Thoughts from an ex GW student...

Introduction
I chose GW because I wanted to go to school in an urban environment. GW definitely provides that. The campus is in an awesome location, right in the heart of DC. Pretty much every part of the city (and surrounding areas) is easily accessible from GW's Foggy Bottom campus. I loved that about it. However, the coolness of the campus, and my love for DC was not enough to sustain me through four years there. As some people mentioned, GW is chalk-full of snooty, rich, oblivious kids from NY, Long Island, Boston, New Jersey, etc. If you are not a rich kid from the New England area who is obsessed with money, fashion, i-pods, Uggs, and generally being "cool," you might as well be a foreigener.

Campus Life and Social Life
I only made a few friends in my 3 semesters at GW, and only went out a couple of times. I am from California, and had a hard time connecting with of the students there...I just felt like I didn't really have any common ground with anyone. But I definitely got the impression that other people were going out and partying a lot...so if you're into that, I'm sure there's plenty to go around at GW. I had the heinous misfortune of having to live in Thurston Hall (one of the two main freshman dorms) for a semester and I just about died. Kids in there were so stupid and obnoxious. I would recommend living in Thurston for mindless, idiotic lemmings who want to make asses out of themselves and be completely ridiculous all the time. Anyone else, stay away. Academics
The good news is that I did have a few really great classes/professors at GW. The Anthropology, Human Sciences, English, and Women's Studies departments were awesome, in my experience. Stay away from the lower division classes in the Psychology department, if you can...all of the ones I took were a horrible waste of time. And unless you're a man, steer clear of the Poli Sci department because they don't seem to have much interest in women's opinions.

Student Body
Typical GW girl: rich, snobby New Englander, faux-tanned, lots of makeup and Uggs-wearing, i-pod-listening, Louis Vuitton purse-carrying, sorority biotch. There are, of course, exceptions. I did meet some cool girls at GW, but the majority are pretty much as described above.

Typical GW boy: rich, snobby New Englander, polo-shirt-with-a-popped-collar-wearing, politically-inclined, sports-following (particularly the Red Sox and/or the Yankees), beer-drinking, hot-girl-seeking, frat dude. There may or may not be any exceptions to this description. I did not meet a single cool guy while I was at GW.

In Closing...
If you're looking for a cool, urban environment to go to school in, and you're even remotely interested in politics, GW can be very tempting. Just don't go there, particularly if you're from the West Coast, without having an understanding of what the student body is like. If you're a rich, snooty kid from New England, you'll probably fit in just fine. If you aren't, you may want to think twice about it.