<p>Is there anyone on here that is in love with U of I? I am from metro detroit so we don't hear about this school very often. From these boards, it almost seems like people apply there just to apply, without considering actually going there. For what I want to do, U of I has a great program so I might actually end up there.</p>
<p>I know exactly what you mean. I'm from New York, and people here have rarely heard of UIUC, but I love this school. I got in, and it's got a very good program in what I'm studying. This place is like a hidden gem in the middle of the prairie. It kind of ****es me off when people use it as a safety, or apply just to apply.</p>
<p>IMO, it's better in some departments than the lower Ivies.</p>
<p>Lol, the website censored p i s s e s</p>
<p>I'd in fact say way better than Ivies in certain departments just by ranking and price.</p>
<p>I live in the Midwest and a lot of people love the U of I. I know a lot of people from my school that are going there, and they all come back and say how much fun it is and how I should go there. Also, I have teachers who have graduated from the U of I and talk about it like it is the best school ever. I'm not positive that I want to go here, but I one reason I like it so much is how everyone else (at least in central Illinois) loves the school.</p>
<p>"I'd in fact say way better than Ivies in certain departments just by ranking and price."</p>
<p>How does it rank in physics department?</p>
<p>All I have to say is that I am a freshman at U of I, and I am absolutely in love with this place. It has changed my life for the better and I am constantly amazed by everything it has to offer. It is so beautiful, I just love this school. I know that I made the right decision to come here, despite what some of my teachers wanted for me. I absolutely recommend you take a look at Illinois... it's incredible, and it's an amazing school. You can't get much better than here, baby!</p>
<p>ciao -K</p>
<p>do you love it because you party and drunk all the time or is it just that good? Just wondering cuz I don't like to party and get drunk all the time and UIUC is known for a bit of that :P</p>
<p>i'm from the midwest too and u of i is very highly regarded, but NAFTA why do you get angry when people use it as a safety? I mean, the engineering school should not be anyone's safety as it is one of the best in the country. However, the liberal arts school is just as good as other state schools that are used as safeties.</p>
<p>Well, Munkeegirl, I have to be perfectly honest and say that one of the reasons I like it so much is because, yes, I have a good time here ;). It's definitely a perk! But there is more to U of I then just the great social life, it's beautiful, has a lot to offer, and it really is a great school. I recommend applying and coming for a visit to check and make sure ya like it.</p>
<p>i haven't checked CC probably since last summer but I was lookin around and had to put in my two cents. Anyways, I am freshman at UIUC but i was originally suppose to be at Tulane University in New Orleans. after hurrican katrina hit the south, i enrolled here at Illinois for what i figured would just be a semester and then i would return to Tulane. i was admitted to the UIUC last year as a senior in the college of engineering but declined admission because i loved NOLA so much...anyways...after being here for a semester i have found all that i wanted in a university - and much, much more. last year as a senior i was one of the people that just applied here because thats what you are "suppose to do" as a high school student in illinois. everyday i am here i love it more and more. whether it is just walking on the beautiful quad everyday, eating lunch with friends in the dorms, listening to one of my many awesome professors in class, or going out on the weekends to one of the many bars here in chambana (for which you only need to be 19 to get into =) ) i hope that you all give the University of Illinois a good look and definately consider it. plus, its a FIRST class education at a pretty decent price for in-staters. GO ILLINI!!!</p>
<p>Ok, UI lovers, what specifically do you love about UIUC? The towns have the 2nd largest number of restaurants per capita (says College *******), there are the Big Ten sports, the schools is actually pretty selective for a state school--not every IL HS grad can get in, that is certain. We live in central IL, have prepaid tuition for UIUC or any other IL state school, always figured this would be the best (public) education we could offer our D. She has gone to tennis camps etc over there, but will only consider it her financial safety and will attend only if she doesn't get a good enough FA package from the smaller LACs she prefers. I think she is most offput by the sheer number of students, large frosh lecture sections, the