Grinnell College Ia 2007 (Off the Record)

Introduction from the Author

When you tell people you go to Grinnell College, a common response is “Oh, Cornell? I heard that’s a really good school.” Or, “Grinnell, isn’t that just west of the University of Iowa?’ Have you ever been to a Hawkeyes football game!?’” In other words, very few people have actually heard of Grinnell, and those who have heard of it usually associate the school with its close proximity to the University of Iowa or, more precisely, Iowa’s football team, the state’s crown jewel. Despite its stellar academics, its national recognition in ESPN the Magazine, and (allegedly) in Playboy’s overall student attractiveness rankings, and despite the fact that many students at Grinnell view their school as the best place a college student could ever hope to be, Grinnell remains an outright mystery. Many students, however, are quite content with the school’s ambiguity.

Sometimes, living smack-dab in the middle of an endless plain of cornfields can feel a little confining, and students often feel like they’re living in a soundproof bubble where news from the outside world trickles in only occasionally. Of course, in the world we live in today, this is not altogether a bad thing. Grinnell then, in a sense, is a bit like Thomas Moore’s Utopia, an ideal sanctuary on a tiny remote island in the middle of an ocean of, well, farmland. Here, it’s easy to forget that elsewhere in the world, there is bigotry and random violence. Yeah, the troubles of the world seem nonexistent in a town that hasn’t had a murder since the Nixon administration. At the same time, most Grinnell students consider themselves just as active, attentive, and up-to-date on world events here as they would be in the heart of Manhattan. Students here can express their feelings about issues without ever having to worry about being condemned by an overly-conservative hierarchy. Yes, we have a very liberal student body. This is due in large part to the Grinnell professors, who constantly encourage their students to push their intellectual limits and think about the world in a new light. “Grinnellians” are constantly inundated by new and fascinating ideas that they just wouldn’t get on television or the Internet.

Of course, everything isn’t all “peaches and cream” at Grinnell (go to school in Georgia if you want peaches). Complaints about the food, the workload, and the social claustrophobia of the surrounding town are not uncommon, and life in Iowa takes a little getting used to if you are from out-of-state. However, the fact remains that most students who choose to stay here will tell you that the top-notch academics that you’ll receive, and the lifelong friendships that you’ll most likely forge, make spending four years of your life in Iowa well worth it. At the very least, it’s worth a close look and a visit, because if Grinnell is your kind of school (and this guidebook will help you determine if it is), you shouldn’t let anything stand in your way. Well, you bought the book, so that’s step 1; step 2 is reading through it and deciding if Grinnell is for you or not.

Lauren Standifer, Author
Grinnell College