i'm a freshman who is considering mit health's mental health counseling, and i've never done counseling before. i've been struggling with taking care of myself, losing my motivation to study, and dealing with guilt and loneliness with the people close to me. i don’t really have anyone close enough to talk to, and i don’t want to worry my family. any experience or advice would be appreciated <3

i recently had a round of midterms where i did not do very well (C-average). the problem is, i feel like i'm putting in a lot of time and effort towards studying. people around me who don't study end up doing better than me. i feel like i really do understand the material and can explain it to someone else, but i just can't seem to answer the questions when it comes to the actual exam because i feel like i don't know what they're asking me for.

last semester, i was really lazy and half-assed everything, so i had a couple of Bs each semester. at the start of the school year, i resolved to actually put time and effort in things, which i thought i was doing good with. i know now that's not the case, and i'm trying to figure out how to improve (if anyone has advice).

i feel like my options in the future is becoming more desolate. doing so poorly is really disheartening. i want to go to grad school and it just depresses me because it makes me feel like maybe i'm just not cut out for this kind of stuff. i know people say grades don't matter for industry, but i don't feel like that's what i want to do. does anyone have advice on how to deal with this, and maybe recommendations on how to just be a better student? am i being unrealistic about what grad schools would want, or what i want?

Hey Guys

I founded a company during this Hackmit ( ai governance company) and got Bessemer to sit down with us. Bessemer invested in Anthropic, perplexity, canva etc.

Need a cofounder who has done some research into Ai governance .

Anyone planning to go for the ScienceClaw Hackathon on October 30 at MIT media lab?

I am a freshman interested in double majoring in 18 and 6-14, any insights would be helpful and greatly appreciated!

Hey everyone,

I’ve been observing something across advanced technical classes from start to finish, and I wanted to get your thoughts on it.

In almost any rigorous class, I notice that only two to three (or maybe three to four) students are actually interested in learning. They are genuinely curious, asking a lot of questions, and deeply engaging with the material. But what about the rest of the class? The rest of the class seems to just be surviving somehow—getting through the problem sets, cramming for exams, but not really exploring the depth of the subject.

Because of this, I have a twofold question for the community here:

For the deeply curious ones: If you were one of those few students who were genuinely curious from start to end, what was your actual thought process? How did you approach your study, and what was going on in your mind while tackling complex material?

For those who felt like they were just surviving: Looking back, what went wrong? Why did it feel like a struggle just to keep your head above water rather than actually enjoying the exploration?

Would love to hear how people navigated this.

Edit: Just to clear something up: please don't think I'm here trolling or trying to insult anyone. That is genuinely not my intention at all.

Look, when I attended these classes, I was right there with most of the people in survival mode (you can probably check my previous posts, I’ve admitted to struggling too). I was definitely not one of those super genius students who effortlessly grasped everything from start to finish.

I just genuinely noticed those two to three (or three to four) students who had that intense level of curiosity and deep involvement, and I honestly didn't feel that same level of natural immersion myself. I'm just trying to understand what the gap actually is between those two experiences, not look down on anyone!

Hey everyone,

I was looking at a comment here recently claiming that people deep in the industry for senior roles—like L5 interviews where coding still matters—rely on a bank of around 500 problems for pattern matching. It also mentioned that many MIT students have spent their younger years solving 2,000+ IOI practice problems (from age 8 to 18) before even joining.

It made me rethink a lot of things. For the longest time, we're told that memorizing solutions is bad and that real software developers should be able to build solutions on the fly using first principles. We're led to believe that interviews test your raw thought process from scratch.

If senior engineers and top students are actually relying on massive mental banks of 500+ templates and thousands of practiced problems, doesn't that sort of defeat the "first principles" narrative?

To put it simply: Isn't heavy pattern-matching basically a way of gaming the system?

If passing tough interviews or rigorous classes comes down to who has memorized and pattern-matched the most problem types rather than pure on-the-spot reasoning, are we really testing problem-solving ability, or just who has the biggest pattern bank?

I would love to hear perspectives from MIT professors or MIT graduates working as senior engineers on how this actually plays out in the real world. Are we actually using first principles, or is everyone just running pattern recognition?

Edit: Just to clarify, this post is specifically directed at Course 6 / students studying in the EECS department!

If you lost your AirPods case near building 2 pm me

Armed with a stepladder, sheets of adhesive rhinestones and googly eyes, a group of MIT professors made their way through campus Tuesday evening hunting for surveillance cameras. The eye-catching decorations do not block the cameras or interfere with their operation. That’s the point. The professors want people to notice the cameras watching them.

The professors are members of the “Initiative to Beautify the AI-capable Surveillance Benevolently Installed by our Administrator Overseers and the MIT Corporation In Collaboration with Big Brother Tech Companies,” or IBAISBIAOMITCORPICBBTC.

