Link me! Link to page from your webpage or MySpace account: Just copy and paste! <a href='http://www.studentsreview.com/FL/FSU_g.html'> Florida State University </a>

Forward me!

I liked graduate school because it teaches you to learn and think differently. The approach to learning is more round table than lecture. I felt equal to my professors for the first time, but my department was over ambitious and I could not agree with my thesis adviser on anything. I wanted to get things done quick and the department worked much slower than that. In my opinion, they had too many grad students in the dept. TA and RA spots were competitive and given to favorites. There was lots of gossip and lots of worthless work being done. There were no funding opportunities. I did not like Tallahassee either. Its good for partying, but for anything else its just a north Florida hick town. My house got broken into 3 times. Other students say that happens regularly. I was miserable in the town, so I did well in my work. The administration is strange, its like the system is set up to not work well at all, but the people within the system can be helpful. Also, too much emphasis on football and trying to be the best by constantly expanding (like the new medical school). The school is trying to compete at some high level and it is just not sustainable. A lot of smaller programs and students are falling through the cracks. Feb 14 2008 Geography and Geosciences

I just did my Masters at Florida State Criminal Justice Dep. I learned a lot about research and general theory. To get experience you have to go into the working enviroment and apply these skills. A lot of the professors are nice and really smart. They sometimes come off as arrogant, but you have to put that aside and try to learn as much as you can from them Aug 02 2007 Criminal

I have loved everything about my experience with FSU so far (just within the College of Information) EXCEPT the Financial Aid department. They are TERRIBLE!! If you email them, it takes at least three weeks to get a reply. If you call them, you will be on hold for at least an hour (that's when I hung up). By the time you receive a reply to your email, the answer to the question is no longer needed and the answer they give is vague and unhelpful. To get your refund, you are required to either open an account through SunTrust or get it mailed to you, taking almost a week to get it (and I'm not even out of state!). So even though you are paying interest on that money from the minute they disburse it, if you get it mailed, you won't have that money for a week. Every other school I have attended has allowed me to direct deposit my refund into my OWN checking account. I do not WANT to open a SunTrust debit card through FSU because I don't even live in Tallahassee!!! (I'm a distance learning student). I am SO sick and tired of this that I have seriously thought about transferring to a more organized school - but I love my program and the professors. Jan 18 2007 School of Information

Most of the doctoral faculty is approachable and willing to involve you in research projects. You can always find research to work on. Most of the faculty encourage a nuturing environment and are invested in your success. If you complete the program, you WILL be very competitive on the market AND you will be prepared to be successful in your field. There are some political factions in the faculty. With some savvy, you can navigate around most of the minefields without getting blown up. The best approach is not to get involved in the politics (it will put you in a lose/lose situation). Ultimately, however, your selection of a dissertation chair will cast you (unwilling or not) into one of the "sides" of the political factions. Again, this is probably true at most similar institutions. Most of the students are collegial, but a handful are arrogant and competitive (probably true everywhere). In some cases students will try to use the existing political factions to their advantage and to the competitive disadvantage of other students. As long as you are aware of this, you can survive. At some point, you'll have to make a decision to fly under the radar or choose a political path .... choose wisely. Remember, aside from your department chair and dissertation chair ... trust no-one. Surprisingly, for a flagship university in a well funded state, the doctoral programs are grossly underfunded. The stipends available for the doctoral students are ridiculously low meaning that you will have to go into major student loan debt unless you or a benefactor have a deep stash of cash to get you through. Sometimes you can teach extra classes for extra cash, but the end result is that you lose valuable research time. Many little tangential issues can tend to drive you nuts. Parking is attrocious. The campus has three parking garages, all of them too small and most are occupied full time by kids living on campus or in dorms. The parking police are diligent and the surrounding neighborhoods are shady. Parking for College of Business is insulting. You might find a space if you arrive at the crack of dawn. Most likely, you will have to pay for it (in addition to campus parking fees) or park in a shady (dangerous) area. They sold half of the business school parking to the local Catholic church (who now charges ridiculous prices to park) and decided to build a luxury apartment complex for students over the remaining biz school parking lots. The result is that there is literally no parking unless you want to arrive an hour early to campus and park at the football stadium (where you get to either ride a bus, or walk a mile to class). That brings me to my next point .... all of the administrative buildings that you have to frequent are built around the football stadium. That means for every little thing you have to do with financial aid, test scanning, registrar, bursar, parking, forms, etc. all occur at the complete opposite side of campus. These two inconveniences seem minor at first, but they slowly eat away tons of your valuable time. My final complaint is with regard to the undergrads. If you need to relive your partying undergrad days, you will love them. This bunch parties morning, noon and night on every day of the week. However, as students of classes that you will teach, they are a royal headache. They hate coming to class, hate doing any assignments, they hate studying and they hate working. They will NOT come prepared for class. They will spend enormous amounts of effort to try and cheat rather than just do the work. They will try to negotiate for grades rather than earn them. They will beg for extra credit and curves. They will beg for the answers to every test before the test. They expect you to be available to them at all hours of the day, every day. They believe that you do nothing but teach their specific class. They demand that you serve them NOW. They are lazy. They are disrespectful. They will roll their eyes at you and bring newspapers, IPods, mp3 players, cell phones and food to your class. They wonder why there degrees are worth little but don't want to work for anything. Maybe this is a generational thing. Maybe this is life at a party school. Maybe this is the college scene at a public university. I just don't know. I do know that I would never work here as a Professor because of the quality of the undergrad student. Jan 31 2006 Business - Management and Administration

