The University of Alabama Top Questions

Professors don't konw my name at UA because their assistants do all the grading. My favorite class was Microcomputer applications...my least favorite (so far) is microeconomics and statistics. Students study time differs from the activities of their lives... Students here are very competitive... I'm in the business administration major...it's okay...could do without some of the certain teachers in it though....just a few though.... Academic requirements at Bama are very fair..thus far... And I'm still trying to determine if the education at UA is geared towards getting a job or learning for it's own sake....ask me when I graduate.

The education at the University of Alabama, especially in the business school, is unlike any other. From the relatively small class sizes, expected class participation, and availability of instructors out-of-class, Alabama makes for a great place to learn your preferred field. Also, professors put a great deal of emphasis on the job-finding aspect of things. The price of victory is high, but so are the rewards.

As a member of the Honors Program, I am blessed to be involved in classes with students willing to learn and professor eager to educate. For example, I am currently taking a course on public policy taught by Dr. William Stewart. I am one of eleven students in the class, and Dr. Stewart takes personal interest in each one of us. I know all of my peers, and have gotten to know almost each one of them on a deep personal level. We support each other in our academic trials and successes.

Teachers as a whole do care about their students. Until you get into an upper division, classes tend to be lecture style and quite large, but you generally have a Graduate Teaching Assistant that you can go to in smaller groups to discuss issues and questions. I have yet to meet a teacher who was not warm, accommodating and caring. Southern hospitality is very contagious, apparently. Most students don't have to study that often, just before the tests because the teachers know what they're talking about and we don't really have to study to get it. Humanities courses tend to just be knowledge for knowledge's sake, but core and major classes are more geared toward "this is what you need to know to work out in the real world and here's why."

Academics can go either way here, depending on your major. Business and Communications are highly ranked year in and year out among public universities. On the other hand, as with any school, you can find majors that are boringly easy.

My freshman year, I was very involved in the Blount Undergraduate Initiative. The friends that I made through this program were very unique and I could always have an intellectual conversation with them outside of class. Students vary at the University. Many are just trying to get by in their classes, and others such as those in Blount and the Honors Program want to gain some extra knowledge from their college education. The Blount Program is a four year program in the College of Arts and Sciences that can be taken as a Minor. Students take 2 literature classes during their freshman year that are held in the Blount dorm. These classes explore the liberal arts and encourage discussion about the different authors like Freud, Descartes, Marx, Toni Morrison, Camus and E.O. Wilson (a notable UA Alumni). The classes for Upperclassmen are more fun because students can choose which ones they would like to take, depending on their interests. These include Yoga, Book Arts, Photography, Star Wars and Religion, Law, and others that are more specific to the sciences and classic literature.

The classes at UA are pretty cool. I get a very diverse education. The Honors College has a lot of neat, interesting classes that aren't too hard. Some majors are very easy while others are impossible!

My proffessors are all basically good. I have one that I'm not so fond of, but they're basically awesome. You can go to any of them if you have questions and they're really good about helping you out.

The academic rigor at the University was incredibly disappointing. The amount of grade inflation that goes on within the classes, as well as the level of discussion that takes place has been below the hopes I had of intellectual stimulation upon arrival in 2005. My most difficult challenge was keeping up with the reading, even though I could usually get away with not reading for at least one of my classes. Within my major, Secondary Education - Social Studies, the history classes I took were the most rigorous courses I encountered during my time at the University. One class in particular stood out, and although I have recently been informed that Dr. Hagenloh is leaving UA to teach at Syracuse, I must say that his course was the most challenging, but I also learned the most from him. In that class, we were held accountable for each reading, and were required to participate in discussions both in online blogs and during class discussions. I would say overall that I was disappointed with the academics at UA, but professors tend to lower their expectations in correlation with the caliber of students they have in their classes.

I've been really pleased with most of my classes at UA. They are definitely challenging. Many lower level classes like English composition, Chemistry, and Math are really big. Comparatively, honors classes are way smaller and more intimate feeling. I feel like the average UA student doesn't really study as much as they should. I'm always hearing about students buying stimulants like Adderall to cram before a test.