The University of Texas - San Antonio

UTSA's social life is pretty non-existant. Out of the 30,000 students attending, I would say that about 99% are commuters.. Campus is dead at night. Nobody really stays around to make friends or hang-out. Most of the students just get out of class and hop in their cars to go to work or run home. Also, many of the groups and people seem pretty clique'ish.

Recreation/activities:

Well.. They have a rec center. I like it. Good weight facility, treadmills, and the basketball and raquetball courts are popular. It's pretty crowded, so I think an expansion is in order soon, but I was pretty impressed with that facility. Other than that… UTSA's activities are pretty limited. There are some intramurel sports, but, the quality and quantity of recreation and activities is very much on the level of a community college, if even that. Reminds me of high school. Definitely not university quality.

The campus:

The campus is pretty small, so walking from class to class or building to building isn't really a problem. But, they close the doors down through some main entry points at night, so if you happen to live in the dorms and need to get to the other main areas of campus to … say.. use a computer lab or go to the library, good luck! You'll have to drive yourself around or take an extended walk. This school is not very friendly to people living on campus.

Food:

The food here sucks. Again, the university caters to the commuter, so if you plan on staying past say, 6pm, and want to catch a bite, you better have a car so you can drive to the nearest restaurant. On campus food has weird hours and closes all the time. UTSA needs to dramatically improve the on-campus eating options.

Safety:

The campus is pretty safe. They have police phones everywhere, it seems to be well kept and mainted, and there are constant police patrols. Just don't speed or park in a wrong spot, b/c the police here like to give out tickets.

Study facilities:

Well.. there are some couches in the UC, there is the library (which for the first time ever will be open 24/7 as of fall 2004, finally), and… there are some tables and inside JPL lower levels. That's about it.

Staff:

The staff at UTSA are friendly and helpful. You can usually get someone on the phone ASAP to resolve some problem, and most of the time the lines are short at the offices if you need to get something done.

Technology:

UTSA's tech. sub-par, possibly mediocre. They don't have wireless access, which blows, and their online serviecs are pretty clunky. You need a billion passwords and usernames to manage all of your onlinea ccounts (Library, Web CT, ASAP, Lonestar), when it should all be consolidated into a USER FRIENDLY resource. UTSA needs to spend some big bucks to invest in it's IT infrastructure. They claim to have a great Information Systems department in their Business School, but they dont' seem to take care of their campus like a real university should. Again, UTSA's IT is what you would expect out of a community college.

On a plus note, their computer labs are pretty good. Fast printing, good Dell workstations, good operating hours. I think they need more labs, and it would help if they implemented roaming profiles so you could save stuff to your desktop and have it appear on any computer you use.

Conclusion:

UTSA is VERY MUCH a COMMUTER campus. It does not cater to the traditional college student at all, and seems to be geared toward those working professionals seeking a degree on the side of their normal lives. If you are a student looking for a top-notch education and college experience, look elsewhere (i reccomend ut austin, a&m, texas tech, texas state, or the university of houston - UTD or UTArlington). I can't speak for everyone when I say this, because after all, a degree IS only a piece of paper, but I don't expect a degree from UTSA to be worth much outside of central Texas. I'm transferring out ASAP!

As one student put it,

UTSA has about as much social interaction as The University of Phoenix - Online.

To UTSA's credit, they are expanding and improving (new bio sciences and engineering facility, new on campus dorms for Fall 2004), but I would say they are 15 to 20 years behind the quality (research, education, funding, admissions standards) of UT-Dallas AND UT-Arlington. UTSA is just a big community college trying to be a big university.

Look elsewhere (unless you have to go there - then just use it as a stepping stone to a better school). Don't let a crappy school ruin your career!