Keene State College

Date: Apr 12 2009
Major: Other (This Major's Salary over time)
While this is a negative (and I mean NEGATIVE) review of the school, lets start with the positive aspects of Keene State College. First of all, the campus is downright beautiful. All year long it looks amazing and the administration does a great job of keeping the courts clean and welcoming.

The faculty here is, for the most part, awesome. Sure, there are a few condescending and downright bad professors, but most of these people really care about the students that have come ready to class and willing to learn. I myself am a film production major and all the professors in the program I've studied under are very knowledgeable in the field and helpful. Unfortunately the school provides little in the way of equipment to the students, expect to spend a lot of money out of your own pocket if film is your thing.

Now the negative aspects, and boy are there a lot of them. In fact, the word "negative" perfectly describes the atmosphere of the student body at Keene. This place is worse than my high school, what with all the drama, fighting and general cliquey bullshit. Lets put it this way, if you're not big on drinking and partying you're going to have a hell of a time trying to find any friends or fitting in. The entire student culture here is based around Keystone and snorting coke and it's really pathetic. There is a lot of rumor spreading and bile being spewed at every given opportunity. Don't expect to hold an intelligent, hell scratch that, don't expect to hold a conversation with anybody here period. The only thing anybody is interested in is the weekend and who's going to throw the biggest banger. My first year here I made some great friends in my roommates and a few other people, but low and behold they've transferred out of here because of the reasons above.

This all carries over into the classroom as well, if you're unfortunate enough to attend. Expect many a bubble-headed idiot to interrupt the professors to make some bland, ignorant personal statement that doesn't pertain to the subject matter at all and for all the guys in the class to jerk off the whole time laughing like hyenas. Nobody is interested in an education here and the few people of intelligence don't feel like putting forth their own thoughts because they won't be appreciated by anybody besides the professor and a handful of their peers. Being a smart person at Keene is seen by other students as a handicap.

As for the film students, they fall into two categories. The first category being people who put forth genuine effort and who show great promise and creativity in their work. These students are generally modest and easy to relate to; if you're lucky enough these will be your friends and you might have a chance of making it through four years of this hell with them at your side. Unfortunately they are vastly outnumbered by the other category of film student here: the pretentious fuck. These are people who have nothing to say and nothing to contribute and only majored in film for the image. Most of these kids come from Connecticut and are coasting by on their parents wallet, you can tell because they have top of the line equipment they don't even utilize it in their work. It's shameful. You can practically see the frustration of the professors teaching these dolts.

Then there are the dorms. In the two years I've attended Keene State College, I've lived in both Randall and one of the Owls Nest buildings. I've also spent considerable time in Monadnock and Carle. To put it lightly, all of these places are falling apart. If you're unlucky enough to be assigned to live in Randall expect to be forced into living with two or three other people in a room designed for two total. I was fortunate enough to have some great roommates my first year, so Randall's deficiencies sort of fell by the wayside to me at the time. The Owls Nest buildings are awful, however. They have no insulation so you'll be freezing all through Winter and the rooms are generally in terrible condition. These were originally constructed as temporary housing buildings back in the 70s to be replaced, but Keene State, being the cost-cutting kings they are, opted to just leave them as is. It's a miserable living environment.

In summation, I honestly can't recommend anybody attend this school. It's no fault of the administration (well, it's partially their fault since they let these people in to begin with), it's just the school attracts the most awful, negative, ignorant and isolated people in the whole of New England. I'm transferring out of here as soon as possible, I suggest to any incoming students to do the same. Ignore the fact that Keene was listed in the Princeton Review of 2006 (that's what suckered me in during my last year of high school), you're just not going to have a good time or learn anything here. Run, run away as fast as you can.