The Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Yet I can't imagine anywhere else I'd rather be. This place is absolutely amazing. Don't come here if you want to be coddled and have grade-inflation and administrators holding your hand all the time. Come here if you want to make your own decisions and work harder than you ever have in your life. Because if you put in the work, this place will give back more to you than you could ever imagine.

I have been able to learn more here than I ever thought possible. I have been able to acheive amazing things working through student groups. I look around at the faces of people in my dorm and I see thinkers, builders, artists, theorists, and great engineers. I know these people will one day change the world, or at least their own little part of it. Yet these same people are the ones I flirt with, pull pranks and hacks with, complain about workload with, order middle of the night pizza with. It's mindblowing. The diversity of culture here is fantastic--you can choose where you live. There's really a sense of community with where you live; it's not just a bunch of people living together. There's an option for everyone: the French speaker, the "cool kids" from high school, the pyromaniacs, the raging liberal hippies, the serious student, the serious drinker, whatever.

The professors are generally quite accessible. As a freshman, I took classes with Chomsky, the guy who discovered the world's oldest rock, and the guy who discovered Uranus' rings. One of my classes was only 2 people. Getting UROPs (research jobs, $8.75/hr to start) is ridiculously easy; I emailed a prof saying I was interested in what he was doing, and within a week I was hired.

Don't apply to MIT unless you love math and science and engineering. It doesn't matter that MIT is ranked in the top 10 or 5 or whatever it is now in USNWR. It matters that you get the best possible education for you--and someone put off by the number of math and science requirements should not be applying to MIT. If you want a broad, Ivory Tower liberal arts education, try the little school up-chuck. If you want to be around some of the best minds in the country and want to analytically look at the problems in today's world (yes, engineering problems but social problems as well), this may be the place for you. MIT is idiosyncratic, so visit before you decide.I Love This Fucking Place.