Cornell University Top Questions

I love the classes that I took last year - Food science (which was an awesome review of hs biology!), global health, and plagues and people. Definitely the best classes at Cornell, in terms of knowledge available, and the readings. The classes are filled with passionate teachers... who have no idea who I am, and that I loved their classes because I want to be exactly like them. I want to get out of here and do real things, because sometimes I think that Cornell is a waste of time because in the real world, knowing organic chemistry just doesn't matter if I want to be teaching people in Africa how to avoid getting HIV/AIDS.

The academics here are rough but not absolutely ridiculous. There are a number of small classes which are nice because the teacher knows you and you can participate. Unfortunately there are the other giant lecture halls for bio and chem and organic chemistry (also known as satan)

I know a lot of my professors well because I am in a small major. I think this has really helped me to adjust to Cornell after having come from a small school. It is really beneficial to cultivate relationships with your professors, but admittedly difficult in larger majors/classes. There are a lot of very intelligent people who go to Cornell and spark interesting conversations outside of classes. There are also, however, a handful of people who one wonders how they got into cornell, namely those people in the farm oriented majors.

The introduction classes are very very big. In general, classes range in terms of difficulty. In general, the classes are probably harder then the classes at other schools.

I would probably make this school less stressful acamedically. Here we have so many libraries and a lot of times, even then, it is hard to find a place to sit and do work. I've talked to my friends at other schools and most of them have only one or 2 libraries on their campus and most people never go. I think that even though it is good that students at Cornell work hard academically, I don't think many people are that involved on campus and with extracurriculars due to this.

Most professors who teach large lecture classes do not know my name. My favorite class has been one called Human Bonding taught by Cindy Hazan. We learned about attachment, human relationships, breakups, etc. I see students studying all day and all night. Class participation is common in smaller sections. I feel students are pretty competitive. You can spend professors outside of class if you go to their office hours. The most unique class I've taken was called NS206: Intro to Global Health. We would have video conferences with professors at Weill Medical School in NYC.

Classes vary immensly. I took a class with 1300 students and a class with 17 students freshman year. Generally the professors are fantastic; however, some of the professors are not so great and a lot of the learning must be done through a textbook, unfortunately. School work is hard and there is a lot of it. However, you are able to manage your own schedule and I've found that the TA's are extremely helpful and most professors are flexible in terms of due dates.

academics at cornell are excellent. some of the best in the country. the professors in my major department know my name (and some not in the department) class participation is common in small classes, and not as much in large lectures students are VERY competitive, as we all compete for top job AEM is an incredible program communication is more fun and lighter i spend time with professors outside of class with some extracurriculars and sometimes just hanging out cornell's academic requirements are very rigorous cornell's education is geared both towards getting a job and learning for its own sake. in AEM, learning is geared towards getting a job. in communication, it is more geared towards learning for its own sake

professors dont know my name in big lectures least favorite class is freshman writing seminar cause theyre a lot of work and so many papers students study every day people participate in class some cornell students have intellectual conversations outside of class, but everyone is different because there are so many students lot of work

A lot of intro classes in engineering are pretty large and anonymous, but as I start taking smaller specialized classes I have more professors who I know and get along with well. I think my classes are very, very challenging and it's much harder for me to maintain a good gpa then it was in high school. At the same time, however, I really feel like I'm getting an excellent education, and I sort of feel like if I can do this, I can do anything.