The University of Maryland - College Park

The people who go here are great. I think its unfair for commuter and part-time students to characterize the friendliness of the students here because they're never on campus to get to know any of us. Every single person's door in the dorms are wide open. The residence staff also post charts on the walls of who in the building has the same classes (you can choose to leave your name off the chart though). Even if I don't know the person, I know that I will be able to just walk into their room and say "Hi. Are you in ECON200 with Professor Gelbach? I'm not sure when the problem sets are due." I know that whoever I ask will be glad to help me. Believe me- I've done it before. And during midterms and finals, we (the students in my sections) organized our own study and the juniors and seniors (who have larger south campus apartments) invited everybody (including the freshmen) to thier places for study groups. I don't think that would ever happen anywhere else.

The social life is good. I mean, we're in Washington. Most of the time we'll go down to Georgetown (via Metro) and go to clubs or restuarants and stuff. We could stay in College Park, but people aren't lying when they say that the town (and the main drag, Route 1 Baltimore Avenue) is a dump- but Maryland students have a very easy solution to this, DC, which is literally a two-minute Metro (subway) ride away. However, the city of College Park is planning a multi-million dollar revitalization of the town and Route 1. So, by the time that some of you people in high schoolers get here the town may be dramatically different.

The programs here are also really great, especially engineering, journalism, behavorial sciences, computer and space science and others. The trick is that we're so close to Washington, that Maryland gets lots of opportunities that other schools wouldn't get. For example, with NASA's Goddard Space Center down the street, the aerospace engineering students really do get first-hand experience and many of Maryland's students work on projects for NASA and it gives them great experience for when they enter the workforce, because they already have connections with people on the inside. Personally, for me as a Government and Politics student of the Pre-Law track, undergrad at Maryland couldn't be better. I mean, again, we're in Washington, the power capital of the world. I've already gotten a (paid) internship in Washington, partly because my professors know exactly who to talk to. Also, people who find the faculty too interested in their work haven't actually spoken to the professors. I've talked with a number of my professors and they're alway happy to to speak with me about anything, whether it's related to class or not.

Also, the facilities are incredible. The university is just now ending a huge renovation and construction program that should be done by spring semester 2004. Of the new, amazing, facilities on campus are a brand-new student union, health center, magnificent health club, basketball arena (Comcast Center), team house, and South Campus Commons apartments (really nice), all for students and with the exception of Commons, all free for our use.

Second, some warnings:

1. The school is big. If you're someone who needs constant personal attention, don't come here- you won't get it. Saying that, I only had one big lecture class so far, but mostly because I entered in with a number of AP credits so I was able to skip many of the intro courses that traditionally have large numbers of students.2. Safety - We are not located in rural Wyoming and we are in between two major metropolitan centers. The biggest thing people have to get used to are that people aren't in their sheltered suburbs anymore and just have to talk basic precautions like not walking alone at night, etc. However, UM's police department is highly visible at night. The biggest thing is just to be aware and take basic precautions. Also, utilize the university's free shuttle services- they'll pick you up from anywhere on or around campus and drop you off right in front of your building.