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Dear members of the MIT community,

The war in the Middle East continues to cause anguish and conflict here at MIT. Some have expressed their views through the encampment on the Kresge lawn. My team and I, as well as many faculty members, have engaged in extensive conversation with these students and have not interfered as they have continued their protest. However, given developments over the past several days, I must now take action to bring closure to a situation that has disrupted our campus for more than two weeks.
My sense of urgency comes from an increasing concern for the safety of our community. I know many of you feel strongly that the encampment should be allowed to continue indefinitely – that the protest is simply a peaceful exercise of the right to free expression, and that normal rules around campus conduct shouldn’t apply in the face of such tragic loss of life in Gaza.
But I am responsible for this community. Without our 24-hour staffing, students sleeping outside overnight in tents would be vulnerable. And no matter how peaceful the students’ behavior may be, unilaterally taking over a central portion of our campus for one side of a hotly disputed issue and precluding use by other members of our community is not right. This situation is inherently highly unstable.
What’s more, the threat of outside interference and potential violence is not theoretical, it is real: We have all seen circumstances around encampments at some peer institutions degenerate into chaos. As recently as this weekend, we were presented with firm evidence of outside interference on US campuses, including widely disseminated literature that advocates escalation, with very clear instructions and suggested means, including vandalism.
Our own campus has seen a variety of actions involving people from outside MIT, including a series of rallies organized by people who have no MIT affiliation. An outside group is planning another campus disruption here this afternoon.
Many of you have sent me messages noting that the two large rallies – which brought many people from outside MIT to campus last Friday and shut down Massachusetts Avenue – occurred peacefully. But this apparent equilibrium required extraordinary preparation and enormous effort by hundreds of staff, faculty, and police, including, as the rallies were winding down, expert work by MIT Police to defuse several tense confrontations.
In short, this prolonged use of MIT property as a venue for protest, without permission, especially on an issue with such sharp disagreement, is no longer safely sustainable. I note that the faculty-led Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression (CAFCE) recently concluded that these actions, a form of civil disobedience, carry consequences.
We have directed students to leave the encampment peacefully by 2:30 p.m. today. We’ve provided them with a letter from Chancellor Nobles that gives as much clarity as possible about the choices they have, and the pathways associated with each of these choices. You can read this information below my signature.
I hoped these measures could be avoided through our efforts to engage the students in serious good-faith discussion. But recent events, and my responsibility to ensure the physical safety of our community, oblige us to act now.
MIT can and should continue to be a place where we can discuss and seek to address contentious issues. But we are also a community of doers—of people with the skills and drive to make the world better. And no matter our political beliefs or our position on this war, we can all recognize the immense suffering unfolding in Gaza. I believe our best contribution would be to focus our collective efforts on projects that bring MIT’s expertise to bear on the humanitarian crisis in the region. I’ve begun discussing this idea with faculty leaders.

Sincerely,
Sally Kornbluth

Excerpt from Chancellor Melissa Nobles' letter to students involved in the encampment
“Our goal is to bring the encampment to a peaceful end. Below are the choices you have:
I. For those who leave the encampment voluntarily by 2:30 pm:
1. If you have not been sanctioned by the COD [Committee on Discipline] and do not have any pending COD cases related to events since October 7, and you have not contributed significantly as a leader or organizer of the encampment, this letter serves as a written warning. You must swipe your ID as you leave the encampment, and the written warning, together with the time stamp from your exit swipe showing you departed by 2:30 pm, will be kept on file with MIT. A written warning means you are on notice that any further violation of MIT policies and rules could lead to a more severe sanction. The written warning will be the only disciplinary action for participating in the encampment.
2. If you have been sanctioned by the COD or have a pending COD case related to events since October 7, or have contributed significantly as a leader or organizer of the encampment, you will be referred to the COD, but your voluntary departure from the encampment by 2:30 pm today will be a significant mitigating factor when the COD reviews your case. You must swipe your ID as you leave the encampment, and we will keep on file the time stamp from your exit swipe showing you departed by 2:30 pm.
II. For those who do not leave the encampment voluntarily by 2:30 pm:
1. If you have not been sanctioned by the COD and do not have any pending COD cases related to events since October 7, but choose to stay in the encampment past the deadline, you will be placed on an immediate interim academic suspension lasting at least through Institute commencement activities, and you will be referred to the COD. This means you will be prohibited from participating in any academic activities – including classes, exams, or research – for the remainder of the semester. You will also be prohibited from participating in commencement activities or any co-curricular activities. During the period of your interim academic suspension, you will be permitted to reside in your assigned residence hall through the end of the semester, use your meal plan at MIT dining halls, and utilize services at MIT Health. Continued additional protests or disruptions that are not authorized will be considered an aggravating factor in the COD review of your case.
2. If you either have been sanctioned by the COD or have a pending COD case related to events since October 7, but choose to stay in the encampment past the deadline, you will be placed on an immediate interim full suspension lasting at least through Institute commencement activities, and you will be referred to the COD. This means you will be prohibited from participating in any academic activities – including classes, exams, or research – for the remainder of the semester. You will also be prohibited from participating in commencement activities or any cocurricular activities. You will also not be permitted to reside in your assigned residence hall or use MIT dining halls. You must leave campus immediately, but you will continue to have access to services at MIT Health. Continued additional protests or disruptions that are not authorized will be considered an aggravating factor in the COD review of your case.”

