Northeastern University Top Questions

Northeastern is the perfect source of an over-abundance of opportunities. However, sometimes there are too many opportunities and the administration lacks the ability to truly ensure the high quality that they speak of.

People still think that I go to school in Chicago (at Northwestern), so our name hasn't become household yet, but it's fairly new still, so it's rapidly growing. I love how this school has a small campus, but 15,000 undergrads. And we are an urban school with an enclosed campus, which I love being in Boston, but still feel like I'm in college. NU administration is TERRIBLE. We call it the "NU Shuffle". It applies for the administration and anything else you want to change at NU. The biggest controversy on campus was the Student Government presidential races I believe. There is not a lot of school pride, the students are focused more on getting out into the real world with getting a co-op job, rather than focusing on sporting events for example. Northeastern is unusual in the sense of our co-op program. We are also the most tuition-driven private institution in the country, where our university is driven by the tuition the students pay (NU has a small endowment). My experience that I will remember will be fighting the administration this year to start a fund for international co-ops involving civic engagement. Most international co-ops in my field of International Affairs are unpaid, and I believe that NU should help alleviate some of the financial burdens student face with the already raising cost of tuition.

The best thing about Northeastern is the friends that I’ve made here. I don’t know if we got lucky freshman year to live with the best people or how it’s happened really. I love my friends because they, like me, work hard and play hard. A majority of my friends are honors students, student group leaders, or working/interning part-time while in classes – and usually a combination of all of them. Compared to my high school, Northeastern is HUGE. However, now that I’m an upperclassman I can’t walk more than 20 feet without running into people I know and pretty much everyone I’ve met recently knows someone I know through one (maybe two) degrees of separation. The school is big enough to allow students to grow and find a good niche, while providing the opportunity of overlapping networks that lend to a tight, close-knit community. When I tell people that I go to NU I get some combination of the reaction to the stereotypes I’ve described and then they usually ask me if I like it. I can honestly say that I love it here, and while sometimes I wish that I had gone to a big, traditional school like BC or Amherst, I’m satisfied with my choice. I love living right in the heart of the city, but also feeling like we have a campus that’s distinctly ours. When you’re on the quads sometimes you can’t tell if you’re in the middle of Boston or western Mass. School pride comes in many forms. Due to the co-op schedules, I think Northeastern will never be a huge football or basketball school like those in Pac 10, ACC, or Big 10 conferences. But I challenge anyone to go to a game and tell me that the students there have no pride in their team. Anyone who’s been to a hockey game knows how crazy the Dog Pound will get. NU sold out its Homecoming football game in 2006. There’s also a lot of spirit in things unrelated to sports, which is the natural association when people say “school spirit.” There’s a lot of pride, especially from those involved in student groups, around activities that we do related to Northeastern. When I go to the after school program in Roxbury to run my Girl Scout meeting, I’m proud to be from NU. When our Model UN team wins a conference and my friend on their E-Board is glowing about it, I’m proud to be from NU. When someone says they heard we have great academics and great co-op opportunities here, I’m proud to be from NU.

The school's size is perfect. It's not so large that no one knows each other but not so small that EVERYONE knows each other (and each other's business). The best thing about the school is the coop program. Unlike most, we graduate with concrete experience which is not only beneficial to finding a job after school but beneficial to our classwork as we can bring those experiences into the classroom with us. The big problem with Northeastern is the administration. It is incredibly bureaucratic and everything takes time. On the other hand, this forces you to learn with the bureaucracy you'll deal with in real life. So ultimately, while it's a nuisance, it's a plus. The school pride is...well existent. People like the school but we're definitely not a "sports" school. It's more of a relaxed community than a crazy ultra-hyped college (in my experience). Plus, we're in the middle of Boston and while our campus is more centralized (compared to campuses like BU which are spread across the city), we are still in the city and can easily mix with people from other schools. Big plus.

its not northwestern. cant stress that enough. its boston through and through.

Northeastern is a community that anyone can flourish in. As with any other college you just have to open yourself up and try. It was hard being in a crowded freshman dorm where it felt like that was the only place to go and you felt most at home in, but when you take advantage of something that you might be interested in at Northeastern you can find yourself amongst a group of people that would have never thought you'd meet and they end up being your best friends. Northeastern may seem big in numbers, but you'll find it's a small world and there is always someone who knows someone. So many opportunities to find your niche here. Northeastern is in the biggest college "town" ever created. There are special laws and ordinances because of the students here ( mostly for off campus housing.) If you want a city, but you think NYC is too big, then Boston is your man. It's easy to get around, as a southerner coming up north, people are generally friendly. With the Red sox, the celtics, not so much the bruins, Northeastern Hockey and intramural sports there is always something exciting going on in the city. School spirit is limited, we are no a huge football school like BC, but we do love to get drunk and go to Hockey games. Best thing to do on a friday night during the season. The Administration is ok, haven't hreally had an complaints about our New president, well he isn't new any more. There is a lot of controversy about the housing that northeastern is building in the surround community of Roxbury. They are putting people out of house and home because they are trying to build enough housing for the entire population to live on campus by about 2012 I think they said. It's truely sad because these people have families and no where else to go because property is so expensive in Boston and the surrounding neighborhood, unless you are willing to go to an unsafe area with your family. This is unfair and something the students of Northeastern should take up with the administration. They probably won't listen to you, but it's best that your voice be heard and maybe one day they'll come up with a better solution.

