Virginia Commonwealth University Top Questions

The best thing: The diversity, the city, the life One thing I'd change: I'd get rid of all the morons who come because they can't get in anywhere else Reactions: Nobody knows where I'm from when I'm at VCU, none of my friends have heard of it in NJ I spend most of my time on campus in my dorm room It's not a college town, it's a city... with a college that empties out on the weekends, but plenty of other stuff VCU's administration is alright- get rid of the University college program! Definitely a big to-do over housing- THERE IS NONE! THere is minimal school pride VCU is unusual in the fact it is huge without actually being united The homecoming game was amazing though! Complaints = no unity, no pride, no involvement

The best thing about VCU is the diversity. I have met so many different people, and made a ton of friends. If I could change one thing, I would give VCU a football team. But as much as I want one, a football team is a huge undertaking and I understand why it will still be a few years until the school actually starts working on that. VCU is huge. It's the largest school in the state, so often times you will see a lot of people you won't know. I like that because it pushes me to make new friends and meet new people. I get mixed reactions from people when I tell them about VCU. Some of them who don't know much or anything about the school will adopt a slightly patronizing tone and look at me differently. Other people will get excited since they know VCU is on the rise, and we have a fantastic basketball team. So the responses are always different. I find myself hanging out in the Student Commons a lot. There is tons of stuff to do there. You can go to a quiet room and do homework, or grab a bite to eat, or there is even a pool hall downstairs if you want to go shoot some pool for an hour or two. VCU is in Richmond. It's Virginia's state capital and one of the largest cities around. However, there are lots of fun things to do on and off campus. On campus there is the Siegel Center which has a gym and a basketball court with lots of fun stuff to do. There are art shows and exhibits to go to if you're into that stuff. Off campus there are clubs and all kinds of shops to hang out at. And just down a ways is Carytown. There are tons of little shops and restaurants and neat places to hang out. There is a $2 movie theatre that shows 1 or 2 movies a week and a lot of students like to go down there. The administration does its best to help out the students. I have a lot of respect for them. The biggest controversy on campus was around our newest campus addition. They recently built VCU brand new business building east of Belvidere Street. The rest of the Monroe Park Campus is on the West side of Belividere. A lot of people were hesitant about the idea of crossing that busy street, but the building is really nice, and the walk really isn't unreasonable, so that dispute sort of resolved itself. VCU students love their basketball. The student sections of seating almost always fill up for every game. A lot of people even get defensive about VCU because so many people see it as a slacker school. So the fans are that much more devoted so they can help crush that idea. The most unusual thing about VCU is the setup. The university is built in the middle of the city almost, and so there are businesses and churches and houses all around and throughout the campus. It's sort of cobbled together in a way, but it works well, and the students like it. I will always remember learning which streets are One Way. You see a lot of interesting traffic situations as people are learning this one way street system, so I made sure I learned it fairly well.

The best thing about VCU is probably that it is located in the middle of a city, so there is always something to do. If I could change anything, it would be that VCU is WAY too focused on being "diverse". It seems like the school and much of its students don't even understand the meaning of the word. As a white student, I find that nearly everything from scholarship and academic opportunities, to many of the events around the school are designed with minorities (mainly African American) in mind. Most of the people that work at the dining centers are African American, and many many times they were quite rude to me. I also have a younger sister who is a freshman at the school, and she went to the school step show (which is kind of like a pep rally), however, she and her roommate were the only white people there. She later called me up crying, because a group of black girls had tripped her and called her a "stupid white girl" behind her back. I just wish the school would realize that racism goes both ways and try to serve all of its students and not just the minorities. Since VCU is the largest school in VA with around 30,000 students, I would say it is definitely too large. The housing problem is terrible. I had to move into an apartment after my freshman year, because I couldn't get a dorm. When I tell people that I go to VCU, the most common reaction is "Good for you. I could never live in the city." I can't say I really enjoy Richmond myself. Going to VCU isn't really any sort of major achievement. It depends on how well I know the person I guess, but since the acceptance rate is known for being so high, I've never gotten "Wow. You go to VCU!" I spend most of my time on campus in the student commons, which is kind of a student hangout that has a Subway and a Chick fillet in it. It also has a small game room with pool tables and a one lane bowling alley. There are also a few classes in the commons. It's located just about in the center of campus, so when I'm waiting for classes, I'll often go there to hang out. There is a joke that goes around VCU, where people say that VCU is going to own all of Richmond someday. I wouldn't call it a college town, but I wouldn't say "what college town?" either. VCU has a large presence in Richmond, but Richmond is also the capital of Virginia. I've visited other schools located in college towns and VCU certainly does not have the same feel. I'd say it's a very different experience then what college is generally pictured as. I think VCU's administration is awful. Twice the school lost my high school transcripts and put a hold on my registration. I've also had problems with withdrawing from classes. Because the school is so large, it seems that each department operates on it's own, but when you have a question no one really knows what is going on. I think the last big controversy at VCU was when Taylor Biel went missing two years ago. It made a lot of younger people afraid to come to VCU, and it also made people think Richmond was a dangerous city. No. I do not feel that there is a lot of school pride. People tend to do their own thing. There are a few who attend basketball games, but I never realized how little pride there was until I visited friends at Virginia Tech. VCU does not have a football team. The dean says he does not want our school to put more focus on athletics, but I think if we had a football team our school would have more pride. I hate to be so negative, but I don't really think there is anything that special about VCU that will make me always remember it. I think the most frequent student complaints are about how rude the people that work for dining halls are.

