The Kutztown University of Pennsylvania

Date: Jan 19 2006
Major: Undecided (This Major's Salary over time)
Kutztown University, like almost all the schools in the PA system of higher education, was originally a teachers college. If you would like to receive an education degree on the cheap this would be the school for you. The Art Department is slowly gaining more recognition due to successful alumni. If you’re not going to this school for education or art you will probably be dissatisfied with your academic program. Professors are a mixed bag. For the most part the ones I have had thus far have been very competent and helpful. If you are consistently putting forth your best effort they will bend over backwards to help you out. There are others who seem disgruntled and will treat you like a high school student. The University absolutely loves to market itself on diversity. I’m not exactly sure if they utilized affirmative action or not to synthetically create a diverse student body or not. The University’s diversity does not exactly mean all students of different ethnic and racial backgrounds get along smashingly and hold hands and sing songs about living together in peace and sunshine in a field of flowers. There seems to be a subconscious segregation amongst the student population - a sort of “black” Kutztown and a “white” Kutztown. The majority of students seem do not seem to be college material - the drop out rate for undergraduates is staggering. The upperclassmen tend to be slightly more motivated, but only after a great weeding out of those who didn’t cut it. There are a handful of students who are quiet brilliant and could probably be attending more prestigious institutions of higher education; unfortunately those students are very few and far between. Campus organizations are only as good as the students and faculty advisors who run them. The school has a very suitcase atmosphere - meaning the majority of students living on campus will go home on weekends because they don’t live very far away. There is very little or no campus social activities on weekends. The town only has a couple of bars, but that’s only significant if you’re over 21. The actual town of Kutztown is home to a mix of upperclassmen students, college staff, and a large senior citizen population. If you plan on living on-campus or in town and don’t have a car you will be very, very bored on weekends. For those living on-campus, unless you live in the Golden Bear apartments or townhouses, you will be frustrated with the living conditions. Many of the traditional dorm buildings are in great disrepair and are packed to the brim with freshman. There are students who live in what they call “reduced-rate triples” , which is a much kinder term for “a room meant to be a small double that has a third person crammed in”. It is also required of you if you live in a tradition residence hall that you purchase a meal plan, which you will quickly find out is practically highway robbery, in addition the quality of the food is appalling and will make you ill. The recreational facilities are either constantly crowded or constantly clothes, and keep bizarre hours. However they are building a new student rec-center that’s supposed to solve this problem. If you absolutely have to go to this school you will most likely have a better experience commuting from home or an apartment in a different town. However if you need to go to a state school for financial reasons and aren’t looking at a career in education or art I would recommend Penn State and the satellite campuses in a heartbeat over any of the schools part of the state system of higher education - they receive much better funding and they’re recognized on the national level.