The University of Utah

Date: May 02 2002
Major: Anthropology (This Major's Salary over time)
As many have noted, Salt Lake City is a sort of insulated, Mormon city. To that end, most of the student body at Utah are overly religious types who object to any sort of intellectual challenge. In many a history or anthropology class, I witnessed students get up and leave the classroom when they found something objectionable. As others have said, pockets of (for lack of a better term) liberalism do exist, but they must be sought out. In my time at Utah, I was greek and found a good deal of kinship in that community. In addition, many of the students work or have served Mormon missions for two years; as such, the student body is older than would be typically found similar institutions.

The faculty at Utah have, in large part, arrived from somewhere else and have no family ties to Salt Lake City. As such, faculty is generally approachable and will go out of their way to help a student who is different from the norm with a genuine desire to learn. For example, I had some professors volunteer (without my asking) to write letters of recommendation for me when they heard that I was applying to grad school.

Most of the city shuts down around ten. Bars are open weekends to around one A.M. Regardless of what many of the natives claim, the nightlife around Salt Lake City is pretty dull. Most small college towns have much more going on in a typical weekend than does Salt Lake City. Still, the skiing is good and there isn't too much opportunity to get into trouble in SLC.

In short, if you are looking for the typical college experience, look elsewhere. On the other hand, the cost/value ratio of academic instruction runs high; just don't plan to have too much fun in the process.