The following reviews are the views of students or alumni at this school and are unrelated to the school data and other editorial content on usnews.com. These reviews neither reflect nor impact a school's position within the Best Colleges rankings.
I love the Knox student body. There really is no "typical" Knox student, and the one thing that brings us all together is how different we all our. At Knox, I have always felt free to be myself, however weird and wacky that might be, and people appreciate me for it. My first week at school, I met many of the people who would become my closest circle of friend randomly sitting in a circle in a sidewalk junction in the quads throwing a ball to each other. This group continues to meet weekly over a year later. One complaint I have about Knox is the town. Galesburg is in the middle of nowhere and the campus is not situated in the safest of neighborhoods. I do not feel comfortable leaving campus by myself at night and there really isn't anywhere to go even if you do leave campus. Although we are only a few hours to Chicago, you won't get there as often as you might like to think you will. This can get pretty confining.
Emily Sophomore
There is no way to name the best thing about Knox. I could name any number of things, from the sense of community, to the wonderful faculty members, to Flunk Day. Even though Knox wasn't my first choice school by a long shot, I can't imagine being anywhere else, and I recommend a Knox education to anyone who thinks they might like a place like Knox because I truly believe Knox is a unique place for people to create an identity. If I had to change one thing, I would probably wish for better food, but no matter where you go, you're going to get sick of the food, and the "Caf" does offer the materials to make some pretty delicious food if you are willing to get creative. Our new Dining Services Director is also taking big strides to make new options which he often cooks himself, and wants to get the students involved in the decisions, so I expect that will get much better as time goes on. When I tell people that I go to Knox, I get one of two reactions. Either they have never heard of it and have no idea where it is, or, they know someone who went there and therefore react very positively to the idea. One of the main things that attracted me to Knox was that every person I met who'd gone to Knox or knew someone who did said that they absolutely loved it. They LOVED it. I never even met someone who said they just LIKED it. That excited me. I spend most of my time on campus either in my suite with friends hanging out or doing homework, or in the Center for Fine Arts, where most of my extracurriculars are held. When the weather's nice, I spend as much time outside as possible because the campus is gorgeous in the fall and spring. Galesburg is far from a college town, which was one of my biggest aversions to coming here in the first place. However, I rarely find myself needed to go off campus to find entertainment. There is always a lot going on right here on campus, and when I'm not attending one of those things, there's always homework. If I do feel the need to get away, Peoria is a 45 minute drive, and it's also very easy to just take the train up to Chicago. Group trips to Target are always a blast as well, and there are 5 dollar movies on Tuesday nights at the town movie theatre, with free popcorn and drinks included. Knox's administration is very approachable, as well as very dedicated to doing the best they can for the students. The Deans at this school are all wonderful people, who genuinely want to give you the best for your money here, and are there to help you through both academic and personal struggles. At Knox, the students really do have a voice. The biggest recent controversy on campus has been a debate about whether or not to continue to have Greek life on campus, or whether the current Greek system should be capped so that it doesn't continue to grow. Both faculty and students have been debating the issue for a while now, and it is still an ongoing discussion. While Greek life on the Knox campus is profoundly different from the stereotypical Greek system of a large university, some people don't think it's positive effects on the student body outweigh what they see as negative effects, so a lot of research is being done on what the Greek system does and does not do to make Knox a great place to get an education. There is a lot of school pride here, and I love that it's not school pride that's focused on a sports team or anything like that; we have genuine pride for the institution that is giving us our education. I love it here. There are many things unusual about Knox. We have a purple track... one of five in the country supposedly. We also have one of the few remaining college carnivals: a day called Flunk Day which happens every Spring Term. It is a surprise day, starting around 5:00 a.m., when students are woken up by a group of Seniors known as the Friars, and a day of festivities occurs in place of classes for the day. Another unusual thing about Knox is the ability of students to be consider equals with their professors. For example, I have had dinner with several of my professors, and have no qualms about going to see them and talk to them about class or about life in general. That kind of comfortability with the faculty and administration was not something I expected to encounter in college. Another interesting tradition is Pump handle. It begins with the President shaking one of the Dean's hands, and then another Dean shakes both of their hands, and a line forms, so by the time everyone has passed through the line, you have shaken the hand of every student and faculty member at Knox. One experience I'll always remember was my first night at college as a first-year. There is an event called "Play Fair," in which the entire first-year class is brought together on the lawn at night and you play a bunch of ridiculous games to get to know each other. What's wonderful about it is that you are there, at a time when you're vulnerable and uncertain, yet you're standing there with your entire class, doing ridiculous things together. There aren't that many colleges where you could get your entire class together in front of one building to play games together.
