Student Profile
Carl
- Class: Junior
- Major: Engineering
- Gender: M
- High School: Tritpn Regional High School
- Transfer Student: N
Big Picture
I think the size of RPI is right for a good engineering school at abou 5000 undergraduate students. RPI is located in Troy, NY which is not a good college town. It can be pretty rough in places but the RPI campus itself is nice and pretty safe. The administration is very authoritative and just a pain. They are always dictating to students and faculty alike, they do not listen well to the student body or professors. Theres not much school pride, theres only 2 D-1 sports, men and women's hockey. All other teams are D-3 or club team which sucks either way. There are a lot of clubs for every interest but they are not usually well funded and theres not a lot of general athletic space around campus. The few actual team sports get all the priority while club sports, intermurals, and regular students get the screwed.
Academic Life
Academics at RPI are very good. You required classes for freshman and sophmores are generally large lectures(~100 poeple) but your electives and usually much smaller(~25) and your professors know who you are. As you get to your junior and senior year your specific major classes tend to get smaller. For my major, materials engineering, there is 25 people in my class so thats the max people in any materials class. Class participation is common, and professors like to converse with students and impart their knowledge on them. Students do have intellectual conversations outside of class as it is a very intellectual institution. Students can often get research for a professor, kind of like a work study, and its good for a resume. The education, especially in engineering is geared toward getting a job and being successful at it.
Student Body
Well RPI is a fairly diverse place. There are people from all over the country and all over the world in attendance here. There aren't a lot of strong convictions amongst the whole student body but lots of small groups advocating certain issues. I'm not sure what kind of kids wouldn't fit in, people who are not prepared to put in lots of work and effort would not survive here. But it is a generally accepting place. Kinda generally wear whatever casual stuff they feel like to class. All student groups generally interact and the school culture is well integrated. There is a fair amount of rich kids at RPI and also a lot from poor families. The school provides a lot of financial aid so that lots of people from different backgrounds can attend. Students are a little politically active but are generally apathetic abotu what does not directly affect them.
The Best Things
academics, my fraternity
The Worst Things
the guy/girl ratio
