Is imperial full of "nerdy males"

I hold an offer for 2007 and will probably accept it as my first choice.

My London friends say it is full of young asian men who do nothing but work, and others who seem to be there merely for the course/ to get a reputable degree, and further that a lot of the time English isn't even spoken that well. A friend who started there this year also said that what organised socials there are seem forced, and very up tight/wierd compared to his friends at UCL.

I am in no way concerned about the race of members of the college but I am am concerned that I wouldn't get the full student experience of various random societies/ interesting people up for adventures, as I beleive that looking back in 20 years these will be the memories you really enjoy.

Also, currently a lot of my friends are female and I'm worried that accepting my Aeronautics offer (3 girls on interview day of 50 ppl) I will not get to meet interesting women.

It also concerns me that there will be no arts students to bring a different sort of life into my experience.

I know some sacrifices must be made to get a degree from such a great place but i'm not prepared to give up a quality of life for a course which isn't that much better than its rivals.

Can anyone reassure me that it will give a great, rounded student experience?

Reply 1

MichailZ

I don't study there, but like you I am applying for 07 entry.

Firstly, the ratio of men to women is around 2:1. So Imperial is full of guys. Whether they are nerdy/work hard.... To get into the 3rd top uni in the country I'm sure you have to put in the work. I do know a person completely obsessed with studying who is learning third year medicine in his second year, I also know some pretty relaxed people who study there. Every uni will have a mixture of all kinds of people.

London unis in general have a lot of asian people in them. The requirement is to get at least a C or so in English, so I doubt they can't speak english, although some of them probably will have accents.

Don't take these stereotypes too seriously. The same thing happens in oxford - people say, this college is full of whites, this college is full of asians and chineese, this college is full of welsh people this college is poor this college is full of binge drinkers when in reality all of them are probably the same.

Michael

Reply 2

Whodareswins89

Waiting for imperial's reply but have an offer from bath... hav the same questions as above... Am i better off going to bath if i want the whole uni experience?

Reply 3

Monoxide

1

Whodareswins89

Waiting for imperial's reply but have an offer from bath... hav the same questions as above... Am i better off going to bath if i want the whole uni experience?

Probably yes. Unless you wanna increase your chances slightly of earning more £££££ after you graduate. Then again KCL/UCL/LSE are not far from Imperial, you can go hang out there if you want a "whole uni experience".

Reply 4

aqfrenzy

2

Imperial is my first choice.

I expect life @ Imperial to be less fun then at any of my other choices simply because students will generally be hard working and with this comes people that aren't as fun. I'm probably one of these people (when sober anyways :P) but I find I can't be surrounded by people like me, I need fun and outgoing people to be around - in this sense I don't know what Imperial will be like for me (and I'm not expecting much).

I don't mind as much because it's in London where there's plenty to do and plenty of other students to mix with - with any luck I should know quite a few other students in London as lots of my friends are hoping to get places at London Uni's, if Imperial is that bad I can always go out with them (or find myself some new friends!).

I would also consider Imperial to be the most prestigious of my choices, in my eyes a degree from Imperial would put me in the best position as far as getting a decent job goes in comparison to any of my other choices, this is another good reason for me to choose Imperial over my other choices should I be made an offer.

Reply 5

Ourkid

12

Do you rekon that people from UCL etc etc would be accomadating to imperial outsiders so to speak?

From what I've heard it's kinda like being in a semi-exclusive club where generally outsiders are welcome but its hard to break into cliques where you can actually hang out with them - if you know what I mean...

Cheers
w00tt

Reply 6

ashy

17

w00tt

Do you rekon that people from UCL etc etc would be accomadating to imperial outsiders so to speak?

From what I've heard it's kinda like being in a semi-exclusive club where generally outsiders are welcome but its hard to break into cliques where you can actually hang out with them - if you know what I mean...

Cheers
w00tt

it'll be harder next year when Imperial leaves the ULU, but maybe your friends can get you in!

Reply 7

Ice Man 3000

w00tt

Do you rekon that people from UCL etc etc would be accomadating to imperial outsiders so to speak?

From what I've heard it's kinda like being in a semi-exclusive club where generally outsiders are welcome but its hard to break into cliques where you can actually hang out with them - if you know what I mean...

Cheers
w00tt

I doubt that there is any strict clique kinda thing, If your an interesting enough person and you get on with people from anywhere I doubt they'll care which uni you go to really.... and I mean I remeber going to the Imperial open day thinking that this uni looks proper dull and boring,(guys doing ball room dancing, ballet in their free time etc.) but once again the whole reputation comes into it. A degree from imperial will almost guarantee you £££, and with that in mind its your decision to sort out your priorities. (social life etc..) But I still think you will end up keeping in touch with mates who go to the other london uni's, so social life in London generally shouldn't be too bad..... I will definately visit all the uni's I'm considering before I make my final choice on firm and insurance, so I guess you've got plenty of time.

Reply 8

Nikuhiru

mpat89

I expect life @ Imperial to be less fun then at any of my other choices simply because students will generally be hard working and with this comes people that aren't as fun. I'm probably one of these people (when sober anyways :P) but I find I can't be surrounded by people like me, I need fun and outgoing people to be around - in this sense I don't know what Imperial will be like for me (and I'm not expecting much).

