Stony Brook University Top Questions

What is the stereotype of students at your school? Is this stereotype accurate?

Matt

Either the students are very academically orientated or they are very socially orientated.

Josh

Cliquey, with lots of Asians. I would say that this is partially true. Yes, there are a lot of Asians. As for the cliquey-ness of the school, it really depends. Most of the internation students will only associate with other people from their home country and dont make the effort to do otherwise. The other ethnic students who are domestic born are really awesome and friend groups at this school tend to be very diverse, just like the school itself! Commuter School. Well its a 50/50 split between commuters and residents. There is a disconnect between residents and commuters but SBU does a good job with bridging the gap with such programs like commuter connections breakfast in the parking lot and drive in movies.

Andrew

Stony Brook is extremely diverse. The stereotype is mainly that everybody's Asian because we have a largely life science-based school - which is true. The student body is about 40{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} Asian which is much higher than usual. The diversity is such that you will find people of all races and ethnicity at Stony Brook.

Krupali

Honestly there is no stereotype at Stony Brook; the campus is so large and diverse that there is a good mix of jocks, and geeks and frat kids. Whatever you're looking for, Stony probably has a group of it, and the campus is too large to be sterotyped.

Vikalpa

The stereotype I tend to hear is that Stony Brook is a school full of stoners. Our university has adopted the nicknames: Stoner Brook and Stoned and Broke. Although there is a considerable population of students who engage in marijuana use, I do not necessarily find it to be anything out of the norm. Drug use is a problem across campuses nationwide. Fortunately, Stony Brook security and regulations work to making the campus an education conducive environment. As a student, the advice I would give to any parent of prospective student concerned about such an issue is that ultimately, the success of the student depends on will power and a proper mindset. There are just as many ways to avoid bad company as there are ways to become bad company.

Krystalyn

There are actually different stereotypes for different sections of the school. Tabler quad is full of hippies, H-quad is full of jocks, Roosevelt is a ghetto, and things like that. It is somewhat true. Upon entering Stony Brook University, people are separated into 5 subgroups with the hope that they will meet people who have similar interests. Eventually, new students settle into the group of people they are most comfortable with and gravitate to specific parts of campus.

Caterina

That everyone is Asian and can't speak English. It's not completely accurate, but around half of the kids are of Asian descent

Caterina

That everyone is Asian and can't speak English.

Rachel

Well there is one stereotype that all the Asian students are science majors, and terrible at writing and English. There is also another stereotype that Stony Brook is a party school.

Raj

The stereo type is pre-med and asians. The stereo type is right to a tee. I am not pre-med

Sarah

I think the sterotype for Stony Brook students is that everyone is Pre-Med and super competitive. Although we do have a pretty high percentage of Pre-Health (medicine, dental, physical therapy, etc) students - everyone is willing to help.

Seth

I have heard every kind of stereotype about Stony Brook students, from potheads to total nerds to party animals. And for every stereotype there is a group of students that do tend to gravitate towards their tendencies, like at any university. There are students who party on Thursday through Saturday every weekend, but there are also those who do not take their heads out of their books. Stony Brook is a diverse university with many unique individuals and groups of students who just want to make the best of their time in college. Being a student of journalism, I get the stereotype that I'm creative but lazy pothead. This stands next to many students at Stony Brook who major in the sciences. But that is not true. I work hard for my grades in the journalism school. I'm up late doing work most nights because I'm a journalism major. But there are probably some journalism students who live the "creative but lazy pothead" stereotype, as there are with any other major and the stereotypes about their students.