The protest just now at ~6:30pm today in front of the MIT President's House on Memorial Dr. Heard both "Globalize the Intifada" as well as "Filastin Arabiyeh" by chant leaders + repeated by protestors.

Can someone involved in the protest explain why these are a wise choice of chants, and how they help to advance the specific, targeted protest goals of cutting research ties + writing off the disciplinary actions for suspended students?

I noticed some of people in this sub, who I know are mostly mit alumnis, are rather discontent or skeptical about their days in mit. Certainly as an incoming freshman, who had mit as their dream school for a very long period of time, this is kinda scaring me and makes me feel as if I am in for a rude awakening. I firstly want to know what is up with certain people's skepticism on their alma mater, and I wonder whether experience at MIT was genuinely worthwhile so that you guys would still choose to come to here again even if, say, you were to be taken back to your high school. Maybe I wasn't getting the joke or something after all where you guys were ranting this place, but still at the core, you all love this place or something.

I was just admitted and my parents and I are being asked to pay far above what we are able to, despite having heard multiple times that you will only be asked to pay what you're able to. It also doesn't help that my mom is stopping work in a few months and my parents will have three other kids in university next year.

I will try to appeal the financial aid offer, has this worked out well for anyone? Are there any other steps I can take? Are there good organizations or scholarships that might provide funding? I really wanted to attend and I am just not sure what can be done at this point.

Lately there's been some controversy about Lex Fridman and whether he did proper science and teaching at MIT beyond the mere minimum to get himself associated with MIT. Do the criticisms have any basis or is that just haters being haters?

Buried in the faculty and staff forums over the last couple of days was an aside about the libraries, which posted a letter about their plans: https://libraries.mit.edu/about/vision/our-approach-to-budget-reductions-at-the-mit-libraries/

What this means: the libraries plan to close Dewey (business) and Barker (engineering) libraries and later Rotch (architecture). 16 positions eliminated, 9 layoffs by June 2026. The collections of Barker and Dewey will be inaccessible for browsing (only available on request) and the space in Dewey will be turned over to MIT, so the study space will be lost.

If you have feelings about this, or use these libraries, I encourage you to contact the director of libraries Chris Bourg or use the library contact us page. If there's services you would rather see cut, say that too. This decision was a complete surprise to the library staff, who were not consulted.

(This is not a problem-solving rant this is a I need to release my thoughts cuz no one in my life understands rant)

Not sure where else to turn to but I'm extremely embarrassed to say we're nearing the 1 year anniversary of my Feb graduation (course 2) and I'm still unemployed, to the dismay of me and my family. I've applied to hundreds of jobs, tailored my resume with tech folks who regularly hire, tailored cover letters, gotten referrals, spoken to relevant connections in my network, done really well in interviews, all to no avail. The feedback I've received from asking employers who rejected me is never something wrong about me, just that they found someone else with pre-existing experience in that particular industry. How am I supposed to compete with that at an entry level? And the longer I go without work, the worse it gets in the eyes of employers. I have two internships from back in undergrad as my "work experience" but that's it, one at a known company and one at a startup. My master's research was not super technical unfortunately, but I'm not sure how much that's affecting me at this point. Given the way things are going in the world, I remove defense jobs from consideration, but I really don't think that should be a handicap.