party school image. How do you get around the 30K UG student issue, how do you get out of or survie the monster lower level class sizes, what do you think of having grad TAs rather than full professors? THe school is good in her intended fields (psych and law) and is close to home relative to other schools, and definitely affordable in comparison. I can't imagine the place isn't diverse (despite the large number of instaters--that alone offers a smorgasbord from Chgo to Cairo!). How do you find your niche/group in such a large environment--is it hard to negotiate all the forms and registration process, etc? I am looking for positive reinforcements to offer my D to consider the school. I personally love C-U and one of my grad degrees is from UI, but I can't imagine attending such a large UG school. I am pushing Allen Hall-Unit One, Honors programs as ways to reduce class size and offer her a niche. She is a bit artsy, distinctive style, very bright, definitely not a sorority candidate or Young Republican material and wants a liberal setting. Any advice?? Thanks!</p>
<p>I'm going to give you two statistics from U.S. News and World Report. In business, the accounting department for undergraduates is number one in the country. In engineering, the civil engineering department is ranked number one for undergraduates. It is a public university, which means it's cheaper than a private. </p>
<p>Those are concrete facts, and I can corroborate both of them as I have e-mailed a civil engineering professor, and this rich math teacher of mine had her son go there for accounting. He loved it, and got a good education. If you like parties, you can have them, if you want quiet studying, you can get that too. The school is definitely on its way up, and its starting from a pretty high position.</p>
<p>P.S. It's like I say, find out what you're interested in, then get the best deal. For me, this place is the best deal.</p>
<p>bookmom, ill try to do my best to give you some pos. reinforcements...anyways...here it goes:</p>
<p>SIZE
one of my good friends last year was looking at schools and one of them was UIUC. she was accepted, but her mom talked her out of going there due to the size factor - thinking that illinois was just too big for her. this is the way i see it: </p>
<p>in the classroom - yeah, the lecture halls during freshman year can fill up with hundreds of students BUT along with each lecture, you will also have discussion sections which consist of 15 to 30 students (a small-sized school learning environment). although these discussion sections are taught by graduate students, my experiences with my TA's have been great and i feel are just as rewarding/important as my lecture sections with my professors. </p>
<p>registration - i have found that in my major, engineering, it is not difficult to find available classes during registration due to the fact that almost all of my classes have a large number of sections. i do not want to mislead you in saying that all majors are like this. but, because you have said that your daughter is looking into the honors program, i know that this will allow her to have early registration, and it will cut down her class sizes (even lectures possibly) substantially.</p>
<p>socially - no matter the size of the school, whether it is 30K or 5K, you are going to have the same number of people that you see everyday going to class or in the dorms or hanging out with on the weekends. the dorms act as smaller living communities that allow students to really find a core group of friends that i'm told will be my friends for life.</p>
<p>DIVERSITY
being from southern illinois, i am definately a minority when compared to the rest of the undergrad. population. 8 out of 10 students from illinois are from the 'burbs. at the same time, there are many people here from all over the world due to the strengths in some of our programs. </p>
<p>i had originally planned on going to Tulane to see what true diversity really meant, but after attending the UIUC, i feel that there much diversity here in champaign-urbana. </p>
<p>i do want to mention that the greek system here is ridiculous. i think we have almost 60 fraternities and somewhere around 25 sororities here on campus. however, if the greek life isn't your thing, there are other ways to meet people/go out. that is one of the beautiful aspects of having a UG population of almost 30K - there are always people to find with similar interests.</p>
<p>when coming here to the University of Illinois, i didnt think it would be such a party school - i was badly mistaken. with all the greek events, bars, apartment parties, etc...if you want to party, you will not have trouble finding it. at the same time, if you dont want to party, you dont have to. i believe there a number of housing options here that offer substance free living or variations of it. </p>