Margaret Sophomore
Knox is a very prestigious school. Though it's small and your every day common person probably hasn't heard of it, Knox's name carries a lot of weight in the academic and professional community. The campus is beautiful and historic, and parts of Galesburg are as well. Galesburg has a pretty bad reputation on campus because there are many run-down areas in the town due to a high unemployment rate. However, it gets a lot more attention than it deserves and I've never found the town dangerous or scary. I would have to say that my favorite thing about Knox is the close relationships you form with EVERYONE! I'm friends with my professors, suitemates, people I work with, etc. It's a small college and if you don't know someone, you probably recognize them or their name.
Anna Sophomore
The best thing about Knox is the size. I am at Arizona State right now and 55,000 people is very intimidating. I have classes of 200 people, and many classes I want or have to take are online and I hate them. At Knox, the professors are full-time faculty and your classes are always small discussion size. The one thing I often got frustrated about was the variety of classes offered, but once I got to a large university I found out that it is a problem there too. Most people when I told them I go to Knox they would have no idea what I was talking about. I spent most of my time in the theatre where I had a student work study in the costume shop or in the library. I never really left campus, and so I wouldn't really consider Galesburg a college town. There is plenty of stuff to do on campus, so I really only ventured out to the train station or grocery store. Knox's administration was always helpful and I knew many deans personally, who were willing to go out of their way to help me. The biggest controversy when I was on campus was a male Ginko tree that smelled really bad. Half of the people wanted to cut it down, half of the people fought to keep the tree. It was rather rediculous and silly in my opinion, but I am glad that that was the only major controversy we had to deal with. There is not much school pride, most of the sports teams were not very good, but basketball games were always packed and a lot of fun. The two major problems I had with Knox were the poor on campus housing conditions and extremely subjective grading. If you didn't like a professor in your department you didn't have the option to not take classes with them and thus I really think my grades suffered because of this. But the pros of a small campus might outway this issue to you, because at large universities you are graded by bubblesheets and often people who are not good test takers have much poorer grades there. It is important to assess your personal learning style and needs when picking the size of college you would want to attend.
Jamie Alum
At Knox each year we celebrate Flunk Day. Each year one day during Spring term, classes are canceled and the entire campus is filled with fun activities. Each year a group of Seniors are chosen as Friars and are charged with the task of alerting the campus. This year I was chosen as a friar and had an awesome time. We were kept up in the night before and completely surprised when we were told that we were Friars, the first group of students to know that Flunk day was indeed tomorrow. It was awesome. The day was filled with fun and friends. I rode a mechanical bull, saw a concert by Lucky Boys Confusion that evening and spent the day in the sun with my friends. I cannot believe that it was my last...
Brian Senior
Reviews provided by: UnigoThe Knox community is probably the single largest factor that creates in us such reverence and appreciation for our institution. The student body is a very diverse one-- not only culturally and ethnically but socioeconomically as well. The openness that most students promote causes lots of social and intellectual blending between small groups and cliques, so much so that nearly any student could find a comfortable group here. Another principal aspect of the Knox community is the high amount of agency that is encouraged within it. Faculty and administration are truly here for the students and serve to encourage us to take initiative-- since its such a small school, any one student can easily start up a club, column in the newspaper, radio program, independent study, or even help a professor design a new course. The community results in a lot of school pride, though its not usually expressed in terms of sports. Don't come here if you care more about being on a winning athletic team than receiving a first-rate education.
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