The University of Iowa

Date: Mar 27 2013
Major: English (This Major's Salary over time)
I would not trade my Iowa experience for anything, even though it wasn't perfect. True, it was hard going to such a party school when I'm not a big partier, but I worked hard to find other stuff to do—and if you do that, you will find it. Trust me. It's hard work, but you will find cultural events, musical events, art events, etc…

Now, onto the school: I was in the Creative Writing Undergrad Program and a Cinema minor and 90% of my teachers truly cared about students, were available to us, and made the material engaging. You should know that UI is a "research" university, which means they have grad students teaching classes as part of their grad program. Grad students, I find, often try harder than professors simply because they have to, so don't let this deter you. The liberal arts programs are filled with passionate faculty and students. I can't think of any "bad" program at Iowa—they work hard to keep everything top quality.

I'm not proud of all the attention the school gives to the football team, but I will say I prefer a lively college town to a boring one, and football certainly keeps that alive. Like I said, though, if you work hard to find other things to do, you will. It probably won't happen overnight though.

UI has an absolutely beautiful campus. I liked how the academic buildings are mixed in with the commercial buildings (cafes, bookstores, bars, etc) It made for a tight knit community. A lot of good bands and authors come through IC for performances and readings. Pay attention to flyers on campus and check the UI calendar for stuff to do. The dorms are very nice and the cafeteria isn't anything special but better than other college food I've tried.

You will get out of this school what you put in. There are slackers taking easy classes and skating by on athletic scholarships, and there are also insanely smart people who deserve to be there and are doing great things. It's not as diverse as, say, Chicago, but it's definitely diverse for Iowa.