<p>Coming from laid back California, never having visited the E. Coast until I arrived, I was shocked by the intensity and competitiveness of my classmates. No disappointment, classes were rigorous, profs available, many challenges awaited.</p>
<p>My college was “just right” - like Goldilocks. I made some nice friends, the professors were great, and it was not hard to finish in four years. I enjoyed my extracurricular activities. The city around me was great. Enjoyed football games and hockey games. I was a biology major at a small LAC and had no trouble finding research projects but I’m sure there were not as wide a variety of research opportunities as would have been available at a big university, but I loved my LAC.</p>
<p>The first college I went to was–too small, academically not particularly rigorous, with students who by and large were not academically inclined.</p>
<p>So I transfered. The second college was bigger, full of many academically engaged students (and some not so much, but so many that were it wasn’t a problem), and had world-class profs teaching amazing classes.</p>
<p>No. I go to a school where I’m at the top of student pool (or at least was when I was admitted with heavy merit aid), and I’m still challenged (with an average-ish ~ 3.8 GPA). 70% of the students in my school fail Autonomy and Physiology, for example, including some very, very smart, vey studious ones, and General Chem was incredibly difficult (passing the exams was considered a laudable accomplishment). I definitely work hard and learn a lot in my courses. While there are some slackers, most of the students I know (my classmates, friends, and students) are genuinely intelligent, hard-working, and focused, to the extent one can reasonibly expect college students to be focused.</p>
<p>With that being said, I’ve gone out of my way to be involved–TAing, teaching, paid and unpaid research, multiple theses, clinical internship alongside grad students, taking course oveloads, volunteering, joining a sorority , double majoring and minoring, etc., but on the plus side, four years of college at an outside public will likely cost my family less than 3 years at an in-state school and, considering I’m in all likelihood paying for my senior year myself, it will probably cost my parents less than what two years at in in-state public would. </p>
<p>Sometimes, I wonder if I would have been better off at a small LAC, though, or an instate school where my tuition would have been waived. I think there would have been some advantages (smaller classes–even though I’ve had no issue getting to know the faculty, no grad students doing research) but also some drawbacks, so I really don’t know.</p>
<p>No to everything, until you get to the last four lines, then yes to everything except spending a lot of time off campus. I’m not sure “easy” is a relevant concept, though. At some point between the start of freshman year and the middle of sophomore year, it became no longer necessary to wonder if a girl would have sex with me if she liked me. But I still had to worry about whether the girls I liked would like me back the same way. And, as time went on, I increasingly understood – but this was not really news, I had known it in high school, just not with the same degree of experience – that the hard part was not flirting at parties, and having sex, the hard part was deciding how to have a relationship and making it work. None of the girls I knew was “easy” in the least as far as that went, nor was I. That part took a lot of trial and error, and a few broken hearts, mine included.</p>
<p>I went to a Big Ten university back in the day and I was shocked to find myself at the top of the academic pool. I came from a rigorous public high school (didn’t realize it at the time) and college was a huge step down. I enjoyed myself, found the classes more engaging as I got into my major, graduated in 3 years and moved on. I have fond memories, but wish I had picked, perhaps, a smaller and more challenging school.</p>
<p>I had a mix of big lectures and small seminars. I liked both. </p>
<p>I had one terrible lecture class, but the TA (grad student was great). I didn’t care for some of the famous names, but liked others. My very best class was a graduate seminar taught by a visiting professor. I had one class (Intro German) taught by a grad student, it was fine. No problem getting the classes I wanted, no problem graduating in four years, I could have graduated in three with AP credits, but I’d have had to decide on a major instantly. My fellow students were a mix - some were brilliant, most were normal smart. Some were nerdy, some weren’t. Loved the urban location, there were plenty of extra curricular activities (and I regret not getting more involved in them.) Research wasn’t really my line of work, but I did get a grant to travel in Europe to research my senior thesis. I was prepared fine for grad school.</p>
<p>Surprises? I was much better prepared than I expected to be - I did think college would be more rigorous - it might have been with a different major. The job placement office was pretty useless for summer work. The smart kids did drugs and drank, that wasn’t true in my high school.</p>
<p>I found college fairly easy as an adult. I didn’t understand some of the processes and procedures after going for a year but having a lot of life and work experiences makes things a lot more understandable.</p>
<p>Oh, my gosh … my college kicked my butt. We had to take ridiculously heavy course loads, and many of our profs graded on a curve. It was just hard, hard, hard. I always say that learning to juggle my classes and homework with my social life trained me for real life. I loved it, though.</p>
<p>My classes were all very small. My profs ranged from hard to understand to HARD … but some of them went to the bar with us & let us see that they were real people … one even came to dinner with us after graduation & came to my wedding (not in the area) with his wife. My classmates were nerdy (we ALL were), but they were fun. I enjoyed going to parties, because we actually talked at parties (unlike the ones I hear about where it’s too loud & crowded to actually get to know the people there). We studied together, and we truly worked together to learn.</p>
<p>No one graduated in 4 years. It was a 5 year co-op school with a mandatory thesis. No research, but we had a very hands-on curriculum & we also worked half the time.</p>
<p>The campus was in a neighborhood area of a midwestern city made famous by Roger Moore. I had no problem with the area.</p>
<p>No sports teams, but intramurals were huge. There was plenty to do as far as I was concerned - not the typical college experience of a state U, but great for me. Greek life was very big, but it was not exclusive & everyone hung out together. </p>
<p>The school prepared me for my work, and I met my husband there … so it met my expectations! :)</p>
<p>I went to two schools. The first was super liberal and most of the students smoked a lot of dope and majored in psychology. I found it fun but ultimately boring. I transferred to a public U that was super competitive and that had very little, if any, drug use (overtly, anyway). I learned a lot, studied a lot, and made good friends. In retrospect, neither school was the perfect match, but both were a learning experience; this was before people worried about “fit.” I graduated early; classes were easy to get at both schools.<br>
I would be concerned if my D were going to a school where the dorms reeked of marijuana 24/7, which was the case at my first college.<br>
For me, it was also a wake up call because at both schools but especially the public U, most of the students were very very smart.</p>
<p>Well, I’m a rising sophomore (I hate that term, but I digress), and I just transferred out of my first school for numerous reasons, among them being that it simply didn’t meet my expectations for academic rigor. I am not an incredibly gifted person, nor am I particularly driven, but I was really shocked about how unmotivated most of my classmates were. I came to college expecting to be knocked down a peg, and instead found myself at the very tippy top in classes supposed to cater to the very tippy top students (i.e. Honors and an invitation-only math class). </p>
<p>I met a lot of nice, reasonably intelligent kids, don’t get me wrong, but I kept encountering things in classes that just galled me. For instance, in one of my first semester classes, we built towers out of uncooked spaghetti and marshmallows. Sure, it was fun, but was this really a $45k education? Second semester, when we were learning how to show that an argument was invalid in a philosophy course, the professor asked “Can someone name an article of clothing that isn’t a shirt?” and NOBODY would answer. </p>
<p>That being said, I did have some fabulous professors who were engaging and really knew their stuff. It’s really a shame that most of the student body didn’t seem to care enough to notice. (By far the most popular professor at the college taught sociology, and was, by my estimation, the worst professor I had the entire year. She also made a lot of jokes about drinking, getting laid, and smoking dope. No wonder people liked her.)</p>