The University of California - Santa Cruz

Date: Apr 05 2004
Major: Psychology (This Major's Salary over time)
I have been overwhelmed by the role that politics plays in this University. It is a part of every class I've had. One Spanish teacher would lead us in angry discussions against the government and tell us about rally's. When I spoke my differing or questioning opinions, she came back at me with condescention and did not even pretend to try and stop the rest of the class from virtually yelling at me too.

That illustrates the close-mindedness I've experienced here in the name of being open and accepting. It's quite disgusting.

This campus breeds isolation. It was built in the 60s at the heart of the protests at Berkeley. To make it more difficult for students to rise up and protest, the UC Santa Cruz campus was built with no central location. Therefore, there's a feeling (and I'm not the least bit alone in this) of isolation and lack of community. After 40 years, the school has finally built a miniscule common area outside the bookstore which can accomodate at most 200 of the schools 14,000 students.

Even with the benefit of friends, parties are often the activity of choice because it's difficult to get off campus- we are far removed from the city of Santa Cruz, up in the hills, and even in the town of Santa Cruz, there is very little to do other than go to the movies until one is old enough to go to the few bars in town.