Cornell University Top Questions

more diverse than expected, however i dont feel like my friends are all that diverse. seems like most people are wealthy, motivated, driven people.

The Cornell student body is extremely diverse, with many people from different backgrounds, religions, interests, and political beliefs. From my time at Cornell, I would say that the campus is predominantly liberal.

Not very diverse

There is a lot of diversity (a lot of Asians and people from other countries). Students wear anything and everything to class (from dresses to sweatpants, shorts in the snow, fashionable, those who don't care about fashion, suits and ties to class in the hotel school, etc.). Students do talk about the fact that they will leave Cornell with high starting salaries.

There are all sorts of different groups of students on campus. Often, they're pretty segregated.

I love the student body--everyone definitely finds their niche, and there are always more new people to meet. People are deifnitely segregated to some extent, mostly self-segregated of course. Pretty much everyone is from New York or New Jersey.

Because of the state schools it is fairly Jappy, but you can find others. I am not from New York, and neither are 3 of my 5 best friends. It is mostly Jewish and Asian. Pretty liberal -- very into sustainability and helping the environment.

Some people come to Cornell and criticize the fact that it advertises itself as "diverse", saying that it's really just a place for rich white students with some Asians thrown in. I disagree completely. One of the things that struck me as a freshman was in fact, the diversity at Cornell - I'd never before seen so many people of so many different backgrounds all in one place. And honestly, I've learned so much about other cultures through this daily interaction with people who are different than I am. Also, a notable aspect of this "diversity" - this is actually a really controversial, emotional topic on campus, by the way - is the candor with which people address it. Honestly, I believe that people's differences are discussed here with an openness that is extremely hard to find anywhere else in the country. And about people's political views . . . Cornell is definitely left-leaning. Actually, I've become much more liberal since I came to Cornell, partly because of the political tendencies of my surroundings. Still, Cornell has a very visible Republican student group on campus, and all aspects of politics and political biases are constantly addressed, so I'd characterize our campus as a very open-minded one, not necessarily "liberal" per se.

Rich and white

I don't think any kind of student would feel out of place at Cornell. People mingle all the time. There is, however, a higher prevalence of students from upper-middleclass backgrounds.