Major:
Art - Grades are subjective; you will be compared to
your class and sometimes other classes. Typically, the project
creative restraints are not bad and sometimes workable with your
professor's permission. It is sometimes impossible to get an
A if you are not talented in that area of
art. The Art History Professor tries hard and is
a nice man, but while his knowledge is high, the
transparency/ability to give that knowledge to students is awful and
you will not know your grade at any point until
finals time. The tests are massive and people fail
even with hours upon hours of studying. His tests
are luck of the draw I suppose. Art History
classes are an area you want to transfer credits in
if you can. Education: Has a mostly reasonable
grading system, sometimes it appears their standards for writing are
too high, but it is for the greater good.
You will have many placement opportunities to get a good
feel of how it might be before you teach and
find out if you can/should be with that grade level.
Nursing/premed: The workload is burdening, but the preparation is exactly
what you need. They often have tests or quizzes
every week, but that is better than one huge midterm
or final. They break up the material appropriately and
tell you areas to study more if you are willing
on your own time. This area suffers from the
shorter semesters time that our university has.
Shorter semesters?: Yes
15-16 weeks if I remember correctly, and short breaks.
If you live 7+ hours away, many breaks will not
be of use to you. Campus life when a
break happens is similar to the ghost town feel instead
of the normal gold rush town feel. Having a
car is nice at these times, so you can at
least try to find something off campus- but usually you
are stuck to do close to nothing. The trade
off is that in the summer you will get out
before may starts and have an easier time finding a
summer job.
Campus Police: not a big safe feeling for
me, I almost never see them on the job, and
the few times I've needed them they have horrible response
time or bad suggestions on injuries. I would say
half or more are too unhealthy to actually stop or
catch trouble if they needed to. But sure you
can call them or visit the office...
Grounds crew and
Janitors: Do so much work everyday. They make this
campus look amazing (inside or out). Take some time
to say hi, or thank them - they deserve it.
Student Government Association (previously student government organization): is
actually a very competent group of elected teams that try
to give us students a voice to upper-management. They
deliver on some promises or learn that IWU in the
end is a business and sometimes acts like a business
instead of a compassionate university
Chapel - if you are
like me, you are excited that the school embraces religion
(even though it is a Christian university) and might be
excited for chapel. Well I do not want to
crush your soul but I am in a hard relationship
with chapel. Chapel appreciation depends on getting good sleep
and having a good attitude, so get good sleep and
lose that morning attitude and you will be ok.
The speakers are a little weak sometimes but they mean
the best and the reality is they are pumping three
of these out every week. The worship is fantastic,
except that chapel worship is like the radio; you often
hear the same songs repeated. Moreover, to me I
will stop worshipping at times because they simply extend a
song too long for my liking. Moreover, this is
exactly it: YOU MAKE CHAPEL. If your head is
there and your attitude is right, you will be fine.
If you go in bitter, sometimes you are ok.
However, if you are in a sour chapel mindset
or a bitter mood you will likely hate chapel. AVOID that last sentence. Start right, preserver, and get
as much you can out of it.
Food services- we
can complain as much as our egotistical hearts desire, but
we honestly have a great food choice. We have
three separate areas to choose from. One (Mario's) specializes
in pizza, and has pasta or salad options as other
main meals (although I must caution the pizza should be
viewed before purchased...you'll eventually understand). Another (Wildcat) has a
Chinese wok focus, chicken and rice, and has good sides;
or a quesadilla line and a burrito line; there is
the grill with crispy chicken, grilled chicken, hamburger, cheese burger,
and grilled cheese focus; OR the sub line with a
Subway style build your own on flat bread, wrap choices,
or bread choices. Still another, the actual main dining
option of Baldwin, has its own focuses on main meals,
and an always-possible cereal or pizza feature. Baldwin breakfast
and late breakfast/ fat meal are the best meals offered
in my opinion. The great thing is if you
get tired, you can get something of the many options
that are available. I have not even told you
everything, but if you visit, you will go to Baldwin
anyways.
Next to Mario's is an ice cream
and smoothie type offer that is the only rival to
juggernaut McConn Coffee Co. which will make you so happy
when you have a 7:50 or any long class.
McConn offers a music night called Crema featuring music of
our own fellow students; it is an amazing Wednesday weekly
event at night. McConn also offers parfaits that are
delicious and invigorating. They both have healthy drink mixes
and the ones you can count to stay awake.
Hate lines? Want coffee quick? Bring a dollar
and get a fresh brew, different fresh brewed coffee options
and the sugar or sweetener options with your choice of
half and half or milk additions.
Religion: Obviously
everyone is allowed, but I would say that Catholics are
overly criticized and stereotyped on campus.
Politics: As you
can guess, the campus is highly Republican. There is
a Republican group that has a lot of success with
alerting the members of issues and going to republican events
or meeting some semi-famous U.S. Politicians.
Food times
- are mostly reasonable, except the weekends. Saturday has
no breakfast. Sunday does not have breakfast either; again,
it starts with lunch at 11:30am. Sunday you also
have a big nothing open time from 1:15pm-5pm. Also
if you wait to the last second on your meal
choice: Wildcat mostly closes early if they can, so the
option you went in for might be gone, Mario's is
always a safe bet, but Baldwin is not worth it
even the last 15 minutes. Baldwin after the first
hour of breakfast and Lunch will not be as good,
wait too long and the option either will be gone
or will be there because it was a poor food
selection choice. They typically literally remove the food a
good chunk of time (I'd say 20minutes early is a
fair statement) before they close - but they will still
swipe you in... For cereal options, I suppose.
Accreditation: Indiana
Wesleyan University is an accredited university (important for post-graduation)!