The University of Memphis

The University of Memphis offers an average education at a good price that can definitely be used to get entry into the professional world. The careers department should be removed as they are utterly worthless, and the alumni association is extremely weak compared to other schools when it comes to assisting in networking. I have now got a good career and will be going to an Ivy business school, but I feel the University of Memphis provided little to this success. What it did provide was a cheap bachelors that allowed me to take on a good amount of debt for Business school.

Alumnus Male -- Class 2000

I have lived in Memphis my whole life and I started going to college a private school somewhere else. For reasons I don't want to talk about, I couldn't afford to keep going so I transferred to Memphis. I have to say that when I go for extra help, say in the Chemistry Learning Community, or professors during office hours, the University of Memphis is great. There are definitely interesting professors who care about you if you show you care. However, that said, I feel like my college life has been ruined going here and I write this because I'm hoping this doesn't scar me or others for life but it just makes me or you stronger later. The people who give you food (literally at every location) are cold, insincere, and make you feel like crap. The people who card you in at the fitness center are cold, insincere, and make you feel like crap. There are so, so, so many immature, obnoxious, and rude people that go here that you will go entire days with only interacting and or having to experience these types of people. I've met some really cool people here--really, really cool--ut they are diamonds in the rough or isolate themselves in fraternity circles (off campus). I went from optimistic to very dismal and depressed. Every morning I try to say it's going to be a good day, but by the time the day is over, so many people have stepped on me and treated me WRONG that I literally feel I'm in a living nightmare having to go here the next day. People horde around, stare, make excessive noise, and are incompetent of social decency. Nobody flushes toilets, there is never soap, every trash can has such a tight lid on it (circa 1990s) that you have to push it where the very trash touches (that's gross!), classrooms are locked so you have no quiet places to study, the dorms are terribly obnoxious to the point that you wonder if you're in college or with caffeinated, addied-out 14 year olds. Everyone tailgates, speeds, and you have to wait days to cross for traffic and the train. The University would like to say it hangs its hat on diversity...but the sad thing is that they just accept anybody and it honestly is a breeding ground for further division and segregation, far from a collective feeling where you can feel good for trying to be a better you or be good to other people. The library has ridiculously limiting hours. Every class I'm in people cheat, distract you from the professor, are immature (understatement), and are disrespectful (also understatement). I wish something could be done about this, but it probably won't so honestly, if you read this and you're choosing to come here, my advice is to live at home or off campus, or really go somewhere else. Then again, it could be a challenge that makes you stronger. But, it is a challenge that honestly should not be reality or a foundation of one's college experience.

3rd Year Male -- Class 2016

Surrounding City: A+, Individual Value: F