I wouldn't say life at Imperial is any less fun than at any other institution. If you're an outgoing and social person then you will meet many people who are like you and you can always have a good time. The thing that I love about Imperial is that you can find people who enjoy doing so many different things. I can't count the amount of times I've stayed up talking to people in my kitchen or just chilling out with them but this is more what I'm inclined towards doing. I've got friends who go clubbing a couple of times every week and there is definitely no shortage of people that want to do that.

I think the thing about Imperial that seems rather odd is that while you still do have those who are party animals most people here have a strong work ethic - so people will actually not go out if they truly do have work to do (although this is not always the case!). I've found that here people have a decent balance with going out/working. You also do need to take into account that Imperial is purely science, engineering and medicine so people here do have quite a large workload.

Imperial isn't really a place where you go to if you are just going to end up partying for 3/4 years of your life. If you go here with that ethic I don't think that you would get through Imperial.

Reply 9

Mithun

1

hmspinafore

I hold an offer for 2007 and will probably accept it as my first choice.

My London friends say it is full of young asian men who do nothing but work, and others who seem to be there merely for the course/ to get a reputable degree, and further that a lot of the time English isn't even spoken that well. A friend who started there this year also said that what organised socials there are seem forced, and very up tight/wierd compared to his friends at UCL.

I am in no way concerned about the race of members of the college but I am am concerned that I wouldn't get the full student experience of various random societies/ interesting people up for adventures, as I beleive that looking back in 20 years these will be the memories you really enjoy.

Also, currently a lot of my friends are female and I'm worried that accepting my Aeronautics offer (3 girls on interview day of 50 ppl) I will not get to meet interesting women.

It also concerns me that there will be no arts students to bring a different sort of life into my experience.

I know some sacrifices must be made to get a degree from such a great place but i'm not prepared to give up a quality of life for a course which isn't that much better than its rivals.

Can anyone reassure me that it will give a great, rounded student experience?

In most engineering departments there are a majority of males but it doesn't mean you won't be able to meet women. If you want to meet women there are so many different ways you can do so and the halls offer an excellent opportunity to meet girls.

You will find different kinds of people in halls and it all depends how well you get on with them, most of them are in the same position as you and are looking for friends so its not hard to meet people. When I lived in halls there were plenty of people who were outgoing and most of them were quite fun to be with.

The Imperial union isn't as good as most of the other unions but Imperial is located in a pretty good area and it doesn't take long to get to central London where there are plenty of clubs.

On the other hand the Imperial degree is well worth it when it comes to finding jobs.

Reply 10

CityMonkey

11

I think a lot of prospective students are worrying themselves on a stereotype that has probably been built up by friends joking around that Imperial is full of nerds etc etc. It is a fact that the male:female ratio is 2:1, and it is also true that a lot of people at Imperial are simply there to work. However, it is definitely not true that "interesting" and "adventurous" people don't exist at Imperial.

As someone else said, there are people who club more times of the week than they sleep, there are people who run corporations while still being students (I kid you not), there are people who are doing sports to Olympics levels, there are fashion shows, if you want diversity there's a society specifically devoted to cheese (God knows what they do at their meetings!), there are hardcore careerist socs like investment clubs, entrepreneurship clubs..these are just anecdotal examples, in short, there are just as many interesting people at Imperial as at any other university.

The opportunities offered are pretty big, especially compared to places like Bath. Imperial Entrepreneurs are holding a party this Friday at one of the top clubs in London and attending are Alex Tew (million dollar homepage, Syed Ahmed (The Apprentice) as well as numerous CEOs and business people, the whole event is going to be film by BBC TV cameras. Bath university does not have the power or influence to get people like that to student events, and it doesn't have that kudos.

The simple rule to cracking Imperial: if you aren't making good friends and you aren't meeting interesting people then it's you who has the problem, not anyone else at the university, and I can vouch for this because in my 1st couple of months at Imperial I used to think the same, but I don't anymore.

Reply 11

username36063

11

http://uk.download.yahoo.com/ne/fu/oa/geektest.xls

here we go imperial bods. Try this.

I am 65% geek. Lets see what sort of figures people are getting. Then we can see if its full of nerdy males.

I sure am.

Reply 12

xaxa

1

Probably most people consider studying science or engineering 'geeky', so that makes everyone here a geek according to those people, so Imperial is full of geeks. But that doesn't mean we're all boring! No need to repeat what everyone else has said. If you want to go out a lot (clubs, parties, etc), there's lots of people doing the same thing, and London's the best place for it :smile:

. If you want to spend a lot of time playing games on your PC you'll find a lot of people doing that. I noticed Felix (Imperial student paper) now has *4 pages* on computer games! But hey, it also has 4 pages on music and clubbing.
Don't be worried that everyone else will be boring, they won't be!

Reply 13

hmspinafore

OP

Cheers for all of your advice on Imperial, it's definately changed a few of my opinions, but what i'd really like to know is how you think student life will change after 2007 (my entry year) when it leaves ULU. Do you think it will get better or worse for student experiences?

Although after scoring 60% on the above test maybe I wouldn't be that far amiss at Imperial.

Reply 14

aqfrenzy

2

I regard myself as a bit of a closet geek but I only scored 28%, I guess not then.

Reply 15

immaculate_m

i got 46 % and i might come to imperial... i dunno why.. why do i believe in 'the Force' :s-smilie:

Reply 16

ashy

17

love2learn7

they accept too many of one certain nationality 'cough' lol

well apart from the above comment, there are tonnes of fun people here- you're bound to have atleast 30 to 40 people out of every 100 that want to have lots of fun too and prob 15-20% people that REALLY study hard.