Furman University

Date: Nov 21 2003
Major: Philosophy (This Major's Salary over time)
Furman University isn't really what it advertises. Yes, there is the whole engaged learning - sometimes - and a pretty campus. On the exterior at least.

The people are close minded. There are more people here so stuck on their religion, that they can't perceive any other religion. I had one person in my class ask why the Greeks were polytheistic, when Jesus was the only answer.

Also get used to seeing people with more money than they need, or deserve. Some of the dumbest people will buy the stupidest, most expensive things - because they can.

Furman advocates a dry campus, but doesn't particularly enforce it. You have to be dumber than dirt to get caught with alcohol (though people still do, amazingly enough), and almost everyone drinks it. In fact, many (read: most) fraternity parties consist of older guys getting drunk, and attempting to pick up freshman girls.

Furman doesn't like to give out scholarships. When they do, they try to give out as little as they can, and steal money from you any other way they can. You can purchase a certain number of meals / week on your palacard, and you have "points" that you can use to buy junk food. However what they don't tell you, is that you can only use one of your meals per dining hall set meal (IE you can't get your parents dinner on your card, they have to pay with cash), and if you don't use them, they are discarded at the end of the week. So if you don't use all of them, you are out money - and they specifically make it so that it's hard to use all of them.

Furman's city interaction is a plus - the Greenville community is welcome on Furman's campus. Greenville however, isn't the biggest town. There's a mall about 45 minutes away if that's what you're looking for, and a Walmart about 30 minutes away. If it's not at Walmart, you're probably not going to find it - but then again, not much isn't at a Walmart.

Going back to the populace - in general, they are morons. People throw opinions that they read somewhere around without even thinking about them. If the RIAA gives Furman a copyright violation notice, a person is blocked. This has been repeated numerous times, and yet people still wonder why they get blocked, and when they are informed again, they claim that they didn't know because it was running in the background. Some of the people here come from such lives of luxury that they're not used to things being difficult for them. Be prepared to tell your neighbor how to use a laundry machine.

A lot of the courses here are memorization and regurgitation. Some teachers on tenure don't deserve it at all, and some teachers here don't care about you. One example is an English teacher who repeatedly cancelled her class just because

it's college, and I can do that.

However, your papers were still due on time, with everything correct, and without her help or teaching. People say that the classes are hard - and some are. Deliberately. The teachers sometimes will go out of their way to make tests rediculous, so no one gets an A. One teacher even boasts that she's only given 6 A's in the 20 years she's taught.

Before you go here, I strongly recommend you do the spend-the-night program. You'll more than likely get one of the bubbly guides, who has nothing but great things to say. Ask to speak with someone who isn't so happy here, and listen to everything that the other has to say. Furman presents a VERY biased view to prospectives - all they want is your 30,000 dollars a year. Be wary before enrolling, unless you're an athelete. Atheletes, the teams here suck. They will always suck. But you'll still get full tuition, room, books, and board. Why? I don't know. They only give 4 Academic full rides, but among all the sports players, there has to be at least 100 free rides.