Carnegie Mellon University

Date: Dec 12 2001
Major: Architecture (This Major's Salary over time)
I came to CMU totally unprepared. I did minimal research when I was choosing a college, and did most of my application on the day it had to be postmarked. I knew nothing about my major, and little about the school. I started to be a little worried when I got here, and when people heard that I was an architecture major, they told me the horror stories about their archie friends who spent ridiculus amounts of time in the studio. Also, at the first meeting of the freshman architecture class, they told us that CMU was currently the #2 architecture school in the country. At a school where students are known for working all the time, architecture students are generally acknowledged to be some of the busiest, hardest workers on campus.

The program is great, the teachers really care, and the students are amazingly talented and versitile. However this is not a program for the unsure. You won't pick an elective until your 4th semester, and you won't have time to explore any other options. You will wonder if you are devoting your life to this because you want to or because you will not do well if you don't give all of you self. If you do have a few free moments, you won't feel like rethinking any major life decisions, or for that matter, like thinking at all. This is not a school for the lazy, or for procrastinaters. This is not a school for people who need sleep… EVER. This is, however, an amazing place to be and learn and experience life. You will work, and you will bleed. If you don't succeed it will be your own fault. While you are expected to succeed, the faculty will do whatever has to be done to make you able to do what you need to do.

Architecture is like no other major or proffesion, and CMU is like no other place.