The University of Missouri St Louis

Date: Jan 15 2014
Major: Biology (This Major's Salary over time)
The majority of classes are taught using power point, meaning, the professor reads directly from the slide and it's up to you to try & decide what is going to be on the tests because there are no study guides. I feel like I don't get what I need to know out of the class because the important points are mixed in with the not-so-important points. Some of the professors are good & seem to care & want to help students, some are horrible, and some don't even know who's in their class or even take the time to read over submitted homework. The financial aid department is a disaster. If applying for financial aid, keep a copy of everything you submit & everything they have you sign. Almost every semester there has been an issue of "misfiled" paper, emails not being sent out pertaining financial aid award acceptance, resulting in my classes & blackboard access being cancelled in the middle of the semester. Then, I have to run all over campus to get signatures of professors to allow me back into the class and then wait for them to re-open my blackboard account so I have access to my course materials; when this happened last semester, it took a week for my access to be restored. Someone had forgotten to send an email to the IT department. Parking is another issue. Last semester, they gave out more parking passes than spots available & parking was a nightmare, plus they decided to do construction during the semester & closed 2 of the student parking lots to park their equipment in. I was having to walk a half-mile to class because I was having to park on the other side of campus. At times, there were no places to park & I had to drive around & wait for someone to leave. Usually, the first week of classes there are no parking tickets issued but people will crazy park everywhere. If you can, get on campus & start looking for a parking spot about 45 minutes early. Sometimes, you can get close spots if you cut your times close (i.e. class lets out at 10:45 for some & starts at 11 for you, you may find a closer spot). Tuition keeps going up & the availability of classes keeps going down. They used to offer classes in the morning and again in the evening for those that have to work to go to college (like myself). Now, they only offer one class time right in the middle of the day and that's it. It's getting harder and harder to enroll because everything is so limited. One of the academic advisers for the biology department is a total jerk & told me "you can think all you want about making something out of yourself but it's not going to happen" and he indirectly called me stupid and told me I wouldn't amount to anything and that I was wasting my time and everyone else's time if I wasn't getting an A in every class. I had a professor that lost my work and failed me for it when I had proof that I had turned it in. I went all the way to the department head and I still had to take the class over and re-do all the work to avoid getting an F. AGAIN, KEEP A COPY OF EVERYTHING!! I had a professor accuse me of plagiarizing a paper I wrote on my own research findings, how can I plagiarize my own work? Given the opportunity to transfer, I should've done it a long time ago but I couldn't afford tuition anywhere else and it kept going up. It's not a horrible school, but there are some lazy people there that either don't care, don't have the time to help (or don't want to help), or that come off as being harsh when you're looking for help and re-direct you to someone else to handle your questions.