Ithaca College

Date: Mar 20 2006
Major: Undecided (This Major's Salary over time)
To be happy at Ithaca, you really need to find your niche. When I first came here, I felt alone and bored, but once I found particular clubs that I enjoyed, I began making friends, and since then, I haven't really been bored. It's also important to find a place to live that meets your desires. If you don't like to walk a lot and you don't like a ton of parties every night, live in the quads. If you don't mind 7-minute walks to every building on campus and you love (almost) nightly parties, live in the terraces. The off-campus apartments and Emerson dorms are rather nice as well if you can pony up the dough.

In terms of education, as an exploratory student, I've gotten a pretty decent look at most of the departments. The arts are very well-funded and not easy to get into from what I understand. If you're good enough and are willing to work hard, you will get out what you put in. Computer science is another great department. All of the professors that I have had for computer science know what they're talking about and are very friendly and helpful. In terms of english and languages and mathematics, it's all pretty much what you'd expect. Nothing too fancy. However, all of the professors are very helpful. They give you their e-mails, phone numbers, sometimes their AIM screen names, and their office hours if you ever need help. On the whole, Ithaca's academics are impressive and pretty high quality.

Now for the not-so-impressive facet of Ithaca… The cost. At first, the rather high expense seems intimidating, but I can assure you that it's much worse than that. Ithaca has a really bad habit of nickel-and-dime-ing you to death. You have to pay for cable and internet access, parking permits cost you an arm and a leg, they hand out parking tickets like candy, and the expense just keeps going and going. Then they have the nerve to ask for donations from their alumni. They seriously need to think things through a little better.

In conclusion, Ithaca is a fine institution with something for just about anybody… as long as you are willing to foot the bill.