The University of North Georgia

Date: Mar 18 2012
Major: Education (This Major's Salary over time)
In my first two years at North Georgia I was satisfied with both the quality of my education and the surrounding campus. I have never been one to go out and party, so the lack of entertainment opportunities in the surrounding town was not an issue for me. I also was not interested in joining a sorority or any other extracurricular activity, so I cannot give advice in that regards.

I posted this critique specifically to talk about the downfalls of the advisement, financial aid, and education departments.

Firstly, I entered college having earned credit for an intro history class through AP credit. For three and a half years, my advisers checked me off on my area A requirements. When I entered the education program I submitted my plan of study with no problems.It was not until the beginning of my last semester here that I was informed through the registrars office that my area A requirements had, in fact, not been met as the AP credit I had earned did not meet state requirements for graduation. This is a common problem that has been encountered in some form or another by more than a dozen students that I personally know - and, I am sure, countless students that I do not know.

Secondly, at the beginning of every semester your student account shows a summary of your account balances for the term. This semester I had an account balance of roughly $500 after my HOPE scholarship. I paid the $500 and my account was settled. More than one month into the semester, I received an email saying that I was in danger of being expelled from the university for non-payment. It turns out, the financial aid office over-estimated the amount that the HOPE scholarship would be paying towards my tuition. I was not informed of this until I was put on the withdrawl list. Thankfully, I have supportive parents that were willing to pay over $1,000 on such short notice. Otherwise, there is no way I would have been able to pull together that much money on such short notice.

Lastly, the education program at North Georgia has so many flaws that the prestige of the program (though great) is often overshadowed. I cannot tell you how many times we were told "Make sure that your students understand you care about them. The only way for students to truly learn is if they feel safe and cared for by you." However, the education program at North Georgia does exactly the opposite of that! We are constantly over-loaded with assignments and projects that have little to nothing in common with what we actually do in the classroom. In your student teaching itself, you are required to complete a teacher work sample that has about 15 steps that I can say (having been in placement classroom for 2 years now) NO TEACHER DOES. It is ridiculous, time-consuming, and - added to teaching full time as an intern - needless.