<p>The title says it all ... why is the DU forum not more active?</p>
<p>I've heard good things about this school. It's got engineering, liberal arts, and a good music school, right? That's a pretty nice selection. </p>
<p>So why doesn't it seem to be on anybody's radar here on CC?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>It’s on my radar! :)</p>
<p>That’s nice. So there are two of you who are interested … my son, and you! :rolleyes:</p>
<p>My daugther is now a sophomore at DU. She stumbled upon it when researching business programs.</p>
<p>^And does she love it? What DOESN’T she like about it?</p>
<p>The food is the biggest complaint. I’ve had it too, and it is bad. Majority of kids are locals, so campus does empty out on weekends. Lots of busy work for the academics. She is in the leadership program, minoring in it, likes that program. Likes the business program. Classes aren’t all based on test grades, variety of different things for the grades in many classes, likes this. Light rail on campus so free transportation to downtown Denver.</p>
<p>My son is a sophomore and he loves it. We live far away and many of his friends do as well so while the school may feel less full on weekends I think it’s because many are taking advantage of the great location for concerts, skiing, hiking etc. He has gotton to know many of his professors and likes them very much. He is in the minority and not studying business. Most of his classes have had 25 or fewer students. Campus is beautiful–food does need work!</p>
<p>^JE004, when you say “he is in the minority,” do you mean to say that the majority of the kids DON’T like their professors very much? Or do you simply mean to say that the majority of the kids are studying business? Or something else?</p>
<p>^seremarcus, nearly everything you mentioned would be a concern for the son who’s considering DU. Bad food? Pretty much a no-go, when there are so many schools that he likes that also have GOOD food.</p>
<p>Lots of locals? He’s looking for a little more diversity than that – though he definitely has other schools on his list that likewise have a lot of locals. So that’s not a huge deal.</p>
<p>Busy work for academics?! Oh no. That would definitely be a problem! None of my kids like busy work. It’s a huge pet peeve for them. And they would especially not appreciate it in COLLEGE! They’re great students who LIKE to get as much as they can from their classes, plus they like to be immersed in their outside activities (a lot of music) as well. So the thought of “busy work” in college? Wow. They would HATE that. And I would understand. Hhmmmm.</p>
<p>Like your D, my son would probably like the idea of a variety of ways to determine his grades.</p>
<p>And the light rail on campus is a huge bonus.</p>
<p>Thanks for sharing! Info directly from parents and students is so much more revealing than any campus visit. (We are, btw, visting DU very soon.)</p>
<p>I meant in the minority that he is not studying business–most of his friends are business majors. He has not found a lot of busy work–and he and all of his friends love the school.</p>
<p>What’s bad about the food, btw? Lack of variety? Junk food?</p>
<p>One of my kids goes to a private school with what we think is EXCELLENT food. We marvel at its deliciousness and variety. It’s incredible. Pizza, burgers, and the usual. A salad bar with tons of options. A home-cooking section with amazing choices. A vegetarian section. A sandwich bar. A pasta section. And new this year, a Mediterranean section with all kinds of yummy, good things like hummus and falafel, and the like. And I’m sure I’m leaving sections out. My kid LOVES it.</p>
<p>And yet, we hear all the time from kids who hate the food. When I see their parents at events, they tell me that’s the one bad thing about the school … the food. Huh? We just can’t understand it. Unless it’s because the food is too adventuresome, maybe? </p>
<p>So what’s the chief complaint about DU’s food?</p>
<p>They offer a much smaller selection of food, and the QUALITY of food is poor. </p>
<p>SimpleLife - what college does your kid go to with such good food?</p>
<p>As for the busywork: DU was my daughter’s ‘safety’ school. She was accepted to Univ. of Michigan also. DU offered a much better financial package. She also thought this would give her more free time for extracurricular activities/clubs/involvement etc. that being said, she wishes she were at a more challenging school for her. The busywork is in the required classes, stuff she had learned in HS. She feels she has ‘grown horizontally in knowledge, not in depth of knowledge’. </p>
<p>The class sizes are perfect, and the professors are easy to meet with outside of class and all respond immediately to email.</p>
<p>Has anyone had the Ammi Hyde interview? What kind of questions did they ask? Did the interview seem more formal or informal?</p>
<p>DU has excellent business, but I’ve never heard much about its engineering programs. Coloradoans have CU, Mines, and CSU for that.</p>
<p>^seremarcus, the son I referred to is at SMU. My whole family thinks the food is really good there. Tons of variety, tons of healthy options, and well-prepared. And we know food in our family! 
