Son still trying to chose between Northeastern and University of Rochester. One thing we are wondering about and wish we had asked some students while visiting in March, is that it feels like there is so much focus on coop that we didn’t get a real sense for what the regular academic experience is like; feels almost like it’s an afterthought. He is majoring in physics and in the past I’ve gotten no responses from anybody who knew anything sbout Northeastern’s physics programs on this forum (though the professors we met when we visited sll seemed nice and approachable), but I would be interested to hear what your regular campus academic experience has been like. Most people we talk to say that Rochester’s academics are superior; it’s hard to know how much truth there is in this and how much is just based on reputation. We certainly realize you would get more of the traditional four-year college experience at Rochester. He likes the coop concept, but also wants to make sure his regular classroom experience is positive.
We felt the same way, Sapphire50. One of the cheerleaders at the HuskyFest (lunch) told us her biggest class was 50 people (with smaller recitations) and that most of her classes were under 20. But I got no sense of how academic it is-- is it hard? Easy? Challenging? Boring? Do people show up for class? Do professors notice? Academics wasn’t mentioned at all. In fact, when I asked about distribution requirements, etc., the professor and co-op lady in our “major” session did not know anything about it. 
@redpoodles yes, We got a good impression of the four physics professors who we met when we went to our breakout session for son’s major, and the students all seemed happy and positive about their experiences, but I wish we had asked the students more specifically about their non-co-op experience. Son really having a hard time making his decision. Northeastern would be less $$ than Rochester but we can handle the difference so i’ve. emphasized that he should make his decision based on where he feels he’d have the most positive experience, but he really likes both.
The reality is it isn’t an easy thing to actually explain. The average Northeastern student has only attended classes at one institution. How do they compare to classes at other colleges? We don’t really know - we haven’t taken classes at them.
I am actually a rare exception to the above rule, so having taken some classes while in high school at a large state school, I can say that the mostly intro level courses I was enrolled in had far more students (I took Biology I in a lecture with 600 students) at the state school than courses I attended as an undergraduate at Northeastern (I believe the closest I came to that at Northeastern was intro Chemistry, which was about 200 students if I remember correctly).
But even with that experience, what can I say. Some classes were definitely harder than others. Professors were interested in what they were teaching to different degrees. But even that isn’t so cut and dry. Do harder classes mean you’re learning more, or just a poor instructor? And while a professor’s enthusiasm is often beneficial, one of the most valuable classes I took was an introductory course where the professor made her dislike of the subject matter blatant, and while it might have been a bit unprofessional, it caused me to reevaluate pursuing a certain area of study, something I absolutely do not regret now.
For the most part, I was happy with my classes - they kept me busy, and were usually interesting. The times I felt like I wasn’t getting much out of my classes were almost entirely issues with my own study habits, and there was more than one course I felt was very interesting, but that I hadn’t gotten as much out of it as I could have if I had put some more effort in. But again, that’s me.
And that’s probably the biggest piece of advice I’d offer to incoming students in any case - you get out what you put in. The occasional bad professor or boring class is inevitable wherever you attend school, and you work through it and move on. Even if a utopian school existed where all teachers were amazing, you’d inevitably point to the least amazing of them and gripe about him.
I’ll also throw this in. I only did one co-op - this had everything to do with me coming in with a lot of credits and putting off co-op while I made some decisions surrounding a major change, as opposed to any negative feelings about the program. My first five semesters of classes were continuous, followed by co-op and another two semesters. Sure, co-op was different, and when I got back to classes it did feel a little odd to be back at first, but I never sat back and thought, “Man, this seems to have disrupted my traditional college experience.” I don’t know what a traditional college experience is. I don’t feel like I somehow missed out on something by spending six months working in the middle of it - I’m not even sure what I would have been missing out on. Would something have happened in that sixth semester if I hadn’t taken a co-op that would have changed everything? I kind of doubt it.
To answer your other questions:
I participated in an interdisciplinary program between the mathematics, biology, and physics department, and my interactions with the physics faculty through that were all interesting.
Sometimes people don’t show up for class. Sometimes professors care. It varies, and it really doesn’t affect each student on an individual basis.
