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In Australia, most of the universities are located in major cities, and most people either live with parents or in their own place off campus and commute there. So not being present on campus 24/7 sort of means there's not much of a 'college culture.' The idea of 'fraternities' or 'sororities' are foreign here. I've also heard that uni is a lot more 'general' in the States, like there's a year of doing just different subjects, whereas here it's all about training for the specific course from day one.
The idea is to get a "well-rounded education." So a student will start off in their first year taking "general education courses" or "gen eds" for short.
Courses like English writing 101, college math, college science, a humanities course, language, etc...
then 2nd, 3rd, and 4th year they focus on their "major course of study" ie, business, psychology, international relations, poli sci, engineering, etc
In a word, suburbia, though the typical experience in an urban environment is also possible (Boston and New York come to mind).
I don't think suburbia is quite the right term. Many of the largest public universities in the US are either situated in a small city of ~50,000-75,000 where the whole city revolves around the university (PA, FL, IL, WV, IN, KS), or in larger cities where the university is not in a suburban environment at all (MN, MI, TX, OH). Smaller universities are scattered everywhere but you could not really label them as suburban either.
most universities in europe are state run , once students leave , they never look back , in america , not only do people maintain life long afinity to the college they attended , they often become donors to the same university , much less common in europe
There's a certain amount of "college culture" in some other countries... in the UK and in some European countries, there are popular student neighbourhoods and the Quartier Latin, etc. Canada and Australia too.
In the U.S., I think college life is such a big thing for a few reasons that are basically unique to the U.S.: fraternities and sororities (lifelong bonds and possibly career networks are established); the mainstream popularity of college sports... especially football, it's HUGE in the U.S. and non-students attend the games in large numbers; the everlasting influence of "Animal House" and many other movies after it.
I live in college town here in the Midwest- Ames, Iowa, home of Iowa State University and this "college culture" is mostly overrated IMO
The United States does a wonderful job at selling BS to the rest of the world, so a lot of people send their kids here. Walking around town sometimes, I am shocked by the number of Chinese students who are going to college here. I don't get it but oh well..
As far as college being "the best years of your life", I have to disagree. There is a lot of depressed college students here and people going through all kinds of financial stress and turmoil- the movies obviously will never show it.
For most people like myself who chose Engineering- it was not fun by any means.
I will ask the same question as I did in the last thread:
What is american college culture?
Beer bongs and panty raids?
Sports and parties isn´t much of a culture.
I have never seen any other college listings than the likes of Americas 20 wildest party colleges.
Like,the college students and alumi in the US would NEVER shut up about their college lives,lol.
Not to mention those cool-wanna-be stupid-ass frat boys,major ew.
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