<p>Could any current or previous students/parents shed light on what the best dorm on campus is, what the reputation of each dorm is, etc? I will be entering AU as a junior and am having trouble deciding.</p>
<p>With regards to courses, I will be studying courses in political science, international studies, government, and economics (thus not necessarily in SIS). Can anyone recommend some courses, who are the best professors/must take classes in those areas?</p>
<p>Thank you so much.</p>
<p>How is housing assigned to transfers? Many juniors don’t get on campus housing at all, and I would think the housing set aside for upperclassmen has already been allocated via the lottery, so I’m surprised that you have a lot of options. If it’s available, I’d recommend Nebraska, which I guess is the most luxurious dorm (ha, can’t believe I’m calling an AU dorm “luxurious”)–each suite has four single rooms, one bathroom, a real kitchen and a lounge area. In general, the north side dorms are considered to be quieter than the south side dorms, but I don’t think there are any other “reputations”. Physically, there’s not a whole lot to distinguish the dorms, since the rooms are furnished similarly and are of similar size.</p>
<p>@MommaJ transfers with 36 credits or less at the time of admission are guaranteed housing. However those w more than 36credits will only be housed if there’s space left. </p>
<p>I’m a transfer and am waiting to hear back on how many credits I have before putting, or not putting in my housing deposit. However I heard that many students would prefer not to stay in the dorms.</p>
<p>tiennyx3 - Hey I would love to help you out in picking awesome professors and classes, but you should really talk to your SIS academic adviser within your school to map out your road to graduation to see what classes you need to take. If you can be a little more specific, I could give you some recommendations!</p>
<p>Disclosure: I am actually a study abroad student but i’d like to have a typical AU student experience. </p>
<p>bk4972b: I’ll be taking mostly GOVT and ECON courses but i’m a bit confused between GOVT and SIS. This may be a really stupid question but do students in SIS take government courses? Do professors in SIS teach government? Even though i’m an IR major, most of the SIS courses seem to be closed to me which is a bummer. Lots of GOVT courses appeal to me a lot but i know SIS is the renowned school for this area of study. So far, the courses that i’m considering are:</p>
<p>GOVT-210-002 Political power and American public policy
AMST-200-001 American dreams/American lives
GOVT-396-004 Creating and debating US education
GOVT-536- Applied Political Writing
GOVT-529-001 Homeland security
GOVT-496-001 Campaign Finance
GOVT-526-001 US intelligence</p>
<p>Can you shed any light on these courses or just the government/IR department/professors in general?
Thanks heaps!</p>
<p>There is a difference between GOVT and SIS courses. If you are studying here from abroad and cannot get into the classes you want or need, I suggest you contact the school. You want to be sure the courses will count towards your degree in your home school. Also, the government classes you listed are higher level courses and may have prerequisites. As far as professors, do what American students do, look them up and see their ratings on ratemyprofessor.com</p>
<p>Students in SIS do take government courses. One of the concentrations within SIS is “US Foreign Policy” (or now “Foreign Policy and National Security”) where courses like Homeland Security and US Intelligence Community are approved courses for the concentration. Professors in SIS do not teach in government because each school hires its own professors. However, the School of Public Affairs (SPA) has amazing, world renown professors. In fact, SPA existed before SIS did and has much more history with the university. To be honest, I think it sucks that you can’t take SIS courses but I think government courses are good as well. What SIS courses are open to you?</p>
<p>I don’t know how stressful you want your study abroad experience to be, but if you don’t want hard classes then I would stray away from upper level courses. Or vice versa. </p>
<p>Like NewJerseyMom said, look at the course descriptions and look at Ratemyprofessor to see student’s opinions of professors. Also, do you have access to the myAU portal yet? If so, look at “Student Evaluation of Teaching: Fall 2006 -Present” or just search “Evaluation” in the search bar to find it. Go to “Individual Course sections…” and look up the professor who is teaching the course. You can see how students rated the professors and projected grades, how many hours per week students studied, etc. </p>
<p>If you take courses like GOVT 210 you’re bound to run into freshman but more likely sophomores within SPA. In Homeland Security and US Intelligence Community you will only see juniors/seniors and more variety considering SIS students take those courses for their concentration. However, my concern would be whether or not you actually want to take those courses. Would learning more about the US intelligence community/homeland security help you in the future? I’m sure you’re interested in the US considering you’re studying abroad here, but I think you should still ask yourself whether or not you want to take it. I’ve heard the professor for both of those classes, Professor Beyoghlow, is pretty tough. However, you can be the judge of that.</p>