The Georgia Institute of Technology

I started undergrad at Georgia Institute of Technology back in 2003 and finished in the winter of 2007. I took classes during two summer semesters as well. Upon graduating I found a good job at a Fortune Global 500 company doing software consulting. I survived the great recession of 2008-2009 without being laid off, and I'm doing quite well with compared to most of my peers at the moment.

Looking back on my 4.5 years at Georgia Tech, I have to say the frustration and bitterness I experienced during that time still affects me to this day. I constantly wonder how my life would have turned out if I had gone somewhere else and had a more pleasant college experience. Despite making some great friends, I still have vivid memories of the misery we went through. It was as if Georgia Tech was a bonding experience for us like people would have bonded through an epic war. We had a common enemy and it was the ridiculous workload and unhelpful professors. Images of students bursting out in tears during tests, people joking about suicide, friends taking Redbull, Monster, and Adderall to help pull multiple all nighters are burned into my memory. I remember one time watching the sun rise up from inside the library after pulling two consecutive all nighters and wondering what the heck I was doing with my life... questioning if this pain and suffering would be worth it one day. The negativity of the atmosphere has sadly made me a more cynical and sardonic person.

Academically, Georgia Tech had the potential to be a great school. The professors definitely knew what they were talking about, but for the most part classes seemed very rushed and if you wanted to understand concepts better, you would need to invest time outside of class to ask them questions. Many times professors would be very busy with research and defer your questions to the TAs. Individual attention was not expected. What helped me the most was working through a lot of problems with my classmates on conference room whiteboards. I feel like my teamwork skills improved drastically during this time.

Socially, GT is not as bad as people make it out to be. There are many interesting people, just as there are many strange and uninteresting ones. The school definitely taught me that associating with certain people helps elevate your mood more than associating with others. You definitely learn to pick your friends here. One thing that helped me get through the tough times was working out at the CRC. The gym facilities were amazing and served as a sanctuary when everything else was going to hell. It was also very difficult to meet girls at Georgia Tech, and I ended up dating girls from other schools in the Atlanta metro region during this time.

After I graduated in December 2007 it was not difficult to find a job. I found a job after living at home for a few months which turned out to be nothing closely related to what I had studied. Instead of doing hardcore electrical engineering, I ended up doing software consulting for engineering software. Fortunately for me this opened up a career path into areas which I could excel and prosper in the growing software/IT industry.

I also ended up relocated to a different part of the country. What I found disappointing was the fact that nobody outside of the south gives GT alumni the recognition you feel you deserve. The school is simply not well known outside the south by the people who matter. When I say people who matter, I'm not talking about technical coworkers. I'm talking about people who matter towards your employment prospects who are mostly managers and HR people.

In conclusion, I had to put up with more hardship than the average person during undergrad and it did not make a huge difference in terms of results. Unless you are serious about being an engineer, and engineering is your passion that you will devote most of your life to, I would advise against going here. I was motivated by wanting an above average salary, and I got what I wanted. However I could have accomplished the same at someplace moderately easier but similarly ranked. A moderately easier school may have also helped me in the search for a graduate program. This is really the next step I am looking to take and I feel like having a sub 3.0 GPA has really hurt my chances of getting into a top tier graduate program. I'm into my late 20s now, and for what it's worth I look back and slightly regret missing out on a more enjoyable while I was 18,19,20, and 21. I have a solid career now, but one thing I cannot have back are those lost years of my life.

