<p>some more stuff i wanted to add - </p>
<p>pros–</p>
<ol>
<li>the cafe!!! - just walk through the cafe and you can see faces of every different ethnicity within 2 minutes. the cafe is like a mini mun!! </li>
</ol>
<p>7.teaching - is great and we have a low faculty-student ratio. and we also have a lot of teaching assistants. every professor i have had till now is really friendly and helpful and more importantly deeply interested and knowledgeable in their subject. so the lectures are really intereesting and informative. </p>
<p>and finally since this whole thread is hku vs hkust, i would sign off by saying that hkust is the best uni for business in the whole of asia, for engineering the best (or atleast one of the best) and for science the faculty is really great and their research is amazing, but the student quality is not that good. so no matter what you are looking at, you can be rest assured that hku, hkust, nus, ntu or cuhk, all are of approximately the same level on the global scale. some are specialized in certain areas and are really good and reputable. like gbus for hkust, medicine for hku etc. </p>
<p>but what i belive makes hkust better than hku is the size. first hkust is relatively small, your graduation class size is on an average about 100 which is just like high school. (i mean that only about 100 students are admitted on an average to a specific major for eg. mechanical engg admits only about 100 students a year, the entire bba program (mkt, mgto, fin etc.) together admit only about 700 students which equates to less than 100 students per major. ofcourse some courses admit only 40 or 50 like gbus, dual degree etc.) so you are not lost in a big whirlpool and lose your identitity. and since there are only 3 schools - science, engg and business - the total number of students is also quite low and this gives a sense of community and individualism. but then in hku and cuhk where you have more than 20,000 students walking all around, it is quite easy to get lost and get confused.</p>
<p>and again we don`t have a school for every other discipline like nursing, medicine, law, animal studies, botany and all the ****. we are highly focusses and specialized. we focus only on science, engg and business - and even in there three areas we specialize in certain aspects and leave out the rest. for example in the biochemistry department all the faculty have joined hands to work on a single massive project instead of a dozen insignificant ones. since every person you come in contact with is from these three disciplines, you can benefit a lot and stay focussed. (however some people who i call freaks still maintain that interacting with a theatre major student will help them in their search for jobs in mechanical enggg!!)</p>
<p>that was a really long post!!</p>
<p>if you ahve any other questions, feel free to post them and i will share whatever information i have</p>
<p>and ya talking about questions, some of you wanted to know about foundation year. i just spoke to another fellow international student who studied year 0. it seems that every mainland and intl (except ib) student has to take year 0. if you are in engg then you will be studying math, physics, english, putonghua (basic) and some other graduation realted courses (like some social science courses which are compulsory to graduate). for the business school, you will mainly be studying english and math and some other business breadth courses.</p>
<p>as for credit waivers, you can get rid of math and lang courses if you have sufficient proof like toefl or high school math record (in his case it seems that he showed his french baccleaurate a levels and his math grade). but i heard that most students take the courses since year 0 is the only time where they can realx and enjoy hkust. once year 1 comes on, then you are caught up in a brimming ocean of midterms, presentations, assignments, project reports and so on.</p>
<p>oh ya, forgot to mention about the mosst important thing - the university of stress and tension. man this post i getting too lon g, but i have so much to say</p>
<p>yes it is quite true that the stress and tension level of almost every ust student is really high. most of the time tou are lost and confused and over whlemed by the oppurtunities and tasks in front of you. you have so much to do and so little a time. you are always stressed and exams come and go every other week. in the fall semester, the classes begin on sept 1st, everyone is happy and bright and optimistic and laid back. then within a few days you have the headache of registering for all the courses you want. then the registration period gets over by sept 15th and then you start settling in with your comfirmed courses and buying the books. before you know it, you have your first midterm in the last week of september. and thats where the story begins. what follows is seried of midterms and homeworks and assignments course after course and it all ends in the end of november. wait you have your finals in early december. life is really crammed and once the semester starts rolling, it is very difficult to lift up your head and make sense of things. its like you are caught up in a storm on a fiery ocean. forgot to mention, these myriad papers and exams are interspersed with project meetings, internship applications, enrichment activities, hall activities, presentations, omg!! looking back, the last 2 years seem to have gone in a flash. its like flash, long winter, flash, long summer and again the cyle starts. i am happy i survived it with somewhat okay grades.</p>
<p>anyways, this post has gotten wayout of hand and s too long. most of you would have gone to sleep by now!!</p>
I think the triple room has bunk beds though, therefore making the room seem even smaller. if that extra $1000 or so really matters then… I guess you could choose the triple room but hmm three guys living in cramped spaces… hahah</p>