University of Georgia Top Questions

In the large lecture classes, most professors don't bother to learn your name, but they at least try to make themselves available to you. I would suggest taking advantage of professor's office hours!

Academics, especially the humanities, are often underrated at UGA. It is one of the preimere public research institutions in the country. We have award-winning science programs (great pharmacy and vet med.), and a deal is in the works to bring a med school to Athens. As an English major, I have seen first hand want wonderful professors UGA has. I have developed a close relationship with several and even consider them my friends. Beware of Terry, the Business school. Many of my friends complain about lare class size even in their major classes.

Professors are what you make them. If you want to get to know your professors, you can, even with the big lecture hall classrooms. My best advice is, the uga "key" is your best friend! It is a guide to every professor's gpa from last semester's classes. Study if you want. If you don't you might end up with a poor grade though. Again look to the key. Competition is high in some classes and low in others. It depends on what you are trying to get from the class. Also a lot of teachers curve based on the highest grade, so even if you don't have a 90 in a class you may still get an A because you did better than your peers.

Right now I am in pretty small classes. The Stat department is so small at UGA that we share our building with EITS and part of the Natural History museum. We have two classrooms and a computer lab, so it's a pretty small building. None of my Stat classes can exceed 28 if it ever meets in the Stat lab because that's all the more the lab can hold. With small classes, most of my professors/instructors know my name. Since I'm in the FRC, I have more opportunities to interact with UGA faculty outside of my classes. We have a group of fellows that visit us each year. That group consists of the Vice President for Instruction, Cheif of Staff to the President, and several Associate Deans of Franklin College. One of our fellows is an astronomy professor and I work with him every semester to organize a trip to the UGA observatory. I've had dinner with faculty and I've even played trivia with a small group of our fellows. Once a week we have a guest speaker (usually professors) come, so it's additional time with faculty that most students don't have. It's helped me meet faculty I normally wouldn't come in contact with. This also brings a lot of "intellectual conversations" that are not directly linked to students' grades. Students study all of the time, but the amount varies from subject to subject. Organic Chemistry is a class that requires a lot of studying time. At the same time, campus is always full of students playing frisbee (regardless of the weather). Some students are very competitive with each other. In large lecture classes where the professors curve the grades, students have to compete. If you're in the top, you could get an A even if you failed all of your tests...you just have to be better than the rest of your class. Other students are just competitive to be competitive. Also, most of the science majors are also pre-med, pre-dent, pre-vet, pre-pharm, or pre-nursing so they need top grades to get into a school of their choice. UGA has the only vet school in Georgia as well as 1 of 3 pharmacy schools in state (and the best pharm school in GA). Pre-vet and pre-pharm students usually want in to UGA's schools, so students are potentially competing against friends in classmates for those spots.

Once you get to upper-level classes, the size is much smaller. Within my major, many of my professors know my name. I think this is a student's responsibility though. Go to office hours and be vocal in class. My professors are more than willing to spend extra time, even with non-class related discussions. As a finance major, I have found the department to be organized, helpful, and academically strong. The finance advising is extremely helpful. There is always someone available with answers to all of my questions.

If you can, join the honors program. It's easier, I'm telling you. Kids can get by doing nothing a lot of the time and still make a B. I do a little more than nothing (I wok hard but I don't kill myself) and I find it easy to make A's. And I party. NO, it is not easy to have genuinely intellectual conversations unless you're talking to a pretentious asshole. Intellectualism is out there, you just have to dig deep. I haven't been especially impressed with the intelligence of my business teachers, either, although there are some gems (Karahanna, Laplante, Mrs. McClain). Education is geared toward getting a job in the business major, which is terribly annoying. I wish i went for anthropology or something where people learn about life and intelligent stuff. Business is a joke, mostly. Spanish classes are a joke and easy and if you want to learn, you have to really force yourself to do extra work. Business kids are generally tightwads and uncreative and just want a structured class where they can assure themselves that they'll at least get a B. It's okay with me because Terry at least has a good reputation, but it's so hard to find students that will actually be good business people and aren't just blindly moving through motions. there is not much competition in my classes and i frequently find myself among the few who have anything to say/is willing to speak up during class.

In the larger lecture classes, its impossible for the professors to know your name unless you make the effort to seek them out, which I highly recommend. There is no time of day when you can't find at least one student studying.

Most of my professors do not know my name, because the classes can have 100-300. In smaller classes I would say the professors are normally good about knowing names, however. My favorite classes are my journalism classes, because I love current events and controversial issues. I love Spanish, but always find it to be my least favorite class. The amount of time students study I think varys greatly and it is hard to generalize that. Class participation, especially in large classes, is hard for many. I think that students are really competitive, because that is how we know the job market will be. I have not taken any "unique" classes, but am hoping to enroll in a sign language class before I graduate. I am in the PR/Journalism department, and feel that teachers are very involved. I will spend time outside of class with my PR teacher, who is having students come to her house to do extra work on a project, which is nice. I think academic requirements are fair, and I will feel prepared to get a job in a few years.

profs know my name cause its a small major fav class was recreation design least fav is plants of the SE students study all the time @ the slc class participation is mandatory in my major my major talks about plants and designs all the time my major is really competitive... almost cutthroat unique class is crss2300 its agro-terrorism my major is small and i love it. we are the #3 landscape architecture program in the us. professors are always around the buidling to talk to outside class my major is preparing me for my job and its terrific. @ my internship i was more valuable than the newly hired landscape architect who just graduated from umass

The professors at UGA for the most part are really willing to work with you as long as you are willing to put in an effort. There are always those professors that jsut go through the motions of being a teacher, but for the most part I had some really great teachers that really did care. You had to put yourself out there sometimes, but it was well worth it in the end. My favorite professor was Dr. Samp, she taught several speech comm classes and I always enjoyed her teaching. She really tried to relate to all of us and what was going on NOW. She also cared for her students and really wanted to see them succeed. UGA is an academically hard school to get into and you have to put forth the work if you want to see the results you want. Even though UGA has a reputation of being a party school they also have a very good academic reputation as well.