Washington University in St Louis Top Questions

Public Transportation system of St. Louis is slow, unhelpful, and badly needed for freshmen

worst thing about the school is that it is sometimes too much work and not enough play and there are a lot of wealthy students

The worst thing about the school is in fact what it is best known for; so many students are pre-med at Wash U. Because of the eminence of WUSTL's medicine program, the science classes are designed to weed out potential doctors, the exams are written so students will fail them, and most of the help and tutoring focuses is steered towards chemistry, physics, and other subjects guaranteed to appear on the MCATs. While no department is ignored, it is much more difficult to obtain help in the humanities than it is in any area of the sciences.

There isn't enough community involvement or socioeconomic diversity at WashU. The student body doesn't realize how priviledged they are. Everyone thinks they are "middle class" but the average student's family is quite a bit wealthier than middle class families where I grew up. Students often don't appreciate how lucky they are, and even when they do that knowledge doesn't often translate into action. This isn't to say that WashU students are selfish. They tend to verbally support social change, but this rarely translates into any actual action.

Sometimes the social atmosphere can promote distant and superficial relationships between friends. Sometimes it is common to have a huge group of good friends but not a lot of really close friends.

Very sterile, money focused environment

I think the racial divisions are tough. I am a black student and the majority of the people I know are black. I do everything with that small group of people and now that I'm a senior, I wish I chose to meet more people, because there are SO many cool people here.

St. Louis weather is cold, and I am from LA so it is the worst thing about WashU

The worst thing about Washington University is the cost of education. Because the school is so expensive, it is difficult to have a diverse socioeconomic student population. I also think that since students pay so much money, there should be better regulation of the quality of teaching. Oftentimes, Wash U hires professors with Ph.Ds, who are sometimes more interested in pure knowledge than in teaching their students in an organized, efficient manner.

How well a student does or how much they will learn in a class depends heavily on the professor of that class. While all of the professors here are very knowledgable in their feilds, some cannot relate to students or are not actually responsible people-they may take far too long to return papers or emails. These are the exceptions however, the the many great professors who do a great job and care about their students.