But as I said, we often hear from other students or parents that the food is bad. We don’t get it. It does get bad, or not as good, on weekends, when they rely more on leftovers and such, in order to be less wasteful. And it gets much worse as each term comes to a close, since they’re relying on more convenient, less-wasteful stuff that won’t leave a lot of leftovers prior to each break. But in general, my son, who insists on eating a good variety and mostly very healthy foods, loves his cafeteria!</p>
<p>^noimagination, we’ve definitely found the same thing – can’t hear much about the engineering programs at DU no matter how hard we try! They put out publications touting that they HAVE an engineering program, and that it can hold its own. And we’ve “met” other people on CC over the years whose schools send more kids to DU than our region does, and THOSE people do think of engineering when they think of DU. So, we’re a little mystified.</p>
<p>While on a campus visit fairly recently, we decided to check out the engineering building for ourselves. (The silly admissions staff didn’t include any engineering material in son’s visit-packet, even though he specified his intended major on the visit request. They were NOT, as a rule, helpful or pleasant, btw. Much worse than any college visit we’ve ever made.) We knew the general area of the engineering building, because the music people happened to mention that it was near their building. So, as we got closer, we asked about 10 different students along the way if they knew where the engineering building was – not a single student had even a clue about where it was located! And it’s not a very big campus! Even as we got very, very close to what ultimately turned out to be the engineering building, nobody knew where it was.</p>
<p>Well, we finally found a science professor in the gorgeous natural sciences building who pointed us in the right direction. He pointed out that the maps we got from admissions were all old and hadn’t been updated. That’s why the engineering building wasn’t on them – well, the BUIDLING was, but it wasn’t identified as the engineering building.</p>
<p>We walked through the building. It appeared to be one of the oldest and saddest buildings on campus. It was hot and muggy inside. We passed three hot classrooms, with their doors open, and they were filled with sleepy, bored-looking students. In all three classrooms, the teachers were talking in broken English with a very dry monotone. The classes all looked cramped. And hot. It was sadly very unimpressive. Same with the rest of the building. Our research had turned up some positive notes about DU engineering – and I’m sure there are some positive things about it. But from what we DID see, my son was quite turned off.</p>
<p>I will definitely acknowledge that a person can’t tell a whole lot about the quality of an engineering education by standing outside three classrooms for a handful of minutes and merely browsing, unguided, through a building. There could be fantastic things that go on in that school! But that’s the nature of the college visit – things that perhaps should not matter, like the personality of the student tour guide, or the friendliness of the admissions staff, or the even the general look of the buildings DO make an impression, one way or another. That’s why people visit, right?</p>
<p>It’s really too bad, because the music school seems amazing! We loved it! And this son is looking for engineering AND music. And much of the rest of the campus really appealed to him (us).</p>
<p>We actually liked the food the day we were there. I had the salad bar and soup – and both were very good and fresh. My son had pizza, yogurt with fruit, and soup and liked them all. Most of the items offered were not exactly healthy – burgers, a tasty-looking hot dog bar with all sorts of fixin’s, pizza, etc. But, besides the really fresh salad bar, with tons of variety, plus fresh fruit, there was a stir-fry bar (problem was – the “meat” was tofu only that day, and we’re not fans), a pasta bar with a few healthy ingredients you could add, and roasted chicken with veggies on the side. I can see why kids who want to eat healthy might get tired of the same old thing there, but we really liked what we had that day.</p>
<p>Anyway, LMduranduran, Colorado School of Mines is out because they don’t have a music program, and my son wants both. That’s what got us looking at DU in the first place. (We did visit Mines while in Colorado, though, and it seems like a really great engineering school that my son would otherwise love!)</p>
<p>Anyone familiar with the men’s soccer team at DU? It’s on DS’s fantasy list of “If I was going to move to some other state that’s completely different from where I’ve lived my whole life in order to play D-1 soccer while I’m in college”. :)</p>
<p>I think DU is often overlooked because it not only is in “flyover country” it is also not conveniently located near other schools on most student’s lists–not all students interested in Boulder would be interested in DU because they are such different experiences. I think that if DU were located on either coast, with all it has to offer, it would be a very hot commmodity.</p>
<p>My son is a senior public policy major at DU and he has been very happy. He started out in business but wanted a bit more “intellectual” content. He’s a geek at heart. Actually, he is double majoring in Public Policy and Philosophy, with minors in political science and Jewish studies. He came in with a lot of AP credit, and also has taken overloads many quarters.</p>
<p>His classes have almost all been very small, his professors all very accessible. They gave him many connections for his internships.</p>
<p>My S has never complained about the food–other than the fact that eating in the dining halls can be repetitious. This year there is a new food court on campus, in addition to the more traditional dining halls–but he eats most of his meals at his fraternity, where the food is excellent.</p>
<p>He loves having all of a traditional campus available to him, while also having the perks of a great city and all the outdoor recreation available too.</p>
<p>My daughter loves, loves, loves DU. She’s a sophomore. I tried to PM you, simplelife, but you don’t recieve pms.</p>
<p>D has friends who are engineering majors, and they are busy. I’d check with the office which helps students find employment to get an idea of what really happens with the students who major in engineering. It would probably be the most enlightening way to find out.</p>
<p>D’s major is in the sciences and the sciences have increased enrollment 14% in the past year. This is true as well for Math majors. If that means anything to you or your son.</p>
<p>D was accepted to Berekely and UNC-chapel Hill, as well, but chose DU for her own reasons. She has not regretted it.</p>
<p>The one type of kid I wouldn’t send there is a kid who doesn’t like to be busy. It’s a school which really caters to people who want to go and do things and the few who have left who my daughter knows tended to be kids who were a little bit overwhelmed by that. Also, it’s quarters, so it’s fast, academically speaking. </p>
<p>Oh, and if your son loves football? No football. DU is a hockey school. As for soccer, the facilities are all new. LaCrosse, the coach from Princeton came there last year. </p>
<p>Food: D eats at sorrority house. didn’t love it in the dining hall last year. It’ sudexo. No campuses with sudexo seem to make kids happy.</p>
<p>YMMV</p>
<p>Ditto on the students being busy.</p>
<p>They need to hit the ground running full tilt because the quarter system goes really fast.
Classes move very quickly and students need to keep up from day one.</p>
<p>Students are also very involved in extracurriculars, internships,etc. People who just want to “hang out” and not do anything else are fairly rare on the campus.</p>
<p>Does anyone have info on the Honors Program or the LLCs (themed dorms). My kid is a serious student who wants a non-party school. </p>
<p>Pros to DU:
Quarter system (out before Thanksgiving, home for the month!)
Not far from Denver Airport
Larger than other privates so there is enough kids in each major
20% Jewish
A Carnegie Research institute (my kid wants Bio research)</p>
<p>Cons:
May not be academically rigorous enough for top students - thus the Honors program
I think they are a bit disorganized
Food/Weekends</p>
<p>Any more thoughts?</p>