<p>I am a high school senior and looking to apply to Carnegie Mellon, possibly early decision. Before I make that committment I want to know what are the pros and cons of CMU from CMU students? It would really help me map out what goes on at campus.</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>pros:</p>
<ul>
<li>Amazing education</li>
<li>~85% successful employment rate (students are very happy where they are employed) six months after graduation, even in the middle of an enormous recession</li>
<li>Nice dorms with good maintenance</li>
<li>Almost every major is a top-notch program</li>
<li>Cool professors and small class sizes make for fun, interesting lectures</li>
<li>Small-ish campus, so people’s faces become familiar to you very quickly, especially within your major</li>
<li>Easy to make friends and get involved with things on campus</li>
<li>Easy to get onto sports teams</li>
</ul>
<p>cons:</p>
<ul>
<li>All of our sports teams are complete jokes</li>
<li>Lack of exciting party-based atmosphere</li>
<li>Too much work</li>
<li>Stressed student body</li>
<li>Not enough time to commit to a ton of activities</li>
</ul>
<p>cons: bad food and evil meal plans. It’s also a relatively “poor” school.</p>
<p>Disagree with “nice dorm”.</p>
<p>Pros.: The city, Pittsburgh is nice and clean. Not too big, not too small. Free buses from campus to nearby areas for shopping, entertainment, food, fun…</p>
<p>Pros:
-Good research/intern-ship opportunities
-Almost all fields have a cutting edge element to them and/or are integrated with computers/technology
-Variety of people in student body
-Good speakers
-Can do a variety of things from arts to computers at very high quality
-Oakland is a nice area with museums and plenty of green</p>
<p>Cons:
-expensive (not only tuition but just about anything associated with CMU) and this is due to a small endowment
-Changing schools can be tough
-A small language program</p>
<p>Pros:</p>
<p>Lots of Indian kids
60 / 40 male to female ratio</p>
<p>Cons:</p>
<p>Lots of Indian kids
60 / 40 male to female ratio</p>
<p>bro im indian not cool…haha anyways i know the academics are crazy good and its a stressful college, but what Im looking for are things that are usually not talked about for pros and cons</p>
<p>Well, it’s a university. The individual pros and cons are going to probably be based on your own personal experience - people are trying to give you more pros and cons that would apply to everyone, since you haven’t told us anything about your intended major, interests, or lifestyle. Can you give us some details?</p>
<p>If you’re looking for specifics, my personal pros are that my professors are awesome, I get to take grad courses as an undergrad (yay game design @ the ETC) and I get to lead campus tours and write an admissions blog even as a new sophomore. I also have kickassly intelligent friends who are way cool and know how to have fun. :)</p>
<p>My personal cons are that professors in the creative writing department don’t think scifi is a real genre, the campus newspaper kind of sucks and I’m not learning as much as I thought I would, and it’s really hard to get into classes that are small if you’re a lowerclassman like me.</p>
<p>“Relatively ‘poor’ school”? </p>
<p>Care to elaborate?</p>
<p>CMU has a small endowment, that is why its tuition is so high.</p>
<p>CMU has one of the smallest endowments of the “top 25” schools.</p>
<p>Also, kate, have you taken the scifi class offered by a professor in the physics department? He taught a class or two of mine and was a pretty good guy, so I imagine that class is also pretty neat.</p>
<p>CMU’s endowment may be relatively small given its ranking.</p>
<p>The primary reason that CMU tuition is high is because it’s a high technology school-- meaning more labs, higher faculty salaries relative say to a small liberal arts or more comprehensive college balanced by Humanities professors. Running science and engineering labs does not come cheap nor does hiring and securing high tech faculty where industry salaries are a constant lure (aka goodbye to Von Ahn).</p>
<p>That said- return on CMU investment consistently outpaces many other schools. Employment rates and admission to grad school more than compensate for the tuition spent (for most majors)</p>
<p>Racin,</p>
<p>No such class appears to be offered for CW majors now, though it would be really cool to be taught by a physics professor. Mostly it’s the same faculty teaching fiction classes, and only two of them are supportive of fantasy/scifi pieces, so it is the luck of the draw deciding whom you get for certain workshops and writing classes.</p>
<p>Well I plan on applying to the engineering school and hopefully dual majoring in finance as well… I want to do chemical engineering because Im infatuated by chemistry… Interests, well I would love to try out for the football team, I dont know how hard that would be. And I want to be around fun friends that don’t focus 100% of their time on studying. I want to go out on the weekends or any free time and just chill with friends and have a good time. That said, Im not looking to go crazy and drink, but I would like to have fun!</p>
<p>kate, I wish I remember the guy who taught the class, but it wasn’t listed in the CW department. It might have just been general H&SS and was aimed more at reading science fiction works and understanding what they did in the context of their time (at least, that’s what I heard).</p>
<p>I don’t have access to the course reviews any more, but he taught my Experimental Physics class (33-104) in either 2005 or 2006. Part of me wants to say it was Luokkala or Suter, but I can’t say for sure.</p>
<p>@r619dude: I don’t think you can major in “finance” unless you dual degree? The double in business doesn’t let you choose a track AFAIK</p>
<p>con:
Only one I can think of other than the tuition…</p>
<p>Horribly hot weather and poor air quality-- check out weather.com today…
SMILE</p>
<p>Major Pro:
Incredibly helpful administrators and faculty who really take an interest in advocating and helping students</p>
<p>Apparently the air quality warning is for ozone, which I’d much rather have than the massive smog days I’m stuck with here in Los Angeles. Or, you know, when the entire hillside north of my apartment is on fire.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Ash days are hardcore. It’s kind of like California’s version of a snow day, I guess, except with more asthma and less snow angel-ing.</p>
<p>Can I learn more about the social events around CMU as well as how the dorms are?</p>