The University of Southern California

Date: Feb 27 2010
Major: Perfomance Arts (This Major's Salary over time)
I intended on writing a review that was not bashing the school; I don't think it deserves to be bashed. Then I started the grading portion of this review and I realized I could not give many criteria anything higher than a C. USC is great for a certain type of person, and I am not that type of person. The professors are hit and miss. I had some great professors, and I had some professors who had no idea what they were doing. I only stayed at USC for one year, so maybe they get better as time goes on, but in the theater department especially the teachers are more miss than hit. I've had one professor who was great, the rest were terrible. For the most part, it seems like at least freshman year theater is a huge waste of time. Also, the kids in the theater department already think they've struck it big. Actually. It seems like most of the people at this school already think they have struck it big. USC classes were like high school to me, except they came with a 50 grand a year price tag. The staff is completely incompetent. When I first arrived to my dorm, the blinds were broke so my roommate and I had to change in the bathroom for the first month. We placed a work order the day we moved in, but they weren't fixed for a month. When they finally came to fix them, they just barged in without even knocking on the door. My dorm didn't have air conditioning (but it did have heating, in LA, go figure), and the fan I bought did absolutely nothing, so after waking up drenched in sweat for a month and a half I decided to move to suck up the extra grand (or something like that) a semester and move to a dorm with air conditioning. I moved to Arts and Humanities which is suite style living (4 dorms with 2 people in each sharing 2 bathrooms). When I moved in I found out that the AC was broken in my dorm. My suitemates had put in multiple work orders and we didn't get it fixed until November. And my room was still broken. I also didn't get service in my dorm and had to go outside every time I wanted to make a phone call. You also had to swipe your ID to get in the building, but my ID didn't work, so I had to wait for someone to come and let me in every time. A few times I had to call DPS and they would let me in like an hour and a half later. I made a few friends while I was there, but I ran into the same issues with every person I met, they did not care about anyone but themselves. I guess it was how they were raised, I don't know. But all the time it had to be about them. I once got in a fight with someone who had borrowed money from me and I had gone to his dorm on the other side of campus to get paid back and they weren't there and then when I asked him to bring it to me he refused to be bothered by me and was appalled that I had the audacity to suggest that after he was doing me such a huge favor by giving me my money back. And this was one of the kinder people I met there. If you're a guy, rush. There is no way you will get into a party otherwise. If you're a girl, do NOT go to frat parties unless you want your drink spiked. But if you are a girl, there is plenty of free drugs and alcohol at your finger tips. They always talk about the Trojan Family, but I did not understand the term until I got there. It isn't the USC Family, it's the TROJAN Family. If you do not love football, do NOT go to USC. I would tell people I went to USC but when they found out they knew more about the football team than I did, I was a loser. There were so many people at USC all the time, I often wondered where they came from. Most of them didn't even go to or work at the school. It was the worst on game day. Random ass people would be drunk and screaming at 8 in the morning. No, they weren't students. The surrounding area is awful, you have to take a bus to get anywhere fun which would be fine except I wouldn't trust the bus system after dark. Sketchy. The campus is beautiful, but that is where a lot of the money goes, and it's always under construction. Oh! I almost forgot, I originally was awarded Cal-grant which was the only way I could afford USC. It was taken away in June because of budget cuts and USC had promised before that to pick up the slack if that happened. But no go. Also, when I left they billed me for the next semester. It took forever for them to fix it and they just sent me around from department to department, no one knew what they were doing. I didn't have too much trouble with grades, but most of the people I know there are on academic probation.

So. Yeah. If you're into the whole fraternity/sorority, football/cheerleading, Daddy and Mummy vacation in the Hamptons thing USC can be a lot of fun. If not, stay away.