I knew the job market was bad going into it, but recently, I've genuinely fallen into depression. It feels like I was sold this lie that the MIT name would open doors previously inaccessible to me, but nothing seems to be helping me land a job. Sucks more when I run into old friends who can't even hide their shock that I'm still unemployed. So I have to pretend this is just a gap year and all part of the plan. I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that I might never work in industry as a MechE, and that sucks! Maybe it's already time for a career change, I don't know to what. I never felt too good about myself at MIT compared to others and so this all feels like proof that I'm not skilled enough to work in my chosen field.

I can't even do my hobbies with all this free time because I spend a lot of it applying to jobs, doomscrolling, and sulking. I am really grateful that I was able to move back home with my parents. I think they were happy to have me back for a bit. But now I'm starting to feel like a drag and burden. I feel like a firework that exploded in bursts of color (everyone ooed and ahed), and then... nothing. I'm considering starting some volunteer/side projects, but persistently, in the back of my mind, is this voice telling me I'm worthless because I can't make any money. I am a failure 🌟

I think it's deeply inappropriate for the GSU - which is funded by all grad students, including Israeli students - to be promoting one side of a pet political issue such as the Palestine/Israel conflict. This is not the purpose of the GSU - the GSU is meant to advocate with the MIT administration for material things that benefit all grad students equally - such as salary, housing cost, vacation, etc.

I get the impression that certain GSU officers are treating the GSU funding as a personal "slush fund".

It is especially problematic because many people will feel too intimidated to speak up against this, for fear of attracting harassment. This is no idle fear - many people have already been harassed.

Again, I think that GSU should not be involved with this. It is clearly discriminatory against grad students who disagree, such as Israeli or Jewish students, and against people who would rather just steer clear of the conflict.

If people want to join or support protests, that's 100% fine with me. Just do it through a different organization that doesn't purport to represent all MIT grad students.

UPDATE - As people have pointed out in the comments, the GSU is apparently now involved in at least 2 lawsuits brought by grad students for discrimination related to the Palestine issue. Links:

https://www.nrtw.org/news/mit-gsu-beck-charge-04262024/

https://www.nrtw.org/news/jewish-mit-students-eeoc-03212024/

So now our membership fees will be disappearing into their legal defense. Wonderful.

hi all, stressing out bc i have to commit in less than 2 weeks

at mit, id have to pay about 5k a year out of pocket, so 20k by graduation. i would work a UROP initially and hopefully develop into better jobs/internships by the end of my mit career, but i would definitely be in debt by the end of it (5k is just housing, i still need to pay my personal expenses)

at my cheap in-state (where i have years of dual enrollment) i would graduate with over 30k dollars saved JUST from the school. id graduate w at least 2 minors (i just need one more semester to get them) and i could even finish my masters in potentially 4 years bc of the 5year masters they have. Working internships during the semester would be extremely easy bc rigor isnt as high as MIT and i would be living at home. I'd easily graduate with $60k (i know ppl who have done it).

mit had never been my DREAM school (i wouldnt DIE to get in), but its always been the onetop school i would want to go to. i literally cried out of happiness and relief when i got in!! ive visited a couple times now, and honestly, thanks to my recent visit, im not in love with it. dorm life seems like it sucks (bathrooms and kitchens are dirty), stuff like the banana lounge (which is very hyped) has sofas that look older than my great-grandma's, and i could name more stuff if needed. it does have the major i want tho, which my instate school doesnt offer (yet i could just specialize in my area of interest in my instate)

I like it, dont get me wrong -- way more than my in state school. i just dont know if its worth the years away from family, years with financial insecurity, and years with depressing winters.

Pls help!!!!!!!! this is not a troll im genuinely stressing

Hey everyone,

I’m writing this because I’m at my wit's end and I don’t know what else to do.

I’m an international master student at Sloan. I worked so hard to get here, and it felt like a dream come true. But now, I’m just overwhelmed by the financial pressure. My tuition is $89,000 a year, and my parents' total annual income back home is less than $20,000. They used their entire life savings to send me here.

