Things I wish I'd known about LSE before applying!

Me wish me knew know speak fluent Chirese. Lots of Chirese here.

I am a current student at the LSE. Disclaimer: My view is probably biased. But I don’t doubt that many LSEians share exactly the same views.

Good points about LSE
- You have all kinds of high profile speakers coming to our school to give talks. Amartya Sen is coming this Oct, and previously we've had Bill Clinton, Kofi Annan etc. But then again these talks are open to the public, so you don't technically have to be an LSE to enjoy this advantage.
- The number of societies we have, by far beats UCL/Kings etc. There're tons of Business/finance/corporate/consultancy types for those wannabe-investment bankers. We even have a Hedge Funds society -_- So if your goal after graduation is to work for the corporate world, then these societies will definitely give you an edge in terms of internships, networking, talks, workshops etc. That said, we have a million other societies for people with any kind of interest or career interest.
- You get to share a classroom with brilliant minds - everyone in the LSE had excellent academic records (well duh), and this environment will force you to push yourself to strive for the best (or feel stupid alot of the time)
- You will have the chance to meet people from all areas of the globe. I took up the Arabic language in my first year, and I distinctly remember that on my first lesson, we were told to introduce ourselves. Everyone in my class, all 20 of us, were from a different country.


The not so good points:
- People studying humanities only have 8 hours a week of lectures. EIGHT. 99% of the learning is done through reading the materials from the library or moodle. Most people agree that you wouldn't miss out on anything if you skip all lectures/classes. I had Friday off last year, and I've had friends who only had classes/lectures on Mondays and Tuesdays, meaning they had a 2-day week. This was a huge culture shock for me, as I was used to spending all day in school at Sixth Form, and having teachers tell me exactly what to study. So you've got to be really self-motivated and LOVE independent study to like LSE. I personally feel lost and alone most of the time. The lack of contact also leads to the next problem.
- You only see your classmates once a week for one hour. Unless you're extremely sociable (which I'm not, explaining why all my friends are from halls), it's likely your friendships formed through classes won't run deeper than the coffee-after-class. I can't forsee any of my friends and I remaining in contact after we graduate.
- A typical day of school for most of us: Go for an hour of class, then head to the library to do readings, go for another hour of lectures, attend home to our separate lives and separate friends. It's definitely NOT a loving studenty community. I guess the only word to describe the atmosphere is corporate.
- Of course, you can join societies. But unless you're in the executive committee, the only 'participation' you have in the societies are the spam emails and newsletters they send you about attending event X. If you participate in a society half-heartedly, it's not easy to break into the clics already formed by the committee members. If you want to be really popular and have a great social life with LSEians, join a sports clubs to get into the Athletics Union.
- Some teachers really suck. I've had teachers coming to class without any material prepared and just sat there half-listening to our debates.
- It's not a myth that people stick to their own nationalities. You hear so many other languages spoken in school other than English. Even the Chinese don't mix with the Hong Kongers. I guess it's just a natural tendency to seek refuge with people you are familiar with when one is in a foreign country.
- 100% of assessment comes from our end-of-year final exams (this varies from dept to dept, but in general we're assessed largely by the final exams). This leads to a slacked off term 1 and term 2, then a crazy rush to catch up during Easter.
- Everything in LSE is competitive. Not just the classes, but even societies and sports clubs. I signed up for recreational activities (which I was told would just be 'for fun') like Kickboxing and Ultimate Frisbee, and if you're not good at it, you might as well not join. Everyone is vying for spots in the Executive Committee, with the sole reason to boost their CV.
- Instead of meeting inspiring minds and interesting people, I've only met Investment bankers. Everyone seems to have a one-track mind: get a first class >> internships in christmas >> internships in summer >> attend career networking sessions >> work in an Goldman Sachs upon graduation. Be prepared to suffer under immense pressure over the dreaded internships, because ‘everyone else is doing one’ and you’d feel like you’re left at the bottom of the waiting list for jobs if you don’t secure one.
- Too many postgrads. More postgrads than undergrads. Sure, you can learn a lot from having postgrad friends, but they’re here to boost their career prospects, and no one will assert that they’re the most interesting people in the world. My kickboxing class, Arabic class, volleyball, development society, were 90% postgrads.
- the student union is highly politicized and most people don’t give a f about them.
- we recently dropped to 80th in the world, while UCL is 4th

All in all, LSE is NOT a fun place to be. It's a place for people who want a degree from a prestigious university and be able to plunge into the world of work with an excellent CV. Don’t get me wrong, I am having the time of my life in London, but LSE is not at all the source of it. Our student feedback review has traditionally been much worse than other universities. Let’s just say that there’s a reason why LSE’s having problems getting funds from their alumni. People who’ve graduated don’t really look back and reminisce about the time they spent at the LSE.

