<p>This is long, but I’d like to think it’s worth the read. These are important issues you need to consider before you decide where to go to college.</p>
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<p>As at any college or university, there are good things and bad things. There are students who love the university and students who hate the university and students who don’t care. (Most students here at IU don’t care.) But before you decide to spend at least four years of your life and thousands of dollars on your higher education at IU, you really need to get real answers to some important questions. The admission booklets and promotional things the admissions office send to you look great, but is that what IU is really like? Do the student admissions representatives really love IU or are they just putting on the smile for their resume?</p>
<p>This post is intended to give you a real student’s perspective. I can assure you that most students at this university (student body of ~ 40,000) who have even cared enough about the quality of education they’re getting share my frustrations. I am a senior year here at IU Bloomington (3.9 GPA). I began this semester with more than 120 credit hours, which means I have taken a lot of classes. </p>
<li>Let’s start with what IU is really famous for: parties. Most students live for the parties and drinking. This lifestyle spills over into the quality of work the students produce and the weekdays in general.</li>
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<p>On Monday, everyone is talking about the parties they attended on the weekend (those who are well enough to come to class - some are still hung-over). On Tuesday, everyone is complaining about their classes and the work they have to do. By Wednesday, it’s like, “Just two more days 'til Friday.” By Thursday, many students have started the drinking. It’s called “Thirsty Thursday” here. Attendance is always sparse in classes on Friday. The weekend nights are spent at parties and the weekend days are spent in bed recovering. On Saturday mornings of home football games, students are out on the stadium lawn, completely drunk by 9:30 am. I am not kidding.</p>
<p>When parents send their child to college, they’re thinking, “The university will challenge Johnny’s mind, broaden his horizons, and set him up for a well-paying career.” They shell out thousands of dollars every semester for this experience. Little do they know that pretty much all Johnny lives for is the booze, slipping through his classes with as little work as possible. And guess who is paying for the booze?? The parents. </p>
<p>But if partying is really your thing, look no further than IU.</p>
<li>This university’s administration is primarily concerned with money. Teaching is not at the top of their priority list.</li>
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<p>IU keeps admitting more and more students. More students, more money. Simple. But more students mean that there have to be more classes. Every freshman has to take take English 101 (actually English W131 here), so now we need more teachers for these classes. The university doesn’t want to hire more professors to teach these courses because professors cost more. So what do they do? They accept more graduate students because they can pay the graduate students a fraction of what they would a professor to teach these classes. And this doesn’t just happen for these “general” classes. </p>
<p>The graduate students they hire are barely a few years older than the students they’re teaching. Most have absolutely no experience in teaching, which makes them ineffective teachers. The classroom environment becomes extremely boring. This quenches any fire the students might have for learning the subject. So, to keep students coming to class, part of the grade reflects attendance. This is stupid because students should come to class because they want to learn, not so they can get points. If students don’t want to come class, they either (a) know the material, (b) have work for another class they have to finish up, or (c) don’t care to learn the material, in which case they should not even be in the class. Another huge problem with the graduate students is that they just don’t care. They are teaching because they have to, not because they want to. You wouldn’t be able to tell for some of these graduate students if they want to be there or not because they can barely speak English. I can’t tell you how many graduate student teachers (called Associate Instructors, AIs) I’ve had here who could barely speak English.</p>
<p>It is appalling to see these poor graduate students completely overworked. They have hard classes of their own, they have to prepare for the classes they teach, they have mountains of grading to do… And they get paid usually less than $20,000 to do all this. Graduate students are students too and most have absolutely no business teaching undergraduate classes. The classes are so huge, though, that one professor cannot see to all the students. Thus graduate students become indispensable.</p>
<p>Let me give you my example this semester. I have a relatively light load this semester, physical chemistry, honors literary interpretation, honors organic chemistry laboratory, and spanish III. A professor lectures in Physical Chemistry, and then there is graduate student who teaches the discussion portion of the class once a week who can barely speak English. A graduate student is completely in charge for the literary interpretation class, and the same story goes in the organic lab and spanish III. Graduate students are teaching both of my HONORS classes. One of them, the organic lab, is a 300-level course and is a core class in my major. </p>
<p>Another problem with graduate student teachers is that they are usually the ones who get to know you better, especially in lab classes. So if you wanted to ask one of them to write a letter of recommendation for you, it’s just a waste of time. They are graduate students, so their letter won’t carry near the same weight as a professor’s. </p>
<p>So that’s that about the grad students. </p>
<p>One last thing, though. This year, IU accepted so many students that there wasn’t enough space in the dorms to house them all. There have been kids who were assigned to dorm lounges, two and three to a lounge, with make-shift furniture. That is pretty sad. </p>
<li>Hardly any student here at IU really cares about what they’re learning. This apathy not only plagues IU Bloomington; it can be found in schools all over the country. This is the fault of the professors and of the university’s administration. This university puts such a huge emphasis on research that faculty members are constantly under pressure not only to teach but to produce results in their research or publish papers. [Raises in their salary is very much dependent on their success (or failure) as a researcher - in all fields, not just science. So when push comes to shove, what is more important to a professor: his research or the students he’s teaching?] IU hires professors that will increase the university’s prominence with their research, not necessarily the best teachers. I can count on one hand the number of good professors I’ve had here in my time at IU. Most are mediocre. This mediocrity from the front of the classroom breeds mediocrity and apathy in the students. The students are being dragged along through the classes. It is unbelievable the absolute brainlessness students devote to their studies. They have to write a paper so they “bs” it. This is allowed by the professors, who now have no choice but to teach a class of students most of whom do not care one wink about what he or she might be teaching. Where is the love for learning in the students? And that desire to understand others and communicate it<br></li>
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<p>This is my perspective of IU Bloomington. Sure there are good things, like lots of opportunities for the students who really care to take advantage of them, and my friends, but it has been a constant battle these four years not to lose my own love for learning. Ironic, isn’t it, that the place you come to stimulate your thinking, “broaden your horizons” turns out to be the place that turns learning into a bunch of hoops you have to jump through throughout the week before the next weekend or the next break? It’s thousands of times more sad when you think about all the money you pay the university. </p>
<p>My advice to all you who are considering attending IU Bloomington (or any school) is to really think about what you want out of your education experience. Talk to a lot of students about the university (at any school you’re looking at). The students who work in the admissions office are only going to tell you the good stuff. You need to know the pros and the cons, so ask random students what they like and what they don’t like. You’ll soon get a good perspective of the university - much better than if you were to only read the pamphlets the admissions office sends you with the smiling students on the front cover. You will be at college for the next four years at least (longer, if the university can help it- more tuition money) and you will pay a lot of money for this experience. You wouldn’t want to pay $40,000 for a car that has a bent frame and smashed windows from an accident, would you? You’d want a new car for that price. $40,000 is a lot of money. It’s how much a lot of people pay for their college education (I pay more because I’m out-of-state), so you need to be sure that you’re getting the best deal your money can buy.</p>