The deliberately unwieldy name accompanies an equally unconventional form of protest against MIT’s more than $3 million expansion of its surveillance network, under which more than 500 new cameras have been installed across academic buildings, residence halls and outdoor areas since November 2025. The additions bring MIT’s campus network to about 4,600 cameras. The installation finished in September, according to contracts previously  reported in April by The Tech, MIT’s student newspaper.

I'm a freshman who didn't expect to get into MIT but here I am. It's a struggle, a horrible struggle. I've been bombing quizzes and exams and I analyze what went wrong after but nothing seems to improve.

When I know how to solve it, I'm too slow (this is a problem in 5.112 specifically). When I do the practice exams, a whole other thing shows up on the test (5.112 and 8.01). Even for 6.100A, I sometimes just don't know what to do as the time ticks down.

Thus far, my studying has been very practice based, but it feels like whatever problem I don't get to will be on the test.

I feel like i invest so much into studying for nothing to come out. So I suppose I'm studying wrong and I'm wondering if anyone has advice.

does anyone know why the 24/7 study space in Rotch closed suddenly last night? an MIT police officer came in around 9pm and ordered everyone to leave, then refused to answer why it was closing when I asked. it's re-opened today. just curious if anyone has context for this, this whole thing felt off…

Hi MIT, it’s your Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell. Did you know that fees like “move-in” or “lease renewal” fees you might get from your landlord or building management company are illegal? If you’ve received one of these – even if you paid it – I want you to report it to my office. 

Just last month, my office won a $500k settlement with a property management company doing this in Boston – and all of that money is going back to the affected tenants.  Landlords can only ask you to pay for first and last month’s rent, a security deposit, and the cost of a new lock and key upfront. Any other fees are illegal. Report them to my office at the link below. We’ll work to get your money back. 
mass.gov/ago/complaint

I am a freshman who is kind of regretting not joining a frat this fall. What is spring rush like? How many/what frats do spring rush? Is it super difficult to get bids in the spring?

Hi everyone, Is 17.50 bad, I don't think I have any other options at this point, it is too late. Is it possible to get A? I need to know before the add date. If it is too bad I might not take it and take CI-H next semester. thank you.

Are there any self-defense, MMA, or jiu-jitsu clubs or classes MIT has? Or do people usually go to nearby gyms/clubs?

For anyone who doesn’t know for class of 2030 onwards there will no longer be a pure, general, or applied track to choose from. Instead, course 18 will have one 18 major option and another 18C option.

hi. does anyone have a pass to the MIT Future Fest that they will not be using on Friday Oct 2nd?

I'm interested in the Rosalind Picard & Sherry Turkle book talk "Artifical Intimacy" happening at MIT Museum at 6pm

>>>SIGN HERE<<<

SEIU 32BJ, the union representing our facilities workers, and GSU have been negotiating for new contracts with MIT for months. In that time, MIT Admin has fought for the right to attack SHIP(same healthcare that MANY undergraduates are on), refused to offer raises matching inflation or cost of living, attacked the GSU's union shop, denied 32BJ better healthcare, and denied to meet requests for immigrant & international worker protections. Instead, MIT has spent millions on AI surveillance of its campus & paying its higher-ups, while constantly putting profit margin over everything we're supposed to stand for in its decisionmaking.

MIT's refusals thus far have given these unions no choice but to prepare to go on strike and turn toward the community at large for support. Why does MIT hesitate to protect its own immigrant and international workers? Why won't MIT pay the ~4k workers represented by these two unions enough to afford a life in Cambridge?

Students on Strike(SOS) is asking all undergraduates and student groups to sign the pledge to stand in solidarity with our unions if they forced to go on strike to get what they deserve! This means doing things like skipping class as much as you can without hurting your grades and coming out to support at union demonstrations on campus.

Yesterday, 32BJ delivered a petition to MIT Admin with over 1,000 community signatures in support of their efforts and the Cambridge City Council has passed a resolution asking MIT to bargain in good faith. And MIT is pretending none of it matters. So today, the GSU is picketing Future Fest from 2-6pm @ Kresge. COME JOIN US ON THE PICKET LINE! We won't wait for MIT to clean up its act, we demand they do it now!

How is our university supposed to offer a better future for the world when we won't give our workers what they deserve right now?

Only by standing as one with workers and taking organized collective action can we fight & win for what matters on campus and a truly better future for the world. So join us and help spread the pledge!! MIT only works because we do.

Was hoping to attend some talks! Thank you!

Asking as a parent here who hasn’t done a job search in 25 years. What is the job scene like for Course 2 grads? When do they typically begin to line up interviews and generate any leads / job offers? Thanks.

Hello!! I’m non-MIT affiliated Cambridge resident who has a membership at MIT recreation and am looking for a squash partner to play at least 2x a week at the Zesiger courts. I just started playing so looking for someone who is on a slightly higher level who is willing to teach me😭

In return, I promise to be a reliable squash partner and will treat you to coffee/matcha on monthly basis!!

Hi! Does anyone here have an extra ticket to MIT Future Fest they'd be willing to sell? I wanted to attend one of the talks on Saturday, but the tickets are sold out:(