Penn State Berks ???

Colleges and Universities A-Z Penn State
21

<p>I'll try to answer some of your questions. I went to PSU Berks for 2 years, and I transfered to UP for my 3rd and 4th years. I lived in the dorms for both years at Berks. I graduate this semester. I'm an IST student. I've spent the last two summers working right outside of Reading for a utility company, so I'm pretty familiar with the area.</p>

<p>Can anyone share your knowledge about this campus with us? e.g.
- quality of learning</p>

<p>Classes were pretty easy at Berks, and I'd say things are a bit tougher at UP. I took most of my intro/Gen Ed. classes there though, so that could be the reason. I had a few professors who doing part-time work at the school (they were mostly retired professionals and a few high school teachers). Professors who were full time were great.</p>

<ul>
<li>campus and dorm life & activities, food</li>
</ul>

<p>Living in the dorms isn't too bad. There's two sets of Dorms, the "Woods" and the "Village". The woods are newer, and the rooms are setup in a suite style. There's more privacy in the woods. The village is setup more like a community, with a limited number of rooms per building (I think it's 8 or 16). The woods is more like a traditional dorm building. Because of how the Village is setup, it's a more social environment. It's easy to become socially isolated in the woods.</p>

<p>The school has activities most weekends. They bring comics and other acts in. They try pretty hard to create a community for the kids who live on campus. It gets kind of cheesy, because they try so hard. As long as you give it a chance though, it's not that bad.</p>

<p>Um, food is pretty good. The cafeteria (Tully's) is pretty nice. It's a good hang out spot, and most kids eat dinner with their friends there. There's a good choice of things (salads, sandwiches, pizza, fried things, etc) and it's pretty easy to be healthy when you're eating. It's ala carte, so there's no buffet or anything like that. You pay for only what you eat. There isn't as much temptation to eat a ton because of that.</p>

<ul>
<li>chances or ease of being relocated to UP at junior year</li>
</ul>

<p>Chances depends on what your major is. I'm not sure what it is for IST anymore, but at the time, you needed a 3.0. I recall hearing from my friends that business majors needed 2.5.</p>

<p>As for ease, it was pretty easy. You filled out a few forms online, registered for classes at UP, and that was it.</p>

<ul>
<li>research opportunities</li>
</ul>

<p>There weren't any (that I was aware of) for IST. I'm not sure about other majors. I got the general feeling that there wasn't a great deal of research going on. On the other hand, there's a ton that goes on at UP.</p>

<ul>
<li>study abroad programs</li>
</ul>

<p>I don't have any experience with that at Berks.</p>

<ul>
<li>how is living in Reading, Berks</li>
</ul>

<p>The PSU campus is located in a good area Reading/Berks county. The city of Reading is a pretty bad place, really high crime rates etc etc. No one really goes into the city, and it's well separated from PSU by several highways. PSU is right next to a large shopping center (Target, Grocery store, Chili's, BBQ place, etc etc) and it's also across the street from a nice park. The park is part of a system with a bike trail that runs along the river, you can bike all around the area using the trail.</p>

<p>There isn't a lot to do though, besides to go out and eat. There's a small movie theater and a pretty sad mall.</p>

<hr>

<p>That said, I didn't like Berks much my first year there. Like others have said, most people do go home on the weekends. There isn't much that goes on at the school, and it's pretty boring. However, it's really easy to get involved with people. There's a great theatre group on campus and an active student government. If your son is able to get involved with any of those, he'll have a lot more fun.</p>

<p>I'm glad that I didn't go to main campus my first year, because it was really quite overwhelming for me. There's a tooooon of kids and a huge focus on partying. I don't know how I would have reacted to that right out of high school. But, I am glad that I didn't have to spend all 4 years there. It was a good stepping stone for me.</p>

<p>I think I answered everything. The Reading newspaper is called the Reading Eagle, Daily</a> News on 3/16/2008 - Reading Eagle Newspaper.</p>

<p>I'll try to check back to see if there's anything else I can help you out with.</p>

<p>Good luck with everything.</p>

22

<p>Hi, nittanylions86,</p>

<p>Your information is so more than excellent (so comprehensive) that I really want to give you a kiss. You make me feeling no so helpless now! If you have time, would you mind to explain a bit more?</p>

<p>~ What do you mean by “classes were pretty easy at Berks, and I'd say things are a bit tougher at UP”? Am I correct that freshman and sophomore courses for SAME program should be the same in both campuses and students should study the same things? Then do you mean that students in UP work harder and have more assignments while those in Berks are more relax??? Do you feel students at Berks have somewhat different personality and living style from those in UP?</p>

<p>~ Do Berks campus provide courses other than those intro/Gen Ed? I am asking this question because my son would qualify for some sort of AP advances credits because he is studing on the IB Diploma, so he should be able to complete the freshman and sophomore courses more quickly.</p>

