Christopher Newport University

First of all, I am not a current student at CNU. I transferred to a larger private university. I would discourage anyone from going to CNU. On the academic side, the professors are absolutely terrible at teaching, unavailable, unfriendly and quite frankly extremely entitled especially for professors at a school leagues away from that of an Ivy where I would expect those kinds of professors. Due to the budget cuts, many are overbooked and it does not provide an environment feasible to learning, vision of the students and general academic success. They are constantly cutting programs, including the Chinese program where the professor, who was excellent, offered to teach for free: exactly the kind of teacher that makes for an excellent school and successful students but CNU still got rid of the program. They also do an incredible amount of construction for no reason seeing as though the facilities are perfectly fine the way they are. Perhaps they ought to look into employing a new budget analyst and appropriating more funds to the educational aspects of the institution.On the social aspect, oh my I don't even know where to begin. You REALLY need to put in effort to have a social life here. Greek life doesn't help either as that will NOT, I repeat will NOT give you access to more friends, parties etc. To top it off, the students are just ugly....

3rd Year Female -- Class 2012

Perceived Campus Safety: A+, Education Quality: F

This school is absolutely the worst dumping school in VA. 4,700 students apply every year and there is a 60% acceptance rate. That means 2,820 students received acceptance letters and less than half decided to attend: MORE STUDENTS DECIDED NOT TO ATTEND THAN TO ATTEND ONCE ACCEPTANCE LETTERS WERE ISSUED.

Of the 1,300-1,400 freshman, only 13% graduate in 4 years: ONLY 169 STUDENTS OF ALL THOSE THOUSANDS FINISH IN 4 YEARS, OVER 1,100 DO NOT. THESE ARE FACTS.

This "GARDEN IN THE GHETTO" is surrounded by homeless shelters, soup kitchens, and widespread drug activity (check the Internet). ON AVERAGE 2 CRIMES PER DAY ARE COMMITTED AND INVESTIGATED ON CAMPUS ALONE (check the CNU Police log .pdf on the Internet). Statistically, that means you are almost 100% guaranteed of either being a victim of a crime (theft, most likely) or being charged with a crime/infraction (honor code violation being the most likely).

Go to the local post office (near Chick Fil-A) and you'll find homeless people sleeping in their 24 hour lobby in the middle of the night in winter. Better yet, go to get a coffee across the street and see where a guy was arrested for exposing himself (Police log). It's the same building that HAD TO BE EVACUATED OVER A POSSIBLE METH LAB IN THE CNU DORMS.

Try to read about this in the school paper? Guess again. The CNU ADMINISTRATION HAS BEEN HIDING ALL NEGATIVE PUBLICITY BY ORDERING STAFF MEMBERS TO STEAL NEWSPAPERS allegedly (google CNU newspaper theft and meth).

Try to read about this on the Internet? A SOPHISTICATED HACKING ATTACK WAS LAUNCHED AGAINST THE SCHOOL ON-LINE NEWSPAPER by "unknown" sources so it crashed (google CNU Captain's Log meth and attack).

Before you place your son or daughter in this school, walk around the ENTIRE perimeter of the campus at 2:00 AM - I dare you. Better yet, would you want your child to go to school for 4 years in a construction pit? Finally, add weekend commuting costs to your budget since 60% of all students commute home on the weekends from this glorified community college. That might just be a plus since only 169 will graduate in 4 years and of these, most won't have a job after graduating.

Now, finally, the quality of the professors here is bad - really bad. The Provost humiliated the school when he announced a hiring policy that would only begin recruiting professors from the top schools as listed in the US News and World Report: THAT MEANS THAT CNU HAS A STANDING POlICY OF "ABSOLUTELY NOT" HIRING A PROFESSOR WHO WOULD GRADUATE FROM A SCHOOL LIKE CNU" (google provost Padilla controversy hiring us news and world).

Almost every professor at CNU is a 2 or 3-time loser: THE PROfESSORS CAME FROM OTHER SCHOOLS AFTER THEY FAILED TO MAKE TENURE AT THEIR FIRST, SECOND, AND SOMETIMES THEIR THIRD AND FOURTH SCHOOLS (check each Professor's previous teaching records as assistant professors prior to working at CNU).

Now I'm sure that my comments will be criticized for even the slightest typo by some anal retentives (admin, faculty, those who "love" the university). And I'm sure that those same folks will criticize these facts by calling them "opinions" and saying that the 6-year grade rate is 38% HEY MOM AND DAD, SPEND ANOTHER $50K AND YOUR KID'S ODDS OF FAILING ARE STILL OVER 60% AFTER 6 YEARS! That is why I left Internet references that will help you decide on your own about what is really happening at this third-rate school.

P.S.: If you personally contact the US News and World Report (as I did), you will receive official confirmation that CNU is officially "unrated.". That means that the school does not meet the standards to be competitively rated and has received the equivalent of an "honorable mention."Being a Norfolk employed military "brat" with both parents on active deployment, I had no choice except to go here due to a host of family reasons. Honestly, it was a miserable experience at the "Garden in the Ghetto" in Newport News (ick).

Alumnus Male -- Class 2000