<p>hope some of that might help..let me know if you have any more ?'s</p>
<p>Topher02--Thanks so much. I will pass this info onto my D. SHe isn't much of a party girl, but she LOVES indy music concerts. I can see her in Allen Hall/Unit 1 for a more intimate experience. If she goes to UIUC she will graduate debt free and therefore in good shape for grad school. For that reason alone, logic might dictate UIUC. I knew most students are instate but hadn't considered that most are from Chgo burbs vs rest of state--seems to be THE place for much of central IL. WHen I went to school in dark ages, we did not have the small breakout discussion groups, just the lecture halls with 500-1000 students (including those watching on closed circuit from anther bldg!) Glad to see things have changed.</p>
<p>Hi Everyone!</p>
<p>Hmm... what do I love so much about UIUC? In short: everything! I love the campus, the people, the atmosphere, the prestige of the school, the social life... everything! There really is something here for everyone.</p>
<p>About class sizes, what was discussed above is true. I found that most of my classes were relatively small first semester, but I was a music major back then. There is some flexibility to class sizes depending upon the class. For example, my Intro to Psychology lecture has about 300 students in it, BUT there are other sections of this course that only have 19 people in them. So, if you want to avoid large lecture halls, there are things you can do to try to avoid them, but not always. </p>
<p>As for TAs, I have always found the TAs to be pretty good at what they do, and I never felt like any of my TAs had no idea what they were doing.</p>
<p>As for the overall size of the school, it really doesn't feel like there are a little under 40,000 (including grads). I go places and run into the same people all the time. There is always someone that I know from somewhere in every single class of mine, whether its big or small. A great advantage to it being such a large school is that there is more to offer everyone. We have an ice skating rink, pools (one with a waterslide), HUGE library system, everything really. Anything one could want UIUC has... atleast I think so.</p>
<p>Socially, UIUC is definitely a lot of fun. I have a good time here. lol. But if partying is not your thing, it's not a big deal. The Illini Union hosts interesting activities on certain weekend nights that are always fun and sober. We had a former Real-World cast member come by earlier in the year recruiting people for the Real World, magicians, caricaturists and everything. </p>
<p>So your daughter looks indie music... we have a lot of indie groups coming through here actually. I am a music staff member on WPGU, a radio station here on campus that plays indie-rock. We have the Canopy Club and the Highdive which have lots of fun concerts and stuff like that. We also have a great bus system which will take you to movie theaters and malls and things like that. There is a lot of stuff to do around here.</p>
<p>Yeah, I love UIUC. It's amazing. I had to choose between coming here and Valparaiso, and I ultimately chose here because it really inspired me when I first visited campus and took a walk on the Quad... Valpo just didn't do it for me.</p>
<p>I thumbed over to UIUC a few times back in the day since a good friend of mine went there.</p>
<p>Nice campus. MASSIVE library system, key if you're in something like History. The people in the sciences tended to be very sharp cookies.
You really are out in the middle of nowhere though, which wouldn't have suited me, but my friend seemed to enjoy it.</p>
<p>I love U of I but I am tired of IL students taking it for granted. Not many think about how awesome or hard it is til they get here. It's just a given that they'll get here. My friend put it into perspective: "Yeah all my friends got in here and it was so easy. I mean I could have gone to the Ivies but I didn't want to work that hard and I figured I'd have more fun here. I didn't expect it to be this hard. I thought it would be easy."</p>
<p>I think a lot of kids (especially suburbs kids) think this way because they take everything for granted (I still can't believe I am lucky enough to live in a state where the state college overall is this amazing). A lot of people come here not fully realizing what their undertaking. It's weird. I mean it is relatively easy to get in (if you went to a good high school, there are lots of schools still where only the top students are still accepted) if you are smart and went to a good high school so a lot of people see every person in their class going and just think it's gonna be easy. It is for some people but it eventually earns the respect it deserves.</p>
<p>I love U of I seriously. I don't know what it is about this school that makes people feel that way.</p>