Harvard University Top Questions

class participation very common in HDS

Students are very competitive. Expect to work hard if you are competitive.

my favorite class here is STAT 270. The professor is trying hard to know each of the student in the class and is willing to take advice.

Incredible. I get the "Wow, I'm at Harvard" feeling all the time.

My favorite class is Spanish. My TF is incredible - she is so helpful, really perceptive, and super nice. Students can be competitive, but I think there is an incredible amount of cooperation. Everyone participates in class. Students study a lot. I love being surrounded by other people that are excited about learning.

I'm a science major whose taken a fair share of humanities electives, and there is a very different culture in those two broad fields. Humanities classes (specifically English, History, Government) are very easy in general, but you can get bad TF's that are arbitrary and you can't figure out how to please. As hard as that is for a perfectionist like the typical Harvard student to stomach, that's just something you have to take in stride; everybody gets some hits like that. The good part is that in general you never have to do much work in those classes- the typical Harvard student can procrastinate on papers and still do well. In economics, there is a wide variety between the joke classes and the very hard classes that are like science classes. Science classes are an entirely different world once you get past the intro level. Harvard science students are cut-throat competitive- unless you are a genius or already learned the material before coming, don't expect to get above average, and hence higher than a B, unless you do every practice problem in every book and do every old exam you can get your hands on- and do that before every quiz and every test. Once you learn how to study like that, you can succeed well. But expect to have a miserable life in the process. (There are easy science classes, but those are about as rare as hard humanities ones, and often very gratifying for one's GPA but not for one's learning experience).

There is definitely no shortage of large, apersonal lecture courses at Harvard. However, once you go past that and really start getting involved in your concentration (major), you'll find countless opportunities to get to meet incredible faculty, and work closely with them. Indeed, there are plenty of chances, be it office hours, faculty dinners, or simply chit-chatting with professors. The key is, nothing will be simply handed to you. If you sit by idly, these opportunities will pass you by. You've got to be assertive and make things happen. In terms of difficulty, Harvard courses vary wildly by department. The math, science, and engineering departments are very rigorous, and you definitely should not expect to walk away with a 4.0. However, if you choose to pursue one of the larger humanities concentrations (government or economics), you can breeze through six courses a semester with virtually no chance of getting less than an A.

Unnecessarily stressful environment, but academics are well taught for the most part. However, Too many students per class, and there is a general fear of asking questions.

Some of my professors know my name, but it's true that most of my classes have been large, impersonal lectures. Students study a lot, although it varies rather widely depending on what classes you take. Pre-med classes, for example, are quite competitive. Math and science concentraters spend a lot of time working. But if you take the right Ec or Gov classes, you can sail through without doing all that much work at all. CS is a pretty time-consuming major, but I think Harvard does a solid job at teaching it, especially considering that we're not a tech school.

I love my history professor Donald Owastrwski . My other favorite professor from the classic department is Albert Heinrichs . I study often and spend many hours in Widener library.