Most of the doctoral faculty is approachable and willing to involve you in research projects. You can always find research to work on. Most of the faculty encourage a nuturing environment and are invested in your success. If you complete the program, you WILL be very competitive on the market AND you will be prepared to be successful in your field. There are some political factions in the faculty. With some savvy, you can navigate around most of the minefields without getting blown up. The best approach is not to get involved in the politics (it will put you in a lose/lose situation). Ultimately, however, your selection of a dissertation chair will cast you (unwilling or not) into one of the "sides" of the political factions. Again, this is probably true at most similar institutions. Most of the students are collegial, but a handful are arrogant and competitive (probably true everywhere). In some cases students will try to use the existing political factions to their advantage and to the competitive disadvantage of other students. As long as you are aware of this, you can survive. At some point, you'll have to make a decision to fly under the radar or choose a political path .... choose wisely. Remember, aside from your department chair and dissertation chair ... trust no-one. Surprisingly, for a flagship university in a well funded state, the doctoral programs are grossly underfunded. The stipends available for the doctoral students are ridiculously low meaning that you will have to go into major student loan debt unless you or a benefactor have a deep stash of cash to get you through. Sometimes you can teach extra classes for extra cash, but the end result is that you lose valuable research time. Many little tangential issues can tend to drive you nuts. Parking is attrocious. The campus has three parking garages, all of them too small and most are occupied full time by kids living on campus or in dorms. The parking police are diligent and the surrounding neighborhoods are shady. Parking for College of Business is insulting. You might find a space if you arrive at the crack of dawn. Most likely, you will have to pay for it (in addition to campus parking fees) or park in a shady (dangerous) area. They sold half of the business school parking to the local Catholic church (who now charges ridiculous prices to park) and decided to build a luxury apartment complex for students over the remaining biz school parking lots. The result is that there is literally no parking unless you want to arrive an hour early to campus and park at the football stadium (where you get to either ride a bus, or walk a mile to class). That brings me to my next point .... all of the administrative buildings that you have to frequent are built around the football stadium. That means for every little thing you have to do with financial aid, test scanning, registrar, bursar, parking, forms, etc. all occur at the complete opposite side of campus. These two inconveniences seem minor at first, but they slowly eat away tons of your valuable time. My final complaint is with regard to the undergrads. If you need to relive your partying undergrad days, you will love them. This bunch parties morning, noon and night on every day of the week. However, as students of classes that you will teach, they are a royal headache. They hate coming to class, hate doing any assignments, they hate studying and they hate working. They will NOT come prepared for class. They will spend enormous amounts of effort to try and cheat rather than just do the work. They will try to negotiate for grades rather than earn them. They will beg for extra credit and curves. They will beg for the answers to every test before the test. They expect you to be available to them at all hours of the day, every day. They believe that you do nothing but teach their specific class. They demand that you serve them NOW. They are lazy. They are disrespectful. They will roll their eyes at you and bring newspapers, IPods, mp3 players, cell phones and food to your class. They wonder why there degrees are worth little but don't want to work for anything. Maybe this is a generational thing. Maybe this is life at a party school. Maybe this is the college scene at a public university. I just don't know. I do know that I would never work here as a Professor because of the quality of the undergrad student. Jan 31 2006 Business - Management and Administration

Fear and Loathing in Tallahassee: +Beautiful girls add to the campus aesthetic, and a lively place to spend divorced mom/dad's money on fraternity/sorority nonsense which dominates some areas. If you've got J-Lo shades and you look like Paris Hilton on crack, then hit the scene, it's all YOU...tanorexic middle-class mediocrity! If you actually study and go to the library, you will find like-minded individuals there, and you will be rewarded with good grades and letters of recommendation. Beware of criminal justice majors who want to play amateur psychologist with YOU! Beware of glory-seeking professors who will sell YOU out! Be true to yourself and have the last laugh! Remember: this is still a backwards-ass racist redneck town filled with sleazy legislators and self-aggrandizing presidential goons. Despite its faults, I love it here; and the gym is ridonculous! May 25 2005 Communications

I worked and studied very hard to become a student in a graduate program. And time and time again, I have been forced to take "Linked" courses (i.e., courses where undergraduates also are in the course). I like undergraduates. I teach them. I hope to teach them for the rest of my professional career. However, I DO NOT WANT TO TAKE GRADUATE COURSES WITH THEM!!!! I studied and worked and sacrificed to become a graduate student, and an alarming number of my "graduate" courses have to dumb down in order to accomodate the 19 year old students in them. Why in the hell did I do all this work if I'm still taking courses that basically cater to undergraduate sensibilities??????? Why did I work so hard and sacrifice so much, just to take courses in which we all have to cater to the (perfectly understandable but they have no place in a graduate course) childish and immature rantings of 19 year olds????? Aug 25 2004 English The other as contagion

Great program! May 22 2003 Physics

The school overall-I would leave, but the people and nitelife are great, there is generally something to do at all times, and to top it off we keep A to Z Home Delivery on speed dial where we can have everything from our beer to groceries delivered--that is SOOOOOO worth it when we are in study group. The pizza's here are okay- to be expected, and they are constantly adding more clubs-- So overall it is worth it-- Dec 07 2002 Business - Management and Administration

The university is ... Sep 24 2001 Computer Science

 

If you wish to further your education, consider one of the many options available through online degrees. Browse a wide range of online college and university programs and find the perfect degree for you.