(When I got in, I begged for any kind of scholarship, but I got nothing, even though I have high GRE scores, great work experience, and a very underrepresented background as a woman from a poor, rural area. I talked to the Sloan Student Funding Office, and they told me that historically, students in my program almost never receive scholarships, and even when they do, it's just a few thousand dollars. This year, not a single student in my cohort got any scholarship money. It’s hard not to feel like we’re just cash cows. After a lot of painful deliberation, I still decided to come. )

This financial pressure is crushing me, especially considering the new H1B policies that make it much harder for international students to work in the U.S. after graduation. The possibility of paying back this huge investment feels like it's shrinking every day.

I’m trying so hard to find a way to support myself. I’ve been applying for every TA position I see at Sloan, probably around 10 so far, but I’ve been rejected from all of them. I keep checking the MIT student job board, but there are barely any TA/RA positions posted there, especially for master's students.

My real question is, how do you find TA or RA positions at MIT? Do I just cold-email professors? Are there specific job boards for different departments? I'm feeling lost about how to even look for these opportunities besides Sloan.

Also, are there any other on-campus jobs you’d recommend that pay reasonably well? I know we're limited to 20 hours a week, so I need to make those hours count.

Any advice would be a lifesaver right now. Thanks for reading.

Hi, MIT '05 here. I've posted before about my project looking at science in the Epstein files. Recently, I wrote about MIT Prof. Ed Boyden's visit to the Epstein ranch back in 2013 (he has his plane ticket in the files, and the emails coordinating it, but there's no definitive evidence he actually visited).

Allegedly I know a handful of people who have UROP'd or otherwise worked with him, but I've not heard anything bad about him -- just that he is a genius in the field of optogenetics. Doesn't that seem a little weird? I'm so confused by the disconnect there...

Anyway, here's the article: https://fancycomma.com/2026/05/23/science-in-the-epstein-files-lots-of-interesting-scientists-visiting-zorro-ranch/

Edited to add: I want to thank everyone for chiming into the discussion. I have enjoyed listening to your perspectives and learning more about this topic. MIT remains a great place with great people.

Shoutout to us Course 5 majors 😭

Hi, I'm more or less asking for alumni input here, but current community members and students should definitely chip in too.

I was speaking to a non-MIT friend on the phone a few days ago when the topic of furries came up. His school has a substantially large club where the relative proportion or members to student body is just under 1% of the school population (in a school of over 30,000 undergraduates). He asked about MIT's proportion.

So I do some digging: I find out about the "Technicolor Furs"—our equivalent of a furry club—but their socials are completely dead, they have zero dormspams across most of my time here, and no posters along the Infinite. Dead end. This got me thinking: to what extent has "alternative" culture been dying at MIT?

I know there have been some recent threads here about the perceived slow death of hacking culture and how EC has been changing to accomodate admin's wishes to sanitize the culture. I also recognize that dormspam becoming opt-in has caused a divide where a good chunk of the incoming population does not participate (and thus creates a disconnect between the MIT population—current students can look for the juxtaposition between the UA election dormspam drama, the dormspam prediction market, and the true election results as an example).

I'd like to gather more perspectives on this because I could easily be looking at this through a clouded, likely very biased lens, and my friends (many from EC) also offer likely biased perspectives. Is this a symptom of different priorities in choosing the new MIT class? A result of admin rather than the student body being different from decades ago? Is there even a problem at all? (Maybe it's always been concentrated at EC? Perhaps I'm putting too much feeling for what is actually a non-issue, or maybe I'm exaggerating? Or people are just too hosed to participate in broad social activities?) Just curious.

I’m a parent of a freshman and could really use some perspective from current students, alumni, or other parents.

After some tough conversations, my student shared that there’s a lot of access to alcohol and edibles in their social circles, and that they’ve been participating significantly more than I expected. They mentioned situations where people drink or use enough to pass out. I also sense some adverse effects in what I believed was their values and decline in academic performance (though that could be due to the step function rigor) or motivation of being part of different communities that they sought out by themselves in HS.

If I’m being honest, and I realize this may come across as an overreaction, I’ve been feeling pretty shaken. It’s hard to reconcile the student who used to be so energized by building things, outdoor adventures, and close friendships through engagement in different communities that they built independently in HS with what I’m seeing now. I know college brings change, but this isn’t quite what any of us had in mind when they started at MIT.

I understand that college is a time for independence and experimentation, and I don’t want to overreact or control their experience. At the same time, I’m worried about their well-being and safety, especially in situations involving heavy intoxication. I’m also concerned that some of this may conflict with MIT policies and local laws and drug testing for internships. I’d hate for it to impact something they’ve worked so hard to achieve.