Coop is definitively the best thing but the change to the semester system seems to work against the goals of co-op. In the quarter model you could leave school when you found a co-op job, it was easier to change rotations and find the job you wanted.

The best thing is the location, definitely. You often feel like you just live in a city rather than on a campus which is nice if you wanted a big school like I did. The worst thing about Northeastern is that the offices are unable to handle the fact that the school is so big - lots of red tape to get anything done. I am having the worst time graduating because of all the paperwork and the red tape. I also think the judicial system is sort of unorganized/weird - I've been written up a lot of times for stuff I didn't do. One time, the people in the office even told me I should have lied to get out of trouble, which sort of seems like...the wrong message? I guess the biggest controversy was the "No More Than Four" rule about student housing - not really on-campus (it was a Boston-wide thing) but it really is going to impact where the off-campus students can live. Personally, I don't think there's very much school pride. Half the people don't even know what student government is. As someone who's a member of a school-spirit organization, I can see this even better. But I'm not very school-spirit-oriented anyway, so I don't care. I'll always remember study abroad in Italy. And freshman year, that was fun.

I think the school is about the right size for me. Although there are many students, you usually see the same people from your major for the majority of the time so it's not like you're drowning in a sea of people. People usually react positively when they hear that I go to Northeastern. It's a very good school that is rapidly gaining the recognition it deserves (Plus it's better than BU). I spend most of my time in my room either studying or sleeping. It's in a nice area of Boston by all the rich, expensive areas. When it comes to hockey, there is a ton of school pride, even if we suck. When it comes to administration, you get the run around but that happens at any large school. It's not that big of a deal. The single best thing I've done this year was the Husky Hunt. It was AMAZING! You basically go around boston for 24 hours straight and you're given 400 clues and riddles. I had so much fun and I would do it again in a heartbeat. Most frequent complaints would be food (it's good if you dont really get home cooked meals at home but I was spoiled), and administration.

The best thing about Northeastern is definitely the co-op program. Unfortunately, it doesn't work out quite as well for some majors as it does for others. As a business major, it's ideal. I can get experience in many different areas and go from there to choose a career path. Some of my friends, however, have had less successful experiences. My friend who was a music industry major said he felt like his co-op was a waste of time, and that he had learned more in the past few years just from being in his band than he had at NEU or at co-op. For me, Northeastern is the perfect size. I always see a ton of people I know on campus, just walking from class to class, and of course see thousands of people I don't know. After being at NEU for 4 years though, I recognize a lot of faces, even if I don't know names. The most common reaction I get when I tell people I go to Northeastern is, "Oh! How is it living in Chicago!?" Yeah, we are in fact NOT northwestern. Who knew. Most of my time on campus is spent in classrooms, in the student center (I like studying there better than in the library) or in the dance studio. Unfortunately, Northeastern decided to screw all the dancers last yeah and tear down the dance studio to expand the law school, so now we dance in a church. It is less than ideal. One of the hardest things for me to get used to was the lack of school pride. I grew up next to a huge Big 10 school, and so I was excited to experience that kind of school and team pride for myself. It never happened. No one cares about northeastern sports, the huskies, or any kind of pride whatsoever. It's too bad that we don't have at least one sports team that is important to students. I would say the majority of people I know have never been to a Northeastern sporting event. Administration can go either way. Sometimes I'm surprised at how much they push for things in our favor, but usually not. Especially with being so involved in the dance company here, it is easy to see that they don't care about certain groups. For example, our auditorium is only allocated to students 8 nights a year. The rest of the time, it is rented out to make money for the university. Every year the dance company tries to get one weekend where they can put on the show that they have worked so hard towards. After 7 performances at other venues, all of which all cost us over $1000, and 7 semesters spent trying to be able to perform on our own campus,I finally was able to perform in the Northeastern auditorium for the first time. I doubt it will happen again. Not only that, but in the previous years when we asked Northeastern just to cover the cost of the space we had to rent out, which was to perform dances we had been working on all year,they denied us. Even though this would have cost them only about $1000, we later found out that they had given the northeastern skiing club over $10,000 for one ski weekend trip. Northeastern needs to assess their allocation of money to student groups more carefully, because some people and groups are getting shafted. One of the biggest complaints at Northeastern is the "NU Shuffle." This is basically a reference to the fact that you can never go to one person and get the answer you are looking for. You always have to go through a million channels, and in the end are often denied anyway.