When I arrived at Wesleyan as a transfer student this fall, I had little idea what to expect. Sure, I had heard all of the stereotypes about hippies and atheists and radicals, but beyond such superficial descriptions, I did not have the faintest idea of what life at the University would be like, or what the students themselves were like. And, despite the fact that I have been here for about eight months, it was not until recently—as my first year began to wind down—that I felt like I truly got a handle on the place.
As I have come to realize, the beauty of this university is to be found in the eccentric attitudes of its students. It has little to do with the campus, the administration, or even the curriculum itself. While those factors certainly make a positive impact, their success depends on the way in which they are utilized by the actual human beings that make up this community. In other words, it is the individuals that make up the institution—not the institution itself—that makes this place so special.
When I say it is the attitude that matters, I do not mean a specific socio-political attitude, as many people here so often mistakenly emphasize. It is not liberal consensus or orthodoxy that makes this a great place to go to school, rather it is the lack of consensus and predictability that makes the University what it is. It is not so much a set of shared values or beliefs, but rather the understanding that diverse values or beliefs should be engaged.
Tied in to this attitude is the intellectual eclecticism and curiosity that so many students here display. Students here are nerds in the most unique of ways—rather than smacking you in the face with it, they surprise you with their knowledge and intellect, which makes things infinitely more interesting. At first glance, there may be an abundance of “hippies” and “hipsters,” but there are very few people here who are “normal” in the sense of neatly conforming to superficial stereotypes.
These eccentric qualities of the student body have been on ample display the past few weeks, whether in the legions of seniors scrambling to finish their theses or the hundreds of students who crowded Foss Hill to celebrate 4/20 and pretended to root for the baseball team. In fact, it is this exact combination—that of intellect and spirit, of ambition and abandon—that seems to define the University.
Within the span of a single fortnight, the same students who were holed up in the library for days on end seeking answers to obscure intellectual questions were dressing up like giant animals and acting generally insane. The same students who ran naked in front of a two baseball teams and a crowd of hundreds will be sitting fully clothed in your class on Monday, most likely making an insightful comment on the nuances of whatever particular subject is being discussed.
What makes this place unique is its character, and its characters—its distinct flavor as a school, and the semi-insane but rarely boring people that make up the campus community. Without these two interconnected features, Wesleyan would simply be another of the dozens of cookie cutter liberal arts colleges that dot the northeast United States; and let’s be honest, where’s the fun in that?
So, what got me thinking about all this in the first place? This past weekend, I ran into a pre-frosh who was trying to decide between Wesleyan and another NESCAC school that will remain unnamed. He asked me what distinguishes life here from life at other schools, and I was almost at a loss for words. How is one to succinctly describe a place that is defined by its eclecticism and failure to fit any familiar mold?
In the end, there was only one way I felt I could accurately capture what makes this school what it is. My cryptic, yet honest response: “It’s the people, man. It’s the people.”
Leave a Reply