<p>“I’m probably not the best person to answer these questions, as I’m not big on sports. But I’ll take a shot at it.”</p>
<p>You did a pretty good job especially considering you aren’t big on the sports. Thanks a lot.</p>
<p>"Your assumption is correct for 99% freshmen (some freshmen get placed in dorms typical for sophomores, but this is not necessarily a good thing and thankfully does not happen often). For many sophomores, nicer dorms are available. For example, there is a nicer high rise with AC which many sophomores get placed in. There are honors dorms with AC in a good location on the mall (however, they are quite small, so getting placed into them is a crapshoot, even for sophomore honors students). There are excellent apartments/suites for lucky sophomores and juniors. For students in special programs - for example, Global Communities, Language House, or Beyond the Classroom - great housing is available through even Junior yr - provided you apply to these programs and have good enough grades/essay writing skills to get in.</p>
<p>But housing at MD is generally not too good. Even as a sophomore, you may get stuck in a crappy high rise with no AC - for the typical MD student (i.e. not an athlete), what choices you have when it comes to housing is randomized (students are entered in a lottery and get randomly assigned a “number”; “1” picks the first room…“2” picks the second…etc. If you get number “894”, good luck getting a nice dorm, unless you have a friend with a higher number willing to room with you).</p>
<p>But where dorming on campus lacks in comfort for freshmen (and unlucky sophomores), it makes up for in heart. The worst dorms - the small, crowded, cement-block high rise dorms with no AC - are generally the most social and the most fun. So there is totally an upside.</p>
<p>In general, though, if quality of housing is important to you, Maryland kind of loses out, there, especially since many juniors do not receive on-campus housing (again, this is random). Most seniors will not live on campus."</p>
<p>I guess it sort of makes sense that freshmen stick it out for a year in the horrible dorms to get the college experience and make some friends. I’m completely fine with that but I’m not sure I’d want to do it for four years. Also, I want to clarify something. If my friend has a really low number (say 5) and i have a very high number, and he picks a room in the nice dorms, he can pick me to room with him regardless of my number? Thanks for the quality response, it really helps to get the student perspective.</p>
<p>2) “They’re really nice. There are several buildings (four off the top of my head - Cole, Ritchie, Armory, Health and Human Performance building…) which house indoor intramural fields/courts/etc. And the actual gym is very new and quite extensive, with basketball courts, weight rooms, running track, swimming pool, boxing equipment, raquet ball and squash courts, etc. etc. There are also a lot of outdoor fields for intramural sports, too, from baseball to football…”</p>
<p>This is exactly what I was hoping for. This is what would really help me get through the cold winter (as opposed to going to say a Cali school haha).</p>
<p>3)“Easy. You just log online and request tickets, then print them out the day of the game. Tickets do “sell out” (I put that in quotes because they are free), but if you keep abreast of when they go online and request 'em relatively early, you will get them. Some games are hard to get tickets for - for example, Duke vs. MD basketball games. Or UNC vs. MD. But if you are a basketball fan they won’t be hard to get - the more games you attend, the higher your priority for getting tickets is. So, if the Duke vs. MD game is the ONLY game you want to go to, well, yes, you may have trouble getting tickets to THAT one if you don’t generally attend b-ball games…”</p>
<p>Don’t worry, I plan on going to as many games as possible. Sporting events are too expensive, I want to go to as many as I can for free. :)</p>
<p>4) “You have options. The intramural leagues at MD are intense. There are varying levels of competitiveness that you can choose to participate in, so beginners and varsity-level players all have a place. Some intramural teams even travel to different states. The most competitive lacrosse league sold out Cole Fieldhouse (a big indoor stadium) when they played some big out-of-state rival team…shoot me, I don’t remember who, but wow.”</p>
<p>Wow, that does sound intense. Again, exactly what I was looking for. Maryland is starting to look better and better!</p>
<p>5) “Undergraduate journalism is extremely respected, and up there with the big names (SU, Mizzou, etc.). One of the best in the nation. Do not know about sports management or the graduate courses…”</p>
<p>Thats what I thought, but it never gets mentioned on any of the journalism threads on CC. Thanks.</p>
<p>6) “Not sure on this one either. But the business school as a whole is another one of the top-ranked programs at MD.”</p>
<p>Yep, so is the engineering program right?</p>
<p>7) "Well, being a state school, a lot of the work finding internships will be from your personal initiative. The profs will write great recs - if you do well in your classes and take the initiative to get to know them (ex. participate, go to office hours, etc.). Some schools offer a lot of help and advice for getting internships, in a sense that you will be required to take a 1 credit “how to get an internship class” or might even have to actually do an internship for credit to graduate (journalism and business come to mind) but others will really leave you wondering (english and history, for example). There is a career center which will give you tough (but good) resume and interview skills critiques, no matter what your major is, and they also run an excellent database of internship opportunities to browse through. “Beyond the Classroom” will also set you up for an internship, but you have to have good grades to get in.</p>
<p>So, in general, internships are pretty easy to come by, but you have to seek out the resources and do a lot of the dirty work on your own."</p>
<p>Fair enough. I have no problem doing the dirty work. But it seems like internships are one of the most important parts of a quality college education.</p>
<p>8) “You can choose varying levels of “points” (that is, how much you have to spend over the semester), but that’s about it. In general the meal plans are a royal rip off monetarily speaking, though the food isn’t too bad (how did I run out of food, even after spending $2,000?!). I don’t know the minimum meal plan exactly…but it is quite small. Try dining.umd.edu for your answer to this question.”</p>
<p>Thanks, I’ll check it out. Just curious, why would anyone get anything other than the smallest plan if its such a rip off? Why not get a minuscule plan and then pay for anything else you need?</p>
<p>Again, thank you so much for taking the time to respond</p>