New York University

First off, I go to the engineering school. Currently it goes by the name of Tandon, but given how ridiculous the school is, it will probably change its name by the time that you read this. In the last 3 years, it changed its name 4 times from Polytechnic Institute to Polytech to NYU Polytechnic to Tandon.

My main hatred for this school lies in 3 things: the major, the student conduct office, and the tuition. I do have some positive things, which I will mention, but they will be some few. I do have a lot of negative things to say about this school, so please take some time to read them and buckle up for the TRUTH!

First my major isn't even called biology. It's called biomolecular science which is just a fancy B-llS%$@ NYU name to look smarter when the programs are bad....

The professors in the BMS department or CBE department truly do not care if you succeed or not. They don't care about teaching or if you're learning. All they care about is their own research and themselves. Send them an email for help on an assignment or ask them a clarifying question, no response.

Want to volunteer or sell your soul to slave away in their research lab, response within minutes. All the professors really talk about are themselves, their research, and where THEY want to go. Not where YOU the student want to go.

The lessons are poorly planned and disorganized. There are rampant cheating going on and self studying because truly no one knows anything or what the professor is getting at. 9/10 times the professor knows the class is cheating and simply does not care.

The BMS department is utter trash. The professors don't do any of the grading, so they literally hire student TAs to grade the exams and lab reports.... more often, your TA may be your age or younger than you.....

that's right, they hire inexperienced and petty teenagers to be in charge of your grades and your future. I am not lying. I have class where the TA is a sophomore in undergrad and there were students in my class who were MASTERS! wtf is wrong the professors.

Also the TAs can even assist in academic dishonesty if you are besties with them. they will help you out in grading when you don't deserve your grades.... Also its a clique system where friends nominate close friends to become an abusive and stupid TA with them.

My other concern about this school is the Student Conduct Office at Main campus. It's run by a bunch of turds who are aware of the shit that goes on in both the Brooklyn and Manhattan campuses. They know students who deal, who do drugs, who drink, who even rape.... Yet they try their best to cover up each scandal to protect themselves and to protect the "reputation" of the school. This can be seen when a school offices asks for evidence of an "alleged" crime, and then suddenly the evidence disappears!!!!! Or the school refuses to give you back the evidence. Or even "forgetting" to turn in the evidence to the police. SUCH BS. This school is whack AF.

There is also the high price of tuition for this crappy education and for the terrible administration. Anyways, the only good thing about this school is the vast resources in doing research, the city is New York, and so much to do in the school and nearby. However, the school would only promote student clubs and fairs to freshman only. Then when they turn older, they stop caring for the freshmen now that they are locked into this school. It's a stupid cycle.

4th Year Male -- Class 2019

Surrounding City: A, Education Quality: F

Make sure that you realize what you're getting into: NYU doesn't have a real campus, it is so large as to be, at times, totally impersonal, and students are extremely competitive. If you're ready to feel like a young professional living in New York, this is the school for you--most people balance school, work, internships, etc. If you're not ready to be a full on adult (and not in the "Friends" way, either), go elsewhere.

Social Life
Freshman year is the only time when there are actual parties in dorms on any sort of a regular basis--then, everyone on your floor knows each other, so weekend parties can be wild. After that, floor-based socializing is nonexistant. Everyone then goes out to bars or clubs, so you'll need a fake ID and lots of cash to so anything social on a regular basis. If you're willing to risk getting caught/spending $10 on a drink three nights a week, it can be really fun and rewarding. Frats are nonexistant, as are sports; no one cares about them and almost no one plays them (our mascot is the Violets!). The club scene is relatively active, but many are extremely competitive--ie college democrats want to be political interns, and the debate club is future lawyers who would slit each others' throats to get into Harvard Law.

Academics aren't anything special. Under no circumstances should anyone apply to the College of Arts and Sciences here, it is a hellhole. I promise. You will get a much better education elsewhere since NYU does NOT care about the CAS students. At all. (+there is red tape everywhere, impossible to get into good classes, etc).