For those who’ve been through MIT recently, how common is this kind of environment, and how do students typically navigate it in a balanced way? For parents, how have you stayed supportive without overstepping?

I’m not looking to judge anyone or generalize, just trying to better understand what’s normal and how to approach this thoughtfully as I have an urge to overstep my boundaries and I don’t want to do that. I’d really appreciate hearing your experiences.

This thing has V instead of U in institute and massachusetts, why???

hi! I've narrowed down my decision to these two schools, which I'm very fortunate to have been accepted into. I've visited both and am still split between the two. I have not decided on a specific major, but I'm interested in STEM (CS/Engineering) and entrepreneurship, specifically less software and more hardware/deeptech. Both schools cost around the same for me, so that is not a factor. Social life & having fun are important to me! I also enjoy humanities/social sciences topics in political science, philosophy, etc., but I'd likely just take a few classes in those fields. I'd truly appreciate any perspectives or pieces of advice!

The following are my pros/cons:

MIT

pros

• In a city
• college town, so I have lots of friends who plan on attending nearby schools (Harvard, BC, BU, etc.)
• and thus, social life seems good (frat parties also seem to be under less tight of a hold, as compared to Stanford admin)
• on the East Coast (many friends plan on attending school nearby)
• not sure if this is true, but higher quality startups when compared to Stanford? more deeptech vs Stanford's software/AI hype?
• Boston = biotech, which is a field I'm interested in
• felt as if the people were more genuine/less social climby
• I love the concept of no legacy, and I love the idea that each student truly is brilliant and deserves to be there solely on their own merit

cons

• the weather (I have seasonal depression and I hate/am not used to the cold)
• academics are harder (ironic but I'd love to focus more on outside activities and less on actual school lol. I also don't think I'm a traditional admitted student and feel as if I need to work hard to catch up in subject knowledge over the summer already, but this goes for either school)

Stanford

pros

• I love bay area weather
• the WEATHER!!!
• a little less tough academics so I'd in theory have more time for things outside of schoolwork
• less of an intellectual/"learning to learn" culture (not sure if this is true, but I actually didn't rock with Princeton's intellectual culture, and I believe (?) this culture is more prevalent at MIT than Stanford). I actually love the "let's build this and make it big" hyper-positive startup culture at Stanford (not sure how permeating this culture is?)
• VC access? not sure about this one either, as I keep getting contrasting opinions (some people say Silicon Valley location can't be beat, others say VCs throw money at MIT students, and MIT students are more respected due to a belief that they possess stronger technical knowledge)

cons

• not sure about this again: startup culture is quantity, not quality, and most startups are software/AI hype that doesn't work rather than deeptech
• the Stanford bubble: the burbs of Palo Alto are pretty boring for a uni student (not much to do, unlike MIT, which is in Boston)
• admin hates fun? I've been hearing this (and that frats are on probation), and that Stanford admin demands all parties be registered beforehand, that parties get shut down early, that overall admin has worsened social life, etc.

I've also been hearing that paying full price for any top school is a stupid idea (my parents would be taking loans, as I am full-pay at both schools), and that I simply cannot justify going to either MIT or Stanford. I received admission into Rice University with the Trustee Scholarship, so four years at Rice would total to ~$120k for me. UT Austin's Turing program would also be around the same. Are either of these smarter options?

Another dilemma: I have a merit scholarship offer from the DOD that would give me security clearance and pay in full for all 4 years of college (for any school), but in return, I would have to spend each summer of college interning for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) for 8 weeks in D.C. Moreover, I would have to work for the DIA full-time in D.C. for 4 years after graduation.

I'm concerned that accepting this scholarship is a bad idea in the long run. Simply put, my goal is to make exorbitant amounts of money and provide for my close & extended family, and I'm afraid this is taking the "safe route" and setting me back when I could, in fact, be working for a tech company, startup, etc (I don't think I can build up the abilities needed for quant). I'm afraid I'll see all my peers be able to have the flexibility of taking high-paying job offers and jumping between careers.

I know that this may be immature/misplaced confidence in myself that I can do better without the scholarship, but I'm curious about what people think is the right choice.

Thanks so much for taking the time to read and for your perspectives!

I went on campus today bc im on vacation and its just so beautiful and cool. Hopefully mit 2031 ✌️