The University of Texas at Austin Top Questions

For the most part, you get out what you put in. If you take the time to talk to your professors, go to their office hours, and ask questions in class, then you will get to know your professors, and they will know you as well. As an underclassman, most of your classes will probably be large (100+ students). However, as you progress and move into your upper division classes, you will notice the size of your classes begins to dwindle down to a moderate size (30-50 students). Every major is different at UT. I can't speak for them, but I can talk about advertising and the College of Communication. As the highest ranked advertising department in the nation, the course work is rigorous. You are among the most revered professors in the nation, and they hold you up to a very high standard. That is not to say they are not friendly or willing to help. More often than not, you can find the College of Communication professors walking around the campus with students discussing current news and class projects. Regardless of your major, you will have to put in the work in order to get the grades you want. It is not easy, but it is certainly doable.

There are a lot of different types of teaching styles and classes offered at the University of Texas at Austin. Some classes, like discussion sections or labs, are small and others can be a little larger (250-300 students), like an introductory lecture class. Most professors here make an effort to get to know their students and give them every opportunity to succeed, and the students in turn respect their professors and participate inside and outside of class. Students aren't really competitive, but it does depend on what type of major you are in. However, no matter your major, the professors and their respective classes are not only geared towards bettering their students for the job market, but also providing them with an education that can aid them in every aspect of their lives.

That's not just our tagline, that is FACT. Only a few days ago, researchers at UT identified a body of water the size of the great lakes... on a moon that orbits Jupiter! Our advertising program is ranked #1 in the nation. Our business school is one of the highest caliber ones in the country. Our professors want to get to know us and they want us to do well. Classes are hard, but you actually learn. Studying is required.. a lot, but you will leave with so much more knowledge than you came with.

To change the world, The University of Texas at Austin is the best place to start. The academic life at this institution is geared toward the acquisition of knowledge in order to better people as individuals, as well as to prepare them for what tough challenges lay ahead for our generation. From social work majors to biomedical engineering majors to political communications majors, everyone can expect to receive an education that goes beyond just "quality". Professors expect a lot out of their students and courses can be quite rigorous, but the professors are also more than willing to take the time in office hours or over email to help students go more in-depth into the material. Lower division classes provide students the opportunity to experience a typical lecture-style course, while upper division classes give students the specific attention they need, both to the relevant material of their major and to their learning process.

My favorite class that I have taken while at UTD is BA 3301 Employment Law. The professor made the class really fun to attend. The learning experience was definitely worthwhile. Many of the students are competitive, considering many of them are international students. School of Management is the largest school at UTD, more than half of the students who attend UTD are in the school of business. UTD has a very high standard for academic requirements, which speaks volumes about its reputation in comparison to other schools in Texas.

Academic educational quality is uneven, especially if you are not in an honors program. The student quality varies a lot (partly due to the 10{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} law). A student who scored 1500 on the SAT might very well be sitting next to one who scored 1000. Most of the basic classes are jokes, especially the non-science/math ones. I've found my liberal arts requirements (English, Sociology, Philosophy, Government) to be absolute jokes. The TA's graded extremely leniently on written exams (when they were offered) and sometimes the tests were all multiple choice or even true/false. I made 98+ averages in these classes with minimal studying. Bad papers I wrote 20 minutes before the start of class garnered sparkling grades. You can make an A without learning or retaining any knowledge whatsoever. I tutor and edit papers and found many students struggled in these (to me) seemingly blow off classes. Some students could not write at a high school level, much less a collegiate one. The Business School is the hardest school to get into, but many outside of the B-school also consider it the easiest school to get grades in/graduate from. While many of my fellow McCombs students would vehemently deny this, I find it to be, outside of Accounting, true. On Accounting, the program at UT is ranked #1. 90{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} of the graduates go on to work at a big 4 firm. Accounting is demanding and one of the gems at UT. But most of the classes offered at McCombs, such as Management, International Business, Marketing, and MIS are not difficult, and require a minimal amount of studying. The fact is, there really isn't anything substantial that you can learn from a BUSINESS class, leading towards the light workload in most McCombs classes. However, McCombs in the last year or so has been promoting and implementing the "group project" as a key part of the learning experience. Classes in the past that used to be all independent work, now all require a group project. This teaches students how to work successfully in teams, which is a great skill in itself. No other school's require th amount of collaborative work that McCombs students engage in. Grade inflation does seem to be a problem in many classes, going to class everyday and doing the required work will earn you at least a B. One of my instructors curved to department standards, or so she claimed, which meant 40{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} A's, 40{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} B's, 20{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} C's, which I felt to be excessively high in an already easy class. No one fails anything(besides accounting). Another instructor gave completion grades on essays. My MIS class had no homework, because it was all done in class, by following the instructors lead (aka copying her code). It's hard to learn when the instructors don't teach much and many students simply don't care about learning. Many are grade whores and choose classes based on grade distributions or try to cop-out of basic requirements by taking classes online or at ACC. They want A's, not knowledge. Intellectual curiosity is absent. The instructors are a mixed bag. There are a lot of foreign professors and even more foreign TA's, especially in the quantitative fields, and many of them commit the three sins of teaching. First, they have no personality. Second, they speak soft heavily accented English. Third, most of them hate teaching undergraduates. All of this leads to dismal educational experiences. I once had a class with a Japanese Professor and an Iranian TA. Suffice to say, neither of them made much sense, so I did most of the learning myself. So if you are an engineering major that's bad at calculus, don't expect the prof's or the TA's to be of much help. On the other hand, I've had some enlightening and truly wonderful professors in some of my classes. Many of UT instructors, especially in the lower level classes and at the business school, are lecturers or adjuncts, so you might not actually be taking class with a "professor"! Advising at UT is unhelpful. All advisors do is look at your classes and make sure you are on pace to graduate. They aren't much help for anything else. You have to be a self-starter, no one will be there to hold your hand.

None of my classes were favorites. Class discussion is common, however, they tend to favor only one or two philosophies of thought. They tend to shun and berate other ideas of thought that are different or unique. Students do not have intellectual conversations outside of class. Students are highly competitive, opportunistic, aggressive, manipulative, curt, flippant, and sarcastic. None of my classes were unique.

UT has some of the best and highest ranked schools in the nation, including the College of Communication and the Red McComb's School of Business. While most of your basic courses are lectures of 300 or more students, the farther along you go the smaller and more personal your classes become. Once you are into your upper division major courses, you'll start to see your professors more as friends and mentors who want to see you succeed, rather than see you fail.

Most excellent. The English Department was the best. The arts and humanities rock at UT. Now, all the science, engineering, architecture, etc. rock as well. It's tough to get into UT, but it is worth it.

The class sizes are pretty big, but the instruction level is head and shoulders above most other colleges. The professors have office hours and usually are very able to help you if you need it.