The University of South Carolina - Columbia

Date: Jul 26 2007
Major: Finance (This Major's Salary over time)
I don't think I can fully express how bad my experience at USC has been. I am in the business school, which is overrated, very focused on teaching definitions, will not get you a decent job and has a beyond terrible administrative staff. First let me start off. I am no slacker. I am in the honors college here, have a SAT above 1400, a GPA of above 3.75. I came in with reasonable expectations. I knew this wasn't an Ivy or wasn't even a top public for that matter. However, every day I experience something that makes me wish I had gone somewhere else even more than I did the previous day. For example, I have a friend right now just trying to find out who his advisor is. He called the College of Arts and Sciences and they transferred him to 15 plus different people in the same little office, all of whom could not tell him who his advisor was. Maybe it was because they listed him as the wrong major after he had already told them what his correct major was many of times! They told him they would call him back, but never did. Trust me, the business school is this way or worse. They try to ride high on their International Business ranking but honestly it isn't worth a crap if you can't use it to get your students employed (which they can't). So many USC grads come out of school (like my cousin who graduated Magna Cum Laude with a Finance degree) with no job and no offers. Then they end up getting some half assed job or going back to school to avoid going into the real world. On a high note, the students are friendly. People in the south are generally nice and welcoming but also a bit more illogical and fuctional as well. Bottom Line: Don't come here unless you can't get in anywhere else. They have absolutely no clue (probably why their employed by a university and not out in the real world). The nicest building is the Wellness Center not an actual academic building. The professors teach straight from a book and are many times condescending and underqualified (most don't have any real world experience). The Business School and IB program is not top notch no matter what you hear.

Oh and one more thing. Darla Moore wants to donate tons of money and build two new buildings to promote her empire thinking that that is what the school needs. WRONG!!! New business buildings won't solve a damn thing. But then again, that is exactly what USC is great at and seems to look forward to.