What hopes and values do new students bring to MIT?

Students were invited to reflect on the values they intended to bring to MIT and talk through their anxiety and hopes for the exciting year ahead.

Partnering with the Office of the First Year and Office of Graduate Education, we organized dozens of conversations in August of 2024 with incoming first-year undergraduate and graduate students during Orientation Week. Students were invited to reflect on the values they intended to bring to MIT and talk through their anxiety and hopes for the exciting year ahead, while their Orientation Leaders facilitated the conversations.

The Questions We Asked

Please share your first name and a food that reminds you of home.
What is a value – something important to you – that relates to why you came to MIT?
What is an experience – it might be recent or from your childhood – that relates to that value?
Look ahead and share a hope, or a question that you have about MIT for the upcoming academic year. Please share an experience, or just a moment in your life that relates to this hope or question.
What is one idea or story that you heard from another person today that you would like to highlight for the larger community? Did someone share a story that you relate to or one that made you think about things in a new way?

The Answers We Received

Most students were intentionally readying themselves (sometimes excitedly) for a challenging workload, knowing they would likely be pushed further than they were at their last academic home.
Some students were worried about the “grind” mindset or culture at MIT, knowing that it would be easy to get swept up by these pressures and miss out on making connections and meaningful experiences.
Many want to make a personal impact here and be remembered for how they changed a dorm, lab, or other group environment in a way that has positive ripple effects for generations to come.

Gabbie, MIT Undergraduate

I'd rather put in, like, you know, B level effort or C level effort and use a TNR if it means I will be, like, sleeping and happy and, you know, able to breathe and do the things I enjoy.

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Our Partners

Rose Poyau, Director of Student Advocacy at the Violence Prevention and Response Office in DSL
Kristen Selheim, Associate Dean for Residential and Community Life
Suraiya Baluch, Associate Dean & Director, GradThriving
Jocelyn Powers, Program Coordinator, MSRP
Samantha Stettner, Fellowships Program Assistant
Denzil Streete, Senior Associate Dean and Director
Elizabeth Young, Associate Dean & Director, First Year Advising & Programming
Michael Santoro, Assistant Dean, Advising & New Student Programming

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Next Steps

We received great feedback in response to this event, which led the technical team to further develop the app for usability and transparency regarding consent.

In the Spring of 2025, we invited these students back to reflect on this first year and record some advice to be shared with next year’s incoming class.

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Get Involved

Check out our opportunities, fill out the interest form to pitch your own project, or email realtalk@mit.edu with questions! We would love to hear from you.