<p>Caroleehut – my son considered options similar to your daughter’s, and in the end chose UVa. He wishes the school offered a communications major (used to, but was discontinued several years back, in part I gather because it became the major of choice for athletes . . . .) He attended a large, public high school, so the prospect of a large university was appealing to him. Since his area of interest is sportscasting, he also wanted a school with large sports programs. </p>
<p>While the introductory classes are heavily weighted toward large lectures, the big name teachers seem to teach them. One thing I have observed about UVa is that the faculty members there, for the most part, are there because they actually like to teach and to interact with students; they are not just there to do research. They seem to be very approachable, but it IS up to the students to approach the professors. If that is not a challenge for your daughter, she should be fine and able to make many good connections with her teachers, even in her early years.</p>
<p>My son loves the school, and does not second guess his decision to turn down major journalism/communications schools to attend, but the jury is still out on whether UVa was the best place for him academically. He has struggled to find classes of interest. The media studies program is a mish-mash of courses on the effect of media on society and film studies. Not much there for an aspiring journalist. He will major in history, because one has to major in something, he likes history, and there is truly an outstanding array of courses offered in that area. (FWIW, he has had TA’s in two history classes so far, one of which is a 3000 level course – so take Wahoomb’s comments here with a huge grain of salt . . . ) My son came in with a fair number of AP credits, so he takes lighter loads and spends his extra time interning with various sports media opportunities at the University. </p>
<p>I can’t say much about the psychology dept. other than it seems to be heavily weighted toward cognitive studies rather than traditional psychology courses (or maybe the area has just changed drastically since I was in school). </p>
<p>I don’t know what Wake offers in these areas (although I do have one friend wondering what her soon to be Wake grad in psych is going to do with her degree), but I have only great things to say about Elon’s communications program. Great facilities and fabulous internships/job placement for those students. My son just wanted a bigger school.</p>
<p>Best of luck to your daughter, where ever she attends!</p>