Freshers, apply at your own risk. The only reason why I'm still here and not at SOAS is the prestige of the LSE (I have NO idea where the prestige stems from by the way, I personally don't see any merit in my education here)

Sorry for the length, I had no idea I had so much to say (rant)

*Asians.

^ HKers are a type of Chinese!!!

Not all East Asians are Chinese FFS!

oh dear, lse students feel the need to neg rep me for stating the truth

why does lse continuingly fall in world rankings when theres no further changes in the criteria since 3 years ago?

and look at these prospect students getting excited at the very fact that they only have 8 hours of contact time per week LOL

this. hohoho the horrifying neg rep!

I can teach myself much quicker independently than I could in a class/lecture. I haven't experienced uni yet, but at A Level I could have comfortably covered all the content we did in a week in a 1 day if I wasn't bogged down by the contact hours. Lots of classes are just a huge waste of my time.

For me 8 hours is just about bearable. Sorry if this sounds pretentious but people learn differently and at different rates. The minimal contact hours at LSE is a huge huge plus for me.

Why does LSE admit so many foreign students? Call me old fashioned, but I feel UK universities should educate domestic students, placing a particular emphasis on promoting social mobility. I'm aware that LSE does have a outreach program, and quite a few of the domestic students I've met are from inner-city London schools. However, I've met many more (well, been in the presence of) rich, jet-set c***s. How does the admission of foreign students operate? Does anyone know the average entry standards of foreign students? I'm aware the foreign students keep the lights on at LSE and pay Alwyn young's massive salary (for his three hours work a week) but the university seems to defer to them and utterly ignore domestic students. Remember Chinese culture week? What exactly were we celebrating? "Chinese cultural influence is virtually nil, and unlikely to increase… Indeed, high Chinese culture and art are almost all imitative of western forms: Chinese concert pianists are technically brilliant, but brilliant at Schubert and Rachmaninov. Chinese ballerinas dance to the scores of Diaghilev. The number of Chinese Nobel prizes won on home turf is zero, although there are of course legions of bright Chinese trying to escape to Stanford and Caltech… It is hard to think of a single Chinese sport at the Olympics, compared with umpteen invented by Britain, including ping-pong, I’ll have you know, which originated at upper-class dinner tables and was first called whiff-whaff. The Chinese have a script so fiendishly complicated that they cannot produce a proper keyboard for it."-Boris Johnson

Hate much?

And lol at bolded.

I don't hate them. I just think LSE is a bizarre place, but I wouldn't want to go anywhere else.

and look at these prospect students getting excited at the very fact that they only have 8 hours of contact time per week LOL

Why does LSE admit so many foreign students? Call me old fashioned, but I feel UK universities should educate domestic students, placing a particular emphasis on promoting social mobility. I'm aware that LSE does have a outreach program, and quite a few of the domestic students I've met are from inner-city London schools. However, I've met many more (well, been in the presence of) rich, jet-set c***s. How does the admission of foreign students operate? Does anyone know the average entry standards of foreign students? I'm aware the foreign students keep the lights on at LSE and pay Alwyn young's massive salary (for his three hours work a week) but the university seems to defer to them and utterly ignore domestic students. Remember Chinese culture week? What exactly were we celebrating? "Chinese cultural influence is virtually nil, and unlikely to increase… Indeed, high Chinese culture and art are almost all imitative of western forms: Chinese concert pianists are technically brilliant, but brilliant at Schubert and Rachmaninov. Chinese ballerinas dance to the scores of Diaghilev. The number of Chinese Nobel prizes won on home turf is zero, although there are of course legions of bright Chinese trying to escape to Stanford and Caltech… It is hard to think of a single Chinese sport at the Olympics, compared with umpteen invented by Britain, including ping-pong, I’ll have you know, which originated at upper-class dinner tables and was first called whiff-whaff. The Chinese have a script so fiendishly complicated that they cannot produce a proper keyboard for it."-Boris Johnson

The foreigners can pay especially when it comes to postgrad. The erm 'rich jet set ****'s' are not all bad at all. Then again, the majority of students (my friends) at LSE are middle/ruling class.

In terms of the undergrads, the majority, even if they are U.K educated will tend to come from private schools because LSE demands you have the top grades and no interview occur because of the sheer numbers applying so you need to be great on paper or the likelihood of an offer is very slim. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that most people at LSE are pretty affluent