The University of Maryland - College Park

Date: Jan 04 2005
Major: Biology (This Major's Salary over time)
I went to the University Maryland because of the opportunity to participate in the honors program. The courses I took in the honors program basically taught me how to write well and gave me an opportunity to study several different topics (architecture, religion, astronomy/astrology, etc) as a reprieve from my major. Now that I am in medical school and I reflect back, I realize how well my science professors prepared me and how much I learned in my biology classes. Living in a large metropolitan area with accessibility to the Washington, D.C. metro system provided lots of entertainment. Both performance and non-performance art at Maryland were also always worthy venues and relatively inexpensive (if not free). While there were some muggings on campus, the large (VERY LARGE) majority of them occurred when people placed themselves in compromised situations like walking alone through a dark area on or outside campus while intoxicated at 2am. Unfortunately there is a lot of poverty in the D.C. suburbs near College Park and that generally inspires some matter of crime, although I almost always felt safe as long as I made smart decisions, like making use of the extensive campus shuttle system and the door-to-door NITERIDE program. I was also impressed by the increased campus police presence following the string of 4 robberies in my junior year.