By virtue of being in the middle of Richmond, VCU has a lot going on. The school does a lot to try to keep students entertained and they're making big strides to create a "college atmosphere" even though the very urban campus completely lacks one at present time. The administration is nothing if not ambitious. They literally want to own all of Richmond. And with that mentality comes some school pride. I think there will always be naysayers on any campus but what I'll always remember about the school was how I attended during a period of tremendous growth which lead to a lot of excitement around campus.

The best thing about VCU is the fact that there's a gay club (Godfrey's) ten minutes from the dorms, and that it's free on Wednesdays with a student ID. The school's nice and large, which makes it good for finding people to connect with, but harder when it comes to having close relationships with professors and that sort of thing. People who do not attend VCU know that it's large, that it's full of art kids. Of course my grandparents just say, "Aren't there a lot of BLACKS there?" I find the professors alright, but wish the counselors would put aside more time to really help the students - respond to emails at length, allot more than ten minutes for one-on-one meetings. Also I find the technology services terrible. Wireless and ethernet are frequently down, cell service is nonexistant in the dorms unless you have Verizon. Calling tech services or submitting trouble tickets is a waste of time. However, if you have a school computer and send it in to be fixed, expect great, free service.

hmm, The best thing about VCU, probably the diversity. THere are so many different kinds of people. VCU is not the stereotypical college. I don't think I'd change anything, except for the 7-940 classes (too long) and the academc advising...its AWFUL. We also should invest in more student housing. We don't have enough so we are putting students up in close-by hotels. When I say I go to VCU, no one really has a reaction, I'm sure they think I didn't get into another sschool, but VCU's accomplishments aren't publicized very much. I send a lot of time, in the Student Commons. Richmond, va is NOT a college town, but VCU takes up most of the city. It's also the largest employer in Richmond. VCU's administration is decent. Trani, never cancels school for weather because he grew up in the North East and believes the snow we get is a joke. The administration thinks greek life is a joke, so really doesn't do anything for/with them. Well, I'm nott sure what the biggest controversy is, probaly the disappearnace of Taylor Behl in 2005. We also get a lot of pro-lifers on a very liberal/ liberatrain pro-choice campus, thats always fun. We have school pride when it comes to basketball games. Everyone dresses in gold and goes to the game. Unsuall about VCU, we are an open campus, we know tthe names of the bums that hang out around here..haha. We have every different type of restaurant from every corner of the earth around campus, we have Nigerian, mediterranian, African, italian, chinese, japanese, anything you can think of. An experiance i'll always remember if move in day. Our freshman dorms are high rises, meaning there are 18 dorm floors. It was AWFUL. I'm not sure what the most frequent student complaint is....probably just student advising.

