Uni in the USA: A British Guide to American Universities and Colleges > All New: Colleges and Universities Added in 2009 > Emory University (new review!)
Atlanta, Georgia
Undergrads: 6,900
Grads: 5,900
How many Emory students does it take to change a light bulb?
That depends.
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Talk to folks at Emory for more than a few minutes, and you’ll find a recurring theme in everything they say. Emory is a place of variety. No two students have the same experience here. What is remarkable is that, as well as allowing for a huge range of educational experiences, which each individual can tailor to his own taste, Emory manages to bring all the diverging strands together and create one of the most rewarding and close communities of any college in the country. As well as this, students enjoy superb academic instruction, a pulsatingly vibrant social life and a university that sits in the rankings up there with all the Ivy Leaguers.
The Campus
Emory’s main campus is a gorgeous marble-based affair occupying sizeable grounds in an affluent, peaceful region of eastern Atlanta. The centre of campus is dominated by a gargantuan hulking hospital, where med-school students gain experience. The surrounding buildings, however, are exquisite structures of gleaming white stone and terracotta roofs, spaced perfectly among delightful green lawns and wooded areas. Constant construction and renovation, much bemoaned by students, has produced ultra-high tech facilities in most buildings. The library is superb, rated one of the finest in the States.
Dorms range from new to in need of repair, and from really top-notch to mediocre. All freshmen are required to live on campus, as part of the administration’s attempt to foster a close-knit community. Sophomores must also live on campus, but are given the option of moving off to the “Clairmont Campus”, a few minutes’ walk away, where there are funky apartments to rent. Juniors and Seniors can also find room at Clairmont, though some choose to live off-campus.
The Emory Student
The people studying at Emory have arrived there from every conceivable location and background. The college is the most ethnically diverse of any of the top twenty. The two main groups are local Southerners and a surprising Jewish contingent, many from Long Island, New York. Unaccountably, for what was originally a Methodist College, Emory has a larger percentage of Jews than any other school in the South: about a third of the undergraduate population. There is a considerable wealth disparity, with a big range between some of the preppier students at one end, and the “financial aid kids” at the other.
The school is small enough for seeing familiar faces to be commonplace, and this helps with the great community style of education, as does the isolated feel of the campus. Cliques are not eliminated entirely, but everyone feels so much a part of the same system that interactions in class, organisations or residence halls are always smooth. The large numbers of international students have no problem feeling at home, even if certain nationalities (eg the large number of Koreans) tend to keep to themselves.
Hitting the Books
Excellent academic reputations aren’t achieved without effort, and indeed the work ethic exhibits a sturdy vitality among the students at Emory. Most students are very hard working, though there are also those who remain a little more laid back: the business school in particular has a reputation for laxity (they only have classes four days a week, for example).
The classes are rigorous, though like everything else they “vary a lot”, both in how high-quality and how difficult they are. Nevertheless, the experience is almost invariably “intense”. The emphasis here is on the sciences and business, and some students claim that “Liberal Arts take a back seat.” Others say they’re “very challenging” – you just can’t make a rule for anything here.
Profs are generally “decent”, while unfortunately the considerable numbers of outstanding teachers are frequently rotated off to other institutions. Students are frequently surveyed and asked to contribute their opinions on their professors to public forums, allowing a good level of evaluation and improvement of the faculty. Professors by-and-large maintain a high level of out of class contact with their pupils, and are always “free and willing to talk”, even if you “sometimes have to take the initiative.”
Classes at Emory are generally as small and focused as you’d expect at such a reputable university, and indeed two-thirds of them have twenty students or less, while only 7% have more than 50. Less popular majors in particular benefit from small class sizes and teachers who certainly aren’t any lower quality than for the big subjects.
Undergraduates benefit from contact with big name speakers – Jimmy Carter, Salman Rushdie, and the Dalai Lama are all official members of the faculty, for example, though don’t expect to see them around on a daily basis! Students report that they have been able to speak directly with some of the most famous practitioners and researchers in their fields.
It is worth noting that Emory has a reputation as a good place to study for pre-professionals, due to the great post-graduation employment opportunities provided by the school’s ties to various big companies in Atlanta. Many students, though probably not the majority, view their education here as a step on the ladder to a job, rather than an education for its own sake.
Social Life
Emory’s campus life positively hums. Emory students are ultra-engaged, and “no one is apathetic”, according to one senior. Everyone appreciates the resulting atmosphere which is conducive to an awesome creativity and what students call a “dialogue of ideas”.
As a rule Emory parties as hard as it works, with students famously “punishing their brains during the week and their livers on the weekends”. There are great local clubs, and older students also like to head downtown or possibly to the Georgia Tech campus to join in the festivities on offer in Atlanta. “Experience shuttles” take students to various interesting or shopping-rich neighbourhoods of the city.
On campus, students can partake in hundreds of organisations, most active on “wonderful Wednesdays”. There’s the usual array of performance and other creative groups, student media and government, and loads of community service opportunities. There are subject-specific groups (“chemory” science club is popular), there are sessions organised by the university itself to help students, such as the “stress and meditation” group. A lot of great stuff is organised as part of the administration’s community-obsessed drive, including “songfest” (for freshmen), tons of “icebreakers”, random workshops, tea tasting, ice cream socials etc.
Sports are not huge, but there are great facilities for them and fun intramural opportunities, and the tennis and swimming teams are extremely competitive. Greek life is active at Emory, with its usual lion’s share of the good parties.
Outside Those Ivory Walls
As mentioned in the Georgia Tech write-up, Atlanta is the state capital of Georgia, largest city in the South, and not the greatest model of a well-planned modern city(its own fault, since most of it has been purpose-built and rebuilt since its historical Civil War days).
Atlanta is now a modern metropolis of sky-scrapers and big-name companies. There is as much to do as can be imagined in any big American city, and Emory students, especially older ones, take full advantage. Although the traffic can be unbearable and the roads are a muddle, there is plenty to do and loads of vitality (even for such a hot and sultry locale).
Atlanta is also a famously international city, at least by the standards of the South, with lots of consulates, including a British one.
Emory itself is located in the very American “Druid Hills” area of the city, a peaceful, well-off region full of trees and large family homes, away from anything resembling the somewhat polluted, concrete image Atlanta has built for itself. Students report a strong “bubble feel” on campus and in the surrounding neighbourhood, and will often approach trips into the city proper almost as tourists.
Emory has another campus out in the Georgia countryside, a little ways east of Atlanta, in a small college town called Oxford. This smaller campus is actually where the university was originally founded by Methodists in the 1830s, until it was relocated to the more luxurious Druid Hills with money donated by Asa Candler (the founder and owner of the Coca Cola Company). The Oxford campus is said to be harder working and even more isolated than the main campus, not to mention a lot smaller.
Getting In
Just over 25% of applications to Emory are successful - the university is rigorous in its approach and will inspect all the details of your application. Emory is especially looking for how interested you are in the school itself - it expects you to be able to demonstrate why you think it is a good match for you, and preferably to have shown some interest, if not by visiting the campus itself then by talking to a local rep or requesting one of their "video visits".
Fees are high (total costs can be close to $50,000 per year) and, shamefully, next to no aid or scholarships are available to international students.
Famous Grads
Newt Gingrich — Former US Congressman and Speaker of the House of Representatives
Peter Buck – lead guitarist, R.E.M.
Alben Barkley – Vice President of the USA (1949-53)