The University of North Carolina - Asheville

Date: Nov 27 2009
Major: Art & Design Department (This Major's Salary over time)
This University is amazing! I used this site extensively last year during my college search and ended up here; I can easily say that I don't think I could be happier with my choice. Asheville fosters a fantastic environment. The school is up-and-coming as a high-quality, great-value public liberal arts school. I've only taken one semester of work, but I've had a great experience so far. The professors are extremely friendly and approachable. I'm going to be doing an arts and community research project next semester through the honors program, and the head of the program has been EXTREMELY helpful so far with that. When I expressed interest in doing the project, he immediately picked up the phone, called another faculty who was an expert in the field, and asked if he'd be willing to mentor me. Then he said I'd probably be able to get an internship in town, and I'm a first semester freshman. I think this little anecdote attests to the quality and concern of the faculty for the students. All around it's been great. My psych class is sort of boring, stats at 8am is a pain in the ass, but my English teacher is inspired, and my liberal studies teacher is experienced and engaging. The work's tough but not overbearing.

Now downtown Asheville is absolutely the greatest fucking place. The atmosphere of the school and the town are similar and they're definitely conducive to a certain kind of person. It's a very artsy, offbeat, bohemian feeling. Lots of cafes, book stores, some boutiques, some hippy music/clothes stores, lotta little music venues and a few bigger ones, tons of art galleries, restaurants cheap and expensive, an art museum and a big center where the Asheville symphony plays, music almost every night of the week somewhere. During the warmer weather there's frequent street festivals, almost every weekend some sort of arts or sustainability or cultural festivity. The weather is summery until the end of October, and still within the 50's -60's at the end of November right now. Mountains are beautiful, but you can't see them that much from campus. Lots of musicians and music appreciators at Asheville, strong programs that I know of are English, Environmental Studies, Music Technology, and Art. Lotta majors in all of these. A friend of mine is dissatisfied with the jazz music program, and their musicians are pretty good, but I'm originally from the Boston area, and the school can't compare with places up there like Berklee, etc. Ahh dunno too much about other programs.

Anyway, that's about all I got. Almost all the students are extremely interesting people with their own hobbies and pursuits, who are very chill and interested in other people as well. I got paired with some phenomenal roommates, so sort of lucked out. We also having a living room space in our dorm, which is only the case with one of the dorm buildings, but overall the dorms are fairly well-sized. The food is decent, there's a cafe and a food court in the student union. Deserts at the cafe, however, are decadent. Shit. Don't get me going about the deserts. Ah, the fraternity scene is very weak as is the sports scene. There is one frat and two soror's, and a Division I basketball team, but sports are just not big. Big things are music, environmental stuff, going downtown is common, parties are common on the weekend but most occur off campus and thus are accessible or avoidable depending on where you stand on that. Drug use is pretty common, low-key drinking and a lot of marijuana. And most students smoke cigarettes, but I'm a non-smoker and find this not to be a big issue. Overall, the place is fantastic for artsy-types and folky-hippy-intellectual ish music lovers, offbeat people and anyone that's dissatisfied with a lot of the bs of normal "university life" and wants a stimulating, friendly atmosphere with great people.