Temple University

I am a freshman who is transferring after only one semester here at Temple. I am in the Global Studies major. I am from rural PA and I believe that Temple did everything they could to pull the wool over the eyes of prospective students about many things.

First, I want to speak about the positives of Temple.
1) Philadelphia is a cool city and there is something for everyone to do/see.
2) The students at Temple are mostly really nice people.
3) The academic side of Temple isn't bad really, I did learn some valuable things during my time here.

Now on to the negatives of Temple.
When I went to the "Experience Temple Day" I didn't know it then but I was being fed a huge crock of sh*t. All they talked about was how safe Temple was and how big the police force is. Bull. In my time here, I have witnessed the infamous riot of 200 juveniles on Broad St and the horse punching incident. I know multiple people who have been robbed. There have also been countless assaults of Temple students simply walking close to or on campus. I recall one girl who was beaten with a rock by Anderson Hall. Temple is not a safe campus. Yeah it is lit up but that didn't seem to help the armed robberies and reports of gun shots that plastered my phone from the TU alerts all semester long.

Next is the problem that would be easiest to solve. Temple has the worst bureaucracy in the world! I recall reading on this website about Temple's staff and faculty being terrible and boy are they right. I had a horrible time trying to get my bill paid and I would sit on hold with the financial aid office for HOURS. This isn't just in the faculty at Temple, it goes down to the RAs and residential life directors of the dorms. I had a problem with my roommate doing pills in my room and all he received was a slap on the wrist. My friend down the hall has a similar problem with his roommate and nothing was done. Temple punishes the victims in cases like these and nobody cares about you. Another example, my good friend had his guest card taken away because he had alcohol on Halloween night. OK, fine. Do the crime, do the time. He waits the 10 days for the violation then after the 10 days were up he went to retrieve his card back from the front desk. But, the card somehow disappeared in those 10 days. They couldn't find it anywhere. My friend was sent all over to different offices to try and find this card and nobody could find it. So, even with him asking every week he had to wait until December to get his card back.

With that being said, I am glad that I could experience life in North Philadelphia. I made a few really good friends here and I am grateful for that. Also I don't believe Temple is representative of all of Philly. I feel that if somehow magically Temple could be picked up and physically moved to south philly or really anywhere out of North Philly it would be exponentially better.

I truly feel that Temple was riding off of their good football season in 2015-16 to pull more students in and get their money. They know how to market well. I'm happy to leave and I look forward to not feeling unsafe in walking around outside.

1st Year Male -- Class 1920

Faculty Accessibility: A, University Resource Use/ spending: F

I am a transfer student. I Went to DCCC prior to transferring for 2 years and fallowed a temple adviser's suggestions. After transferring i was told that more than half of my credit wouldn't matter for their requirements have changed... This has been a recurring issue for me at temple. As i finish my math course and am about to move in to higher level programming they changed their requirements AGAIN! I didnt think much of it becuase i figured i was grandfathered into the program that I initially came into. This was wrong, and they told me i had no choice but to take the next math course and wait till the fallowing semester to take the courses i want. Here I am a year after that and they have done it again, only this time they made me REPEAT a course because they said it has changed drastically. This wouldn't be a big deal if the credits from both counted, however they do not. I think that Temple is SCAMMING their students into staying longer than they should have to. I choose to transfer out and would not suggest this school to anyone unless your going for law or theater for those departments have nice people that actually help their students instead of forcing you to sit and wait for up to 2 hours for an appointment you made 2 weeks in advance. Dont let temples tax write off building fool you, if you are paying out of pocket you cannot afford morgan hall.

2nd Year Male -- Class 2015

University Resource Use/ spending: A+, Useful Schoolwork: F

I transferred to Temple University from West Chester University of PA in order to gain experience working with children in an urban environment. Overall, my experience was negative due to extreme problems with administration. The student population and professors were the only redeeming factors of this school. When I transferred, Temple administrators gave me a lot of trouble with course reciprocity from West Chester, even when the course titles were identical or nearly identical. I eventually was able to get a few additional courses transferred through a meeting with the Dean of Education, but ultimately I lost over 30 credits which is more than a year of work. I still believe that they simply wanted me to pay them $$$ for tuition and that was the ONLY reason my courses were not transferred.

Once I was admitted and started my classes, I did enjoy the course quality and student population. I found work easily working with students in an urban setting, and my experiences with that work are quite frankly what set me up for success in the teaching field. The information you get in class is helpful, but not always practical. There should be more field experience for education majors!

I personally felt as well that Temple requires too many "core classes"...it was a waste of time and money. I was often thinking why I needed to take classes that had no relation to what my professional and personal goals were...but that is pretty standard for most schools, so take it at face value I guess.

Ultimately, as I stated above, administrative errors were what made my time at Temple regrettable. Advising is the WORST problem at Temple, at least in the College of Education. You get whichever advisor is available, and they are incredibly disorganized because of the huge work load that is placed on each advisor (at the time of my attendance, there were only TWO advisors in the College of Education). Each time I had to explain which classes I had taken, and when I was getting near my student teaching experience I was told I only needed one more class. Once I finished that class, I was told I NEEDED ANOTHER CLASS. Advisors are supposed to support and guide you, but instead they let me down. The school wanted me to take another semester for the additional class, but I fought it hard because I was already delayed in graduating. Eventually they agreed to let me take it while student teaching...it was a challenge but at least I am done now.

Prior to that headache of an experience, another advisor told me I could take my last methods the summer after student teaching. I scheduled everything around that, until I was later told that it was NOT an option. Her error cost me a YEAR of my time as I had to restructure my entire course load. What's worse is that Temple told me I was "lying" about the fact that my advisor ever told me that this was an option, and wanted me to "prove" a verbal discussion that was held privately. Talk about demeaning the people (students) who are providing YOUR paycheck!

Luckily, I am very self-supporting and I was able to fight and "deal with" the ill advice and incorrect information provided by Temple. There are other instances I could discuss here but I believe what I have written gives you the picture.

Interestingly enough, whenever you owe Temple tuition they are RIGHT on top of it...perhaps that is the only area they are competent in with administration and staff aside from professors...asking and reminding you regarding your owed tuition. However, if you are relying on student loans...good luck! Even to get into the student loan department in the beginning of a semester is a challenge, let alone getting the staff there to appropriately and adequately handle your loans.

Maybe other majors do not have such problems, but think carefully about attending Temple. It is a huge school with many staff and administrative problems, however, it is in an urban setting which provides many wonderful opportunities for culture and socialization, and the professors/student body are pretty wonderful as a whole (at least in the College of Education).

As a side note, I did not live on campus during my time at Temple (I was a non-traditional married student) but I have heard that housing is pretty terrible and you can only live "on-campus" until your Junior year. I believe that will be changing soon, which would be good because apartments in that area are horrendously expensive and not exactly safe due to the geographic location of Temple (North Philadelphia).

Please note that this review is for MAIN campus...I also attended Ambler (I had to because of advising and scheduling problems) and I believe Ambler does not have nearly as many problems with staff and administration as main campus!

Alumnus Male -- Class 2000