Northeastern University Top Questions

professors pretty much become your friends. meaning that if they know you are not doing great in their class, they personally write you an email or call you at the end of the class to let you know and see how they can help. all of my treachers have known my name.

In my experience, Northeastern's academics are rigorous, but fulfilling. The business program is no joke as well as the Sciences, Architecture and Engineering programs. Professors love class participation and it can take you a long ways. Students here are very competitive and will sometimes speak in class for no reason. Some students will show you up just because they can. Most students speak with professors outside of class, it is a norm here. I keep my intellectual conversations inside the classroom where they belong. I spend a lot of time studying because college academics move fast. There is no such thing as "going back a day."

As a freshman, I had three general science lectures, all of which were prerequisites for some major and so these classes were very large. However, my freshman English class was only thirteen students and a French Composition 2 class was nine. In the lecture halls, as can be expected at any school, the professors did not know my name. But they showed a great desire to get to know and meet with as many students as possible. I have found that there is an extraordinary balance between work and play and that Northeastern students understand how to organize their time. Students are engaged in class and oftentimes class topics will carry on outside of the classroom. Students are driven to succeed and perform at their best but are not competitive in the traditional "Whatjaget?" sense. If one students succeeds, all of his or friends celebrate his or her success. I am a pharmacy major and all of the professors are leaders in their fields and anxious to pass on their knowledge. Pharmacy is one of the most competitive in terms of admissions and so all of the students are top-notch. The academic requirements vary from college to college, but there are a few "NU Core" classes that have to be taken. Towards filling this requirement, I took "An Economic History of the Middle East" and found many new ways in which economics have come to shape the region that we call the Middle East. This course has opened my horizons and taught me to be more critical and questioning and to think outside of the box. The learning at NU balances between getting a job and learning for its own sake. Some majors, like Criminal Justice, are more job-oriented while others such as history fulfill a student's curiosity. The NU Core helps students from one end of the spectrum reach to the other end of the spectrum and connect the two worlds.

I am in the Bouve school of health sciences and I think the program is challenging but wonderful. Northeastern doesn't get enough credit for the difficulty of it's classes and the amazing professors we have. There is so much research going on in the university that you can (even as a freshman like I did) be involved in some research.

My favorite class, hands down, was Jazz. It was about a 500 student lecture in Blackman auditorium. I had Professor Price - he's the best! You learn everything from the beginnings of Jazz right up through to how it has influenced music today. It was a great elective!

As a chemistry major I was accepted as the class of 2009 along with only 21 other majors in my year. I am on a first name basis with all of the professors in the department. I can go to any of them for anything, and I haven't even had a class with some of them yet! I got to know everyone my freshman year through my workstudy job as an assistant in the front office. Because I'm a tourguide I know that those big lecture-hall style classes only make up less than 1{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} of all the classes here. My freshman year, my organic chemistry class had only 12 students. My synthesis course this past spring had only 9! But classes are totally different depending on the subject and the professors teaching style. Most of the time the professors are very engaging, even in the big classes. I remember Prof. Gilmore (who is unfortunately retiring this year) used to pick on specific individuals for answers, especially when they seemed like they were sleeping, in a class of 50 kids. Seminar style classes are the best, they facilitate intellectual discussion that is very stimulating, and very easy to apply in every day life, beyond the classroom. The honors classes here are also great, and if you're not accepted into the program as an incoming freshman you will be automatically accepted once you get here and achieve a GPA of 3.5 or higher. Most departments have the option of hosting perspective students to sit in on classes that might seem interesting to them.

Professors are very professional and very good. They have lots of experience simply because before Neu they worked in companies.

While Northeastern is known for being a competitive school, my experience with other students baffles me. I went to a preparatory school, scored very high on my SATs and graduated with a 3.8 in high school. I expected to be the "dumb one" in all my classes. And yet, when I came to school here, I was surprised that the majority of my classmates barely knew some of the things I learned by my Freshman year of high school. There are a lot of very, very intelligent students who belong at Ivy League schools, but the majority of students have surprised me with their lack of knowledge.

The class sizes are either small or very large, depending on the class. Honors classes are usually 15 students - but not many honors courses are offered to upperclassmen. Regular classes are around 40 students, and lecture halls have about 100 students. Most of the classes are geared toward getting a job, and practical education. It's difficult to take courses not related to your major.

I was a mathematics major, and the department was amazing. Professors not only knew your name, but they knew who you were. The department was extreamly close, and hanging out together outside of class was not uncommon. Class sizes were not tiny, but not huge either. I would say I had an average of 30 people in my classes, but they were usually the same 30 people, so we became a close group. Different majors at northeastern have different levels of difficulty. A communications or criminal justice major may not be seen as acedemic as a physics or engineering major. Our business school is top ranked in the country. Our research labs are amazing. I believe NU students can be among the smartest students in the country (although we also have our share of low achieving students as well..) and depending on what you're looking for at NU, I believe you'll find it. Since our university is so large, there are groups of students who get together for intellectual conversations, and there are groups who never mention acedemics outside of the classroom. Group projects are popular as are students getting together at the library to work on homework. The best part of acedemics at NU is being able to apply them to real world experiences through co-op. NU is constantly answering the question of "when am I ever going to use this in real life" which to me makes learnign that much better.