Going to NYU, in the end, is forsaking college as a distinct experience. If you want to feel like you live in the city and take classes somewhere, than NYU is right for you. If you're ready to start working on your career, if you want a killer internship, if you're extremely independent, and if you hate nature, then NYU is for you. If you want even the slightest feeling of being young and carefree--essentially, being a college student--go somewhere else, even somewhere else in the city. If you aren't ready to be thrust into adulthood, to feel guilty for not juggling 15 things at once, or to spend hundreds of dollars a weekend having the same amount of fun you could have anywhere else, pick somewhere else to go to school.

3rd Year Female -- Class 2010

NYU was a colossal waste of my time and money. I picked it because the director of scholarship programs told be my scholarship included a couple of trips to Europe during school breaks. I got there to learn that it was actually a different scholarship program that took those trips, not mine. They did let me go on the second of the two trips, but I felt like an idiot, because the people in charge of the group knew I had just gotten to go along because of some administrator's mistake. While my own scholarship did cover about half the tuition when I started, I am still $80k in debt. They did not increase my financial aid by one penny when my parents lost all ability to contribute money toward my education (and my FAFSA form verified that they were unable to contribute.) I was a junior with excellent grades, writing awards, and no financial support, but NYU did not care.

I had virtually no guidance when it came to picking classes and majors. I did not know which departments were excellent, and which ones were disorganized messes. I picked English, and it turned out that the English Department was a disorganized mess. I did not learn anything in any of my English classes. I read, and I learned a bit through that, but the lectures and assignments were pointless. They rarely challenged me or made me think.

The grade inflation was out of control. I got A-'s when I wrote my papers hours before they were due and failed to proofread them. I got A's when I proofread. I love a challenge. I like to work hard, especially on my writing, and I like my hard work to be rewarded. But there was no reward for a really good paper in the English department. There were A's ... but they were, ironically, cheap.

The lack of social life I found at NYU was thoroughly depressing. I am a quiet person, but also a smart, kind, and creative one. Everywhere I have lived, worked, or studied, with the exception of NYU, I have found plenty of friends. I met plenty of people I liked at NYU, but did not make the cut for any of the cliques that I wanted to join, which I blame on the fact that I was a few years older than most of my peers, and ended up with very, very few NYU friends.

The facilities were awful, especially the library. It was the singular in its poor construction--it's loud, heavy furniture and doors, it's carpet-less, echoing prison-like walls and floors, it's lack of any of the books I needed, it's loud, cell-phone-talking, crunchy-snack-eating students, and it's terrible lack of seating. The dorms were dingy and tiny with paper-thin walls, and the form to find a compatible roommate was optional and hard to find on the housing website.

Nothing, however, tops the rudeness of the administrators, their unwillingness to discuss student problems in a direct manner, and their viciously defensive attitudes. The worst interaction I had with one of their hired idiots came at the end of my junior year when I found an internship through their website that turned out to be a complete violation of labor laws. The employer was depending on my, profiting from my long days sweating over her phones and files, not paying me, and not allowing me to take lunch breaks. Now, federal minimum wage laws (including FSLA) do not allow for-profit companies to depend on or profit from unpaid interns, and obviously being denied a lunch break is not allowed. So after I quit, I thought, "Gee, why don't I let NYU know that this person who is adverting through their career center is breaking labor laws with her interns?" The first person I spoke with chastised me for "unprofessional behavior" because I had quit. When I told her about FSLA she laughed and said, "Well, that's a federal law, not our law." When I went to higher-level career center administrators, they dodged all my questions, defended the first person I had talked to, and told me not too politely that they were not legally responsible for the content on their career center website. When I brought the issue to the attention of the deans of my college, all they did was reiterate the fact that the university's policy of posting known FLSA violators on their website had been vetted by their legal committee. A month or two later they came out with this statement saying that backing out on a position obtained through the career center would be grounds for loss of all career center services.I could go on all day with these stories. I did have a couple of classes I liked, but that was it. Now I just cringe when I see those ugly purple flags flapping all over the city. Goddamn NYU, go on cheating unsuspecting young people out of vast amounts of money and out of their chance for a real college education if you must--why didn't I go to University of Michigan??--but don't flaunt your stupid purple victory flags in the face of every poor sap of a graduate who still lives in the city. Let me quietly hand over most of each pay check to Sallie Mae and forget you.

4th Year Female -- Class 2007

Surrounding City: A-, Education Quality: F