<p>~ I also noted from Berks’ website that it has quite a large portion of part-time professors. Is this common in UP too? Will it be difficult to access the part-time professors for questions after class (what I meant will they leave quickly)?</p>

<p>~ for relocation to UP at junior year, apart from meeting the GPA and pre-requisite courses and minimum grade requirements, are that any sort of QUOTA limitation and competition among students with same interest for each major quota?</p>

<p>~ Just like what you felt before, my son on the one hand worries about the lack of weekend activities at the school, but just hope to get involved with people easier as compare to living in a huge campus like UP (he is a shy and timid boy). In particular he is afraid of the drinking parties (he never drink before and he didn’t even what to taste a teaspoon of the beer)</p>

<p>~ Just one more question, do you know how to go to Philadelphia if I don’t drive?</p>

<p>~ By the way, may I ask if you are an out-stater of PA? I don’t know why I feel that you may be a non-American? (sooorry, just ignore this question if you think that this is too private)</p>

<p>Thank you veeery much again and best luck with everything for you too!</p>

<p>p.s. if you wish to give me some private comments / advicde, i will be happy to receivd your private message too!</p>

23

<p>
[quote]
What do you mean by “classes were pretty easy at Berks, and I'd say things are a bit tougher at UP”? Am I correct that freshman and sophomore courses for SAME program should be the same in both campuses and students should study the same things? Then do you mean that students in UP work harder and have more assignments while those in Berks are more relax??? Do you feel students at Berks have somewhat different personality and living style from those in UP?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Right, the classes should be the same for all campuses. I've found that they can differ, but I think that has more to do with the professor who's teaching the course and not because it's a separate campus. I think for Gen Ed classes, the material is probably the same. I've taken a few IST courses at Berks that had different technical material then was taught at UP, but it got the same general idea across.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Do Berks campus provide courses other than those intro/Gen Ed?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yeah, Berks has classes for most majors. There's quite a few programs that can be completed at Berks in 4 years, so they have advanced courses. IST is one of them, their website should have them all. Programs which Berks doesn't offer for all 4 years usually have enough classes to take up 2 years, after which the student transfers to UP.</p>

<p>
[quote]
I also noted from Berks’ website that it has quite a large portion of part-time professors. Is this common in UP too? Will it be difficult to access the part-time professors for questions after class (what I meant will they leave quickly)?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>It seems to me like UP has more fulltime professors, or at least I've had more. I don't know about basic courses, because I've only taken higher-level classes here. Professors generally have office hours, and the part-timers are no exception. It was pretty easy to talk to part-time professors, especially after class. A few of them even gave out their cell phone numbers so they could be reached easily when they weren't on campus.</p>

<p>
[quote]
for relocation to UP at junior year, apart from meeting the GPA and pre-requisite courses and minimum grade requirements, are that any sort of QUOTA limitation and competition among students with same interest for each major quota?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I can only speak about IST. The way they did it when I transfered to UP was that any IST student with above a 3.0 was guaranteed to transfer to UP. There was a quota for the amount of students they'd let in who had under a 3.0. I had a few friends who had 2.7's and 2.8's and they still got into UP.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Just like what you felt before, my son on the one hand worries about the lack of weekend activities at the school, but just hope to get involved with people easier as compare to living in a huge campus like UP (he is a shy and timid boy). In particular he is afraid of the drinking parties (he never drink before and he didn’t even what to taste a teaspoon of the beer)

[/quote]
</p>

<p>It's easier to get involved at a small school like Berks, but there's also less choices for things to get involved with. Berks seems like a lot of the other local state schools (Shippensburg, Millersville, IUP, etc) in that many of the kids go home on weekends. As long as you're involved with things, it's not too bad on the weekends. It just depends what he decides to do.</p>

<p>There's off campus parties, but not a lot of drinking on campus (it's a "dry" campus - of course that fact doesn't keep some kids from still drinking). There's not a lot pressure to drink unless that's the type of social crowd you hang out. There's plenty of kids who don't drink.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Just one more question, do you know how to go to Philadelphia if I don’t drive?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>There really isn't an easy way to get to Philly. You'd have to take a bus into Reading and then take one from there to Philly or to a train station that goes to Philly. I'm not really familiar with how kids did it. They had a system for kids to carpool with one another, but I don't know anything about how that worked.</p>

<p>
[quote]
By the way, may I ask if you are an out-stater of PA? I don’t know why I feel that you may be a non-American?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Nah, I'm from PA.</p>

24

<p>Thank you for your help, nittanylions86.</p>

25

<p>I recently got accepted to Penn st Berks however they put me on their housing waiting list. What ways can i do to stay on campus apart from moving off campus. Do they offer a music scholarships at Berks as well?</p>