Haverford College Top Questions

The student body is varied and outspoken about many different issues. However, there are certain unifying trends. For instance, the population is overwhelmingly liberal. Conservative members of the community are practically frowned upon and socially outcast. Most students wear comfortable, semi-nice clothing on a daily basis. Maybe one day out of the week the girls will wear a dress and some nice shoes and the guys will wear a nice button down and some slacks, just because they feel like it. Ultimately, I think people wear what makes them feel good and what fits their personality, of which there are many types on our campus. Different types of students interact (for the most part- I'm excluding the sports teams. They keep largely to themselves and their groups of significant others, who almost always come from other sports teams anyway).

Haverford students are all very diverse and come from many backgrounds. One of the main issues with diversity is definitely political diversity since almost all students are democrats. A nice thing about Haverford is that all students interact. There are always the athletes who tend to form groups but most athletes have other friends as well. Students at Haverford are definitely not worried about getting jobs in which they will earn a lot of money, but rather getting jobs that will make them happy.

Students here are liberal. Quite frankly, if I were republican, I'd be terrified to come out of the closet about it here. Despite the remarkable level of tolerance for racial, religious, sexual, and economic differences, there is very little respect for the conservative point of view.

I personally come from a stable household that used to be poor. Both my parents are immigrants to the US and we went from living in an apartment in the bad part of the city to owning our own home in an all right part of the city in my lifetime. There are kids here who pay the whole tuition without breaking the bank and others who get the whole thing paid for because they can't afford to give out a dime. I'm in the middle and hang out with both sides. The way i see it is its all in the company you keep, if your big on the whole race thing then have a bunch of friends that are your race and you'll feel fine.

Students are extremely chilled out. We know how to work, and we know when it is absolutely necessary to STOP working and play some ultimate frisbee. Arbitrary social boundaries (high-school style) are looser, but not absent; however, they are less based on physical appearance and personal style, and more on personality. Smart kids, nice kids-- we could use more alternative personalities though. It gets a bit country club from time to time.

Boring. Disjointed. Awkward. There are a small percentage of very interesting people who got duped into coming to Haverford. They stick together and struggle to have a normal college experience, living with one another and venturing into Philadelphia whenever possible. It isn't easy.

Most students wear Haverford clothes, like things that say Haverford in some form. Dining Tables: Boy Track Team Girl and Boy Ultimate Frisbee Team Custom Groups Random People that met somehow A lot of sport teams eat together because they finish practice and just eat together.

There are groups on campus to represent everyone. We have students of color, women of color, a sexuality and gender alliance, jewish groups, christian groups, latino/a groups, and groups that are not affiliated with any of these categories. Haverford goes out of it's way to make everyone feel comfortable. Students here express themselves freely. I don't see many people wear pajamas to class (I think out of respect for the professor), but students wear everything from sweatpants to jeans and sneakers to dresses and high heels. Most Haverford students are from the Northeast and we don't really know what financial backgrounds are most prevalent. That is something else that is just not spoken about. Students here love their politics, especially with the primary and the upcoming election. People here are very liberal and conservatism is not really well represented here at all.

Haverford is very welcoming of LGBT and other minority groups on campus. There are a lot of organizations and also outreach/awareness events for such groups. As for socio-economic position, most people at Haverford are very privileged to come from the backgrounds that they are. That said, Haverford is not a place where people are at all showey with their money and I've never felt uncomfortable as a person who is here on financial aid. I looked at other schools where everyone wore the trendiest clothes and had the new Louis Vuitton bag, but that's just not what Haverford is like. The general disposition here is a relaxed one, so even though lots of people have plenty of money, it's not a segregating factor at all. I would also say that a lot of different types of students interact; it's too small a school not to.

The student body has ongoing conversations about anything from diversity on the campus to what was on last night’s menu. I believe that we have a fairly diverse campus, as far as race, religion, LGBT, socio-economic, etc. are concerned because of how small we are. I’m in contact with people outside of my own “categories” all the time. Funny question – most students wear whatever is comfortable, although some tend to wear high heels and mini-skirts, which I don’t understand. Half the time I wear sweatpants and sweatshirts, half the time I wear “normal” clothes. If there were four tables of students in the dining hall, this is what it would look like: one table would be the track/cross-country men, one table would be the rest of the athletes (all races, religions, etc.), another table would be the very shy/awkward nerds, and another table would be the rest of the cool people that aren’t at the sports table (including all the Puerto Ricans). We have lots of people from Puerto Rico and other Caribbean islands, lots from Asia and India, and some people from Africa. We have students from all financial backgrounds because we have need-based financial aid. We are politically aware and active (in fact, today Hilary Clinton came to campaign here at Haverford, and two days ago Michelle Obama was here doing the same thing!). Not many students talk about how much they’ll earn one day, but we all know it’s important, unfortunately.