4th Year Male -- Class 2007

Faculty Accessibility: A, Useful Schoolwork: F

-Avoid on-campus housing, even in your first year. You have no control over who your roommates will be until after you have paid your contract (and then only, housing does not refund to my knowledge - you can only change to somewhere else on campus). Sure, you can specify your desired roommates in your application and most of the time, you should get them (if they specify also, that they want to room with you), but it is not always easy to guarantee you will have great chemistry with your roommates (just because they are friends, doesn't mean you will successfully share the same space). Since you pay the whole 3-4 month housing fee up front, do you want to take a chance of wasting your money? I sure wish I can gone off-campus to a single room apartment, living alone, throughout my years at Georgia Tech (until I found my awesome life partner, of course). I sure got burned by my roommates. At one point, my ultra-conservative roommates decided to complain about me because my boyfriend slept over too much (IN MY OWN ROOM in an apartment with shared bathrooms). Oh, the walls are too thin for sex in the apartments. Sure, I can see their point..NOW, that I finally do live in a decent apartment off-campus with my life partner (where the walls are NOT thin, thankfully). At another point, when I actually shared a room rather than an apartment, I had no privacy at all, with my roommate' friends constantly coming in and going and having a party at any time. So, it seems I have experienced both irritating others and being irritated myself. I sure wish all my energy had not been soaked up by roommates. SO DO STAY OFF-CAMPUS OR BE VERY SURE YOU ARE STAYING WITH ROOMMATES AT EACH POINT WHO YOU CAN ENJOY A PLEASANT ENVIRONMENT WITH. I guess my advice is hardly Georgia Tech-centric, but I was badly burned. (Oh and you don't want to deal with housing officials who often have a policeman-like attitude towards students. One guy decided he would threaten me and show his power, even though I was sobbing helplessly in his office AND NOT PICKING A FIGHT WITH HIM).

-Student solutions at Georgia Tech? Argue with your professors too much or mention you want to drop out of Georgia Tech? Rather than experience professors changing their ways and trying to be more accommodating and teach better (and I will get to how lackluster and boring the teachers are in a second), you are referred to school authorities, who force you to go into therapy or medications. Another stupid mistake that came from speaking my mind to my professor (and I wasn't even insulting him/her in anyway, I just mentioned I was considering leaving Georgia Tech). No one ever actually helped me solve my problems there (like help me explore better housing options for myself off-campus, or help me explore my interests more, or help me find more interesting classes/professors). Instead I was put on stupid meds that continue to have side effects to this day.

-But now, I understand, why no one at Georgia Tech could actually help me live a better life there and learn. Not the professors, not the Dean of Students office. It is because that stupid university is just not set up for a person like me. It took me too long to understand that. I sure regret the years I spent there.

Oh, let me tell you about the teaching..
Lackluster and pointless..they never gave feedback on grade on your paper. I went to a high school where teachers were far more interested in giving individualized feedback to me, but here, the best you could expect are answers released for everyone in the class. No red scribbling on the margins of the homework you worked so hard in, explaining how you got 17/20..just 17/20. It hardly matters whether you are taking senior or freshmen classes, most of the classes were like this only (and some lower level classes were half or fully multiple choice), which hardly merits paying such high tuition..even at instate rates. How the hell does Georgia Tech distinguish itself from other so-called party schools with lower admissions standards, if it follows such teaching and grading practices? You are paying for the name of faculty who are only interested in re-writing the whole damn textbook for you on the board in class time. Many classes have no class discussions. And there are still people arrogant enough to put down online colleges? At least in online colleges, you are not wasting money on the fuel and parking and commuting time.

In short, don't waste money here unless you get it for free, in which case, there might be a point for having such a name (and a mere hollow name) on your resume. Pointless pointless school for out of state undergraduates.

Oh wait..the campus? Many old buildings that look bad. Campus is in a poor state and not at all aesthetic. It is a very boring campus with extremes of social life (extreme drunken fraternity/sorority partying on the one hand, complete isolation with video games/movies on the other hand), and lots of cliques.

My advice for undergraduates is..try to two years of community college in Georgia first, be a Georgia resident and pay no tuition because you are covered by Hope...otherwise, stay in your own state/country, or do classes online..stop funding overrated colleges like Georgia Tech.

4th Year Female -- Class 2011

Surrounding City: B, Faculty Accessibility: D

Tech takes undergraduate tuition and spends it on research, or so it appears. Professors view teaching as below them. They load you up with work and then make the GPA system very steep and curved so that the students won't have time to complain about the lack of teaching.If you're sure you want to be an engineer and are prepared to work hard and teach everything yourself, Tech can set you up afterward and is well connected and highly respected in industry. If, however you're like me and don't have your life planned out, think twice about coming to Tech. When your GPA is trash and you feel like you've been scammed it might be too late then.

1st Year Male -- Class 2012

Surrounding City: A-, Education Quality: F