We asked Ash...
What are the academics like at your school?
No.
My favorite class so far was Drawing. It was a small class so we got individual attention, and I enjoy drawing. I'm also really enjoying Modern South Asian Literature because it's also a fairly small class and there's a lot of discussion and room for students to speak and I like the fact that there's not too much lecturing.
My Least favorite classes were Perception (in the psychology department) and Early Modern Architecture. The Perception teacher was unorganized, hard to understand, and just in general didn't teach well, and on Top of that he was a hard grader. The only person who knew what they were doing in that class was the TA and he's the only reason I passed. The early modern architecture teacher was a Terrible teacher. She was boring and didn't explain things well. She was way too old to be teaching, I don't even think she's teaching this semester or anymore after this last semester. She knew her subject but had no idea how to teach it. Any interest I had in the subject was sapped out of me through her teaching.
I do think NYU students have some intellectual conversations outside of class.
Students are definitely competitive, more so in some departments than others.
My department (Urban Design and Architecture- in the Art History Department) is really small and I don't really like it. The biggest pain is that we have a "Fine Arts Library" where you have to go and read some of the homework your teachers assign you, but you can't, check out the books, or photocopy pages and take them out, nothing like that. You have to sit there and read you homework. AND the hours are bad for it too, so if you have a heavy course load then it's really hard to get in there to actually do your homework. Also there's NO DESIGN really involved in my major...it's mostly architectural history...and I'm most interested in the design aspect... so it kind of sucks overall.
No, I don't spend time with professors outside of class.
NYU's academic requirements are okay, I think it's good to have people try out every field of interest. The only thng I don't like is the fact that we have to take 2 sciences.
The education is geared toward getting a job in some schools, but being a CAS student I don't think there's much help there unless you VERY actively seek out help at the career center. Learning for it's own sake doesn't happen unless you pursue your subjects like that.