Bowling Green State University

Date: Jun 29 2011
Major: Computer Science (This Major's Salary over time)
I transferred out of BGSU after my first year because my experience there was absolutely horrible.

I came to BGSU because of the Computer Science program and it looked to be a very good program but only on paper. The CS department is fairly small but it had a few very good professors when I started. However all of the good professors left the university or retired during my first year. Now the department is left with old tenured professors who still think Fortran is a modern and useful programming language, and newly graduated foreign professors who can't speak English.

The CS program was fairly easy. I breezed through my freshmen classes without studying for a single test. The programming projects were fun but they are weighed down with so much busy work you almost don't do any programming. First you have to write an essay to show to the professor that you understand the problem, then make a flow chart, then make the pseudo-code algorithm and then finally program. In the end, programming only account for 10% of the work. What's worse is the professor doesn't let you solve the problem yourself; they tell you exactly what algorithm to use and how to program it. So, if you get a sorting problem where you can use any basic sorting algorithm (Bubble sort, merge sort, insertion sort, etc…) the professor will tell you to use one of them and that what you have to use. Even if another algorithm is a better fit for the problem, you will get a zero for doing it a different way. There are also not that many programming classes to take. At most you will have 1 or 2 during the semester and the rest of the curriculum is filled with useless liberal arts classes that you have to take to graduate.

Problems with the faculty outside of the department also contributed to my decision to leave. With all its faults the CS faculty was still very friendly and professors were available outside of class if you had problems. That was not true for the other departments. My English Comp professor was never available. She didn't even have an office on campus. The only way you could get in touch with her was through email, which she rarely answered, or come in before class to ask her questions. The math professors were even worse. I was actually told by my calc 1B professor that

I you don't understand the material from my lectures, you should apply for a job in McDonalds because you are clearly too stupid for college.

This was pretty much the last straw and I left the university after that semester.

Another thing I didn?t like about BG was that social life and parties are more important than education. If you want to go to college to party instead of to get an education and a good job afterwards, BGSU is the perfect school for you. There are at least 2 parties on campus every night, even during exam week. Drug and alcohol are everywhere on campus. The police won?t stop anyone unless they are visibly drunk and they don?t stop and ID people if they are carrying alcohol. Most stores in town don?t ID and usually you can get anything else you want from your resident advisor, and those that don?t deal will look the other way.

What makes this even worse is that you usually won?t have many friends when you do need to study unless you go to the parties to meet people. Students that party together form cliques in class that they won?t let anyone else into. I had this happen to me a few times when I had to do a group assignment in class. The group just met without me outside of class; no email or phone call even though we exchanged contact info in class; and did all the work and I ended up getting a zero for the participation credit.

The importance placed on sports and school spirit is also very annoying. I had a few times that assignments and exams were pushed back because there was a football game that night. I even had a few assignments to go to a football game or other sporting even to get credit in class. As a result football players, and to a lesser extent other athletes, will never fail a class. In my social sciences class, the professor lowered a C down to 40% so that one football player in the class could pass and still play the following season.

Parking on campus is a nightmare. The parking pass costs like $200 a semester but there is rarely any parking anywhere. Freshmen have to park in the overflow lot on the other side of campus from the dorms so you have to walk a mile to your car. And you can?t park anywhere else on campus so don?t even think about driving to class. You have to live in the dorms for your first 2 years so it?s effectively pointless to have a car for those years unless you want to drive home very weekend. The police also ticket for everything and anything when it comes to parking. They will also tow your car with no warning if you park in any of the faculty lots.

There were a lot of other things I didn?t like about BG but they were relatively minor. Financial aid is very annoying and difficult to deal with. They will screw up your funding every semester and you will have to go in at least 2 weeks before the semester starts to fix it. The town of Bowling Green is very small and there?s nothing to do there but drink. The mall only has 4 stores and 1 restaurant in the food court so it?s not like you can go and hang out in the mall. You pretty much have to drive to Toledo to do anything interesting.

Anyway, I transferred to Wright State after my 2 semesters at BG and I wish I just didn?t go to BG in the first place. It turned out that the CS major at BG is not nationally accredited so none of my classes transferred to Wright State and I basically had to take my freshman year over again. The CS degree at WSU is accredited by ABET but the one at BG isn?t.