The University of Texas - San Antonio

Date: Feb 20 2005
Major: Business - Management and Administration (This Major's Salary over time)
UTSA is a school with a great faculty and potential that will someday become an outstanding school. Unfortunately, I don't believe it will be great anytime while I'm here. Let me start by listing the pros.

The faculty here is outstanding, they really do care about their subjects and are very accessible (one professor I have gives out his home phone number in case you have questions). It is very easy to get ahead here if you try. They have a very generous CLEP and transfer policy which makes it practical to graduate in 3 years. The tuition is also very affordable. On campus housing is very good, almost all dorms let students have their own room, but housing is very limited.

However, there are many downsides to UTSA that quickly become apparent. First, this is a COMMUTER school and the students have NO spirit. The parking situation is abysmal due to all the commuters. The average age of students is 23-29 (according to UTSA itself), and many of these students aren't the brightest. This also produces a situation where most students work full time, are married, and even have families which is very un-conducive for a college environment. Coming in is an 18 year old like myself, you can't really associate with these people.

Diversity here is horrible, 95.3% of the students are from Texas (UTSA stats). Over half of the students are from Bexar County. Thus high school clicks carryover and it is VERY hard to make new friends. Everybody here thinks they are THE and have little perspective outside of San Antonio. Very few students have much ambition beyond making next months rent and getting drunk. A lot of students are very low brow and unintelligent, causing a major problem with theft and vandalism.

UTSA accepts anybody who applies, which has really dragged down its reputation. As a business major, I find that very few companies outside of San Antonio show any interest in hiring UTSA graduates.

UTSA is OK, but if you’re looking for the “college experience” and some intellectual stimulation this is not the place. I have made a few good friends here, but I do have to think about my future and that’s why I am transferring to UT-Austin next semester. Someday UTSA will be great, but for the interim I would avoid this school.