Anyway, those are my thoughts. I think the reality of the college decision making process is that most people only ever go to one college, and as a result, very very few people have actually developed any ability to judge whether a school has what they’re looking for, because they don’t really know what they’re looking for. Obviously, you have to make a decision eventually, so I generally say base it on cost, because college is ludicrously expensive and who knows what’ll happen - the only constant is debt, so might as well minimize it. I was incredibly happy with my time at Northeastern, but keep in mind that the university funded my education in its entirety - if you can get that deal (which they haven’t offered in several years), or just have oodles of cash, go for it, but if you can go to a relatively well regarded school for even 5K cheaper each year, don’t discount it - 20K ain’t nothing to sneeze at.
Your co-op probably happened exactly when you needed it. I remember feeling very burned out after my sophomore year and wanting to quit college. A co-op would have been wonderful. We all do the best we can with what we have, I guess.
I would agree mostly with wiseguy: they keep you busy/challenged/interested and vary in quality, some amazing some “eh”. You will get that almost everywhere. Personally, I have had a very good experience with the CS department in particular. My only notably “eh” teacher was in a mid-level math course.
Most students show up to class regularly, I don’t think there’s many classes you can do well in without showing up. Some classes are so small someone missing would be noticed. Others take attendance (I have had 3 of 8 classes take attendance, all smaller class sizes if they do).
Overall I feel like it’s just pretty standard. Every school will offer high level academics with challenge for its students. I think NEU focuses on co-op because it is the unique factor of the school. You can learn anywhere, there’s hundreds of great universities and do we really think that First Year Writing, Calculus, or X, or Y are really taught THAT much differently at each? So long as the professors care and teach, and there are sufficient offerings in the upper levels of your field, academics aren’t as different as everyone makes them out to be. The reality is that academics aren’t a distinguishing factor these days. Every school has them in essentially the same form. I think all rank shows is the scaled difficulty. Chances are, NEU will challenge you unless you are some sort of genius where only Harvard and the like would. So, college selections are now done based off of other factors, which I would guess NEU tries to showcase rather than the standard academics.
At the Open Houses and Admitted Student Days Northeastern emphasizes coop and experiential learning. With the large increase in applicants in recent years, especially from outside New England, they want potential students to realize that NU is not a traditional school. You cannot just go through 8 semesters of classes with perhaps the occasional summer internship.
They only have a few hours to present the school and they try to emphasize what sets NU apart from other schools.
@TomSrOfBoston I totally get that; but while co-op is the major thing that sets Northeastern apart, Northeastern students don’t spend 100% of their time in co-op and it would be nice to know what the regular academic experience is like as well. It’s got to be more than just biding your time until the next coop comes along. I’m sure it’s like any university where you have good professors and bad ones, I’d just like to hear from some students about their experience is the regular classroom setting.
@WiseGuy57 @PengsPhils Thanks both for your feedback. Very realisitic and helpful.
I think classes ARE different at different schools. In my own personal experience, I attended 3 colleges (my real college, one near my home I used for summer classes, and one I exchanged at), and each varied vastly, not only in how challenging the classes were, but in how knowledgeable (and also how smart) the teachers were. Similarly, in grad school, it was very easy to guess who came out of giant diploma mills and who came out of LACs where they had a lot of personal attention and guidance-- these two types of schools do not produce the same kind of graduate student. They just don’t.
That said, it certainly is challenging to get into Northeastern these days and I’m sure my kid would be challenged by her peers. It just would have been nice if the school didn’t forget that it’s a school and let up a little on pushing the co-op aspect ad naseum. The spiel started to feel like a broken record, by the end of the day.
It was kind of the same feeling I got after UMass-Amherst day, where several speakers echoed each other in saying “If you don’t go to a giant school, you won’t have any choices!” That just isn’t true. The NEU equivalent was “If you don’t do 3 co-ops during college you’ll never find a job!” That just isn’t true either.
These are problems set up by the respective schools’ marketing departments. When you can SEE the marketing being done to you, well, that isn’t very good marketing.
That said, there were bits of wisdom we heard that I hope my D takes with her wherever she goes. The COS Dean’s passion speech was particularly good and I hope reflective of other parts of the school. It felt quite authentic.
Also, I really enjoyed the student body as far as we saw it. NEU is a very interesting option for those lucky enough to have it.