiosity, what course are you on?

This university rejected me. But reading this makes me feel good a bit..still..what ... LSE is great. Who cares about the Chinese?

Didn't you know this before you applied? Do you think the people at OxBridge are party animals? Obviously not. The smartest guy in my school was extremely awkward socially and kinda a snake too. I knew Unis like those will be full of them. Obviously they give 0 shits about interaction. They want to 'be the greatest' or whatevr that means.


Reading this still surprised me a bit... Oh and Warwick rejected me too.

Guys, seriously, this is why most people steer clear of posting their experiences at top universities because it usually ends up with people who have never attended the uni having a back and forth. I have continuously made it clear throughout this thread that it takes a certain type to enjoy lse. If you’re that ‘type’ then great! You will most definitely enjoy your uni experience at lse. Even if you’re not that ‘type’ you may still enjoy your experience-I’m sure there are lse undergrads who love their time at the uni. I just wanted to share my own experience with you guys and really shed some light on how people who believe that LSE is the holy grail to investment banking are completely wrong.

The whole point of this thread was to advise prospective students. If you visit a uni like warwick, Nottingham, durham etc and love it but still decide to pick lse SOLELY based on the reason that it will get you into investment banking then you’re making a huge mistake. I have said it again and again on this thread: uni is just a stepping stone; the onus is on the individual. So if you’re after a campus based, pretty university with a community feel to it, lse is not for you (and trust me it’s better to acknowledge this now rather than a year into your course like moi)

Like a previous poster mentioned, I was expecting this thread to be full of questions which had substance to them such as what other unis were on the internship, the workload at lse, the lecturers, the careers service etc. but instead its turned into a thread full of people asking me which uni is best for socialising. And in answer to that question, if you truly want to socialise and get ‘blind drunk’ no London uni is for you. London isn’t a student friendly city hence the reason why most London unis have the lowest student satisfaction scores. Much like London itself, the unis in London are fast paced, very career orientated, expensive and have a largely international student body (again some people will thrive in this environment whereas others will hate it)

Asides from that, all the LSE students who are starting in September and those of you who are prospective students, best of luck, I genuinely hope your lse experience is better than mine.

I knew about LSE's problems and wrote about it on this forum but some of the bigwigs on this forum with larger fan following than Preeti Patel brushed me off and called me all sorts of names. When I touched on the standard of teaching and the poor spoken English of many of the lecturers, people called me racist.

Thank you for sharing. It was very brave of you. Please do share more to expose the nonsense that happens at LSE.

Wow - did he expand more on that?

Those same people should have also warned you that you get plenty of chances to socialise with people from other London unis, and that a lot of the social aspect comes down to the accommodation you pick and the type of societies you join. Then, of course, it comes down to personal preference and what sort of character you are - two guys from my school who are both doing Econ there said that they loved how everyone was so like-minded as them in terms of their goals etc. My point is that one's experience varies massively and cannot be described in bold, all-encompassing terms. There's a lot more nuance here, something which OP rightfully acknowledged early on.

I don't think that this thread would be appropriate to start some sort of massive comparison between UCL/KCL/LSE. They all have their merits and demerits, and I imagine that academics and "opportunities" are impossible to gauge without knowing what course/career you're looking at.

Actually, most of this thread has come down to the social aspect, which is strange considering that OP made some very interesting points that people glossed over (such as, why does he think that the careers office is diabolical?)