The University of Jamestown

Date: Oct 01 2013
Major: Business - Management and Administration (This Major's Salary over time)
Looking back on my education at JC I really feel that the business program is far too easy, I wasn't challenged at all and got a 4.0 just by going to class, doing my homework, and not missing any exams. Every semester there was only one class that I would have to spend a lot of time studying, classes like accounting and financial management.

Perhaps if I had majored in accounting or finance my experience would have been different, but the general business degree with emphasis on marketing was a joke. Most of the other business majors were people there on sports scholarships who had no idea what they wanted to do with their lives. A TON of class time was spent on short presentations by students. These were supposed to be examples of marketing or business and what we learned from them. In reality these reports typically included a student sharing a commercial from youtube (that we had to wait to load, planning ahead and getting the videos loaded before class started required too much forethought for the jocks and I hate to say it but absent minded professors) and saying that the video was good marketing because it was funny. If you are looking for stimulating class discussions with your fellow students then look elsewhere. While I really liked a lot of the professors as people some of them are the very definition of the absent minded professor. A brand new building with all of the latest technology was built to hold the business and computer departments, yet we still had professors copying out their notes by hand on a whiteboard when there were overhead projects and computers with internet in every lecture hall. Using time efficiently is just not a priority at this school.

The college as a whole is a private, for profit university and they're not ashamed to milk it for all it is worth. Tuition was going up massively every year I was there to fund their increased marketing efforts and lure more athletes to the school with scholarships.

Jamestown itself is a small town in the middle of nowhere, with a police force that is large enough for a town twice the size. They have little to do but enforce under age drinking laws with high school and college students being their main targets. You really need to understand what you are getting into before you sign up to go to school there, if you are at all hesitant about going to school in a small town then don't think, but run the other way and find a different school.

So who is this school for? If you can get a sports scholarship, want to sleep through your classes and still get a passing grade, and want to be a big fish in a small pond then this school is for you. I did take some science classes that were challenging but it wasn't my major so please don't take my comments as advice for programs other than business. If you do like small towns and wide open spaces then this school could be for you, and there are some really nice, friendly, helpful professors on staff here. I'm sure that my degree from this school had nothing to do with getting the job I have now, and other than my photoshop class I really feel like a lot of my time was wasted going here. At least I have a degree now so I can find somewhere more challenging to go to get a master's.