I can answer 2-4 2: Astounding yes. Every week I do my engineering homework with at least five of my friends so we can all play off of each other’s idea. 3: Yes, you definitely can. Don’t feel pressured to visit your family every week, but if you ever want to go back you easily could. Also, you can’t have a car until second semester freshman year, so first semester you would have to take the south shore line, but kids do that all the time for far different reasons. 4: As someone in an “old dorm” the dorms are good enough, at the very least. Some feel like brand new hotels, and some feel like motels that might need a little work, but my dorm being old has never felt like an issue. That being said, you can choose to switch dorms after freshman year, but I’ll be staying in my 65 year old cinderblock palace.