The Art Institute of Pittsburgh

Date: Nov 29 2008
Major: Business - Management and Administration (This Major's Salary over time)
I've been attending AIO for the past two years. I've had good experiences in the classroom, but the student advisors and financial aid officers are unhelpful and unreliable. It took almost one week for my student advisor to call me back after I left her a message on her voicemail. Within those two years I have been shuffled from advisor to advisor with no notice of the change. The financial aid department is the worst. I can't get in touch with someone when I need to and it seems like they want to sit on the paperwork rather than process it in a timely fashion. Last semester it took six weeks for my financial aid to be verified and distributed. It resulted in me being charged "finance charges" for having an outstanding balance on my account. The funny thing is that I called Student Support two weeks into the semester and they said that my financial aid was verified. Well if it was verified, why the hell did it take so long for it to disburse?! I called my financial aid advisor and he could not offer any other answer but "I have no idea, but I'll look into it". They also offer little help with school scholarships and grants. For maintaining a good GPA, you get $300.00 from the school. That doesn't even cover the online fees for a full time student! I was promised that I would recieve honor roll certificates in the mail and have yet to recieve one. The classes are mostly busy work and have little to do with the fundamentals. The positive reviewers will probably say that negative reviewers don't do the work or did poorly and are now taking it out on the school. Let's just clear something up. I maintain a 4.0 GPA and have recieved President's List Honor Roll for every semester in the past two years AND I STILL WON'T RECOMMEND THIS SCHOOL TO OTHERS!!! Save your time and money and find a school with a better reputation. I'm already too far into the session to cancel, but I plan on transfering to a school that employs people who actually know what they're doing.