The best thing about VCU is the amount of things available that you can be involved in. There's something to suit all your interests. I'd definitely change how the people at the Commons and that are in charge of events run things. They really don't help out the student organizations and in fact, they make it hard for you to succeed. There have been many times where the organization I have been involved with has tried to have a fund raiser on campus and we've have simply given up because of all the red tape and excuses. It's really sad to see student org's trying to make a difference and the very school that they go to and are helping promote put them down. I think in some ways my school is too large because in many instances, there are people that have to sit on the floor in lectures. Of course, this is a fire hazard, so what choice do they have? I get mixed reactions about VCU when I tell people I go there. Some ask me if it's really dangerous, or I get asked about Taylor Beil a lot. Other times people comment about how much VCU has done for Richmond. I spend most of my time at a coffee shop called Common Groundz that isn't part of the VCU campus but is close by enough to make it convenient. VCU is Richmond and Richmond is VCU, so the whole city is a college town, but some parts are better than others. VCU's administration, in relation to the music department specifically, has in at least one instant taken money out of the music scholarships to pay for a light fixture in our dining hall. They are most concerned with departments having to do with Engineering, Medicine, and Business. I think they feel that college is a business and they're more concerned with expanding their empire in Richmond than making our education more affordable. What good will shiny new buildings be if no one can afford to take classes in them without the aid of loans with insane interest rates? The biggest controversy on campus that I can remember recently was the shutting down of the Student Resource Center. It was a grant-funded center and the only place students could go for specialized service if they were raped, sexually assaulted, etc etc. In a place like VCU, in an urban setting and with a huge student population, this is a much needed resource. Students protested and talks were held, but because I'm studying abroad right now, I'm a little behind of how that has all turned out. A few times I wanted to walk up to campus tours and tell the fathers that if something happens to their daughters here, there will no longer be any specialized resource for her to go to get guidance and help. I think if the administration thought it would put a dent in how many people come to VCU or pay for school, they'd keep it around. It's all about the money. There's a good amount of school pride, we have a really great basketball team and that helps out a lot. VCU is a mix of every kind of person. Internationally, interest-wise, everything. You have artsy, fraternity-type, preppy, quirky, all kinds. I think students most complain about how the size of the school hinders the inner workings of our education and daily university life.. There are a lot of rules and regulations, red tape and excuses made by people who work in the Commons and Activities department. An organization on campus tried to have a fund raiser involving food and beverages and the school made up all sorts of excuses because Aramark is in charge of food and the organization would be competing with them. Aramark is a huge company and this fund raiser was for a non-proit organization. How ridiculous is that?

I think that the best thing about VCU is that it's in the middle of a city, and that you can easily escape campus and go wherever you want quickly. There's so much to do in Richmond, and students are rarely bored here. One thing I would change is to have more on campus housing for upperclassmen who don't want to live in an apartment or be an RA. The school is sized pretty well. VCU is the biggest school in VA now, but the school is actually large enough to accommodate that many students, so there aren't really any overcrowding issues. People usually assume that I'm an art major when I tell them I go to VCU, I'm actually an English major. The school has really good art programs, but I need something more grounded as a major that I can really depend on for a long time. I spend most of my time on campus in the dining hall, or in the commons socializing with the many new friends that I have made here at school. VCU has a "quasi" college town, in that the immediate areas around the school are mostly owned by VCU, or are apartments for students going to VCU. The school has less influence downtown or up by Carytown though. I haven't had much direct contact from the school's administration except for periodic emails sent to all students about upcoming events and such, but they do a good job of keeping the school in line, and safe. There was a recent controversy about a hazing incident with one of the fraternities on campus. They have since been placed on suspension. There is a TON of school pride for the basketball teams, and VCU homecoming is a one-of-a-kind event. Most student complaints are about freshman housing or the security guards on the first floor of the freshman dorms.

Richmond is not defined by VCU; though the school as had a positive impact on the economic development of downtown. VCU has woven itself into the fabric of the city, while still having a definte identity. We're urban but personable, hip but historic, and edgy but not intimidating. The best thing about VCU is that you get a large campus experience with a family-like enviroment. There are over 30 thousand students at the university, yet there are only 32 kids in my junior class of photography. We're best freinds, working together day in and day out. I am so lucky to have the tight-knit student enviroment usually found at private colleges, and still have acsess to the resources of Virginia's largest educational institution.

The best things about VCU are that, in my experience, no matter how big the class you'll be taught by an actual professor. TAs were only encountered in labs or supplemental instruction sessions. The other thing is that its location in the middle of downtown Richmond makes boredom nigh-impossible. The sheer volume of restaurants around here alone make it so that, if you have the necessary funding, you'll be eating out with friends a lot. We also tend to be the focal point (or near enough as makes no difference) for local events, including music, sports, and minor disasters on the local news. Just make sure you can walk around: the campus is quite spread out but it does tend to ward off the freshman 15. School pride is strong, especially when it comes to Basketball, but allow me to let you in on one of the school's biggest in-jokes: as VCU has no football team, we make the claim that VCU is "Still Undefeated" in football. Hoodies declaring this are widely available at the bookstore (no joke).