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The only good thing about this school is the massive alcohol tolerance of most of its students and St. Pat's day week. The sports, besides women's basketball and soccer, are quite possibly the worst in the country and what's worse is no one cares. My freshman year I didn't even know when the homecoming football game was because there was nothing on campus about it.

MST has some good things going for it here. You can pretty well get to know all your professors with ease, the grad school is great for engineering and the non engineering department staff are some of the nicest most helpful people you will ever meet. I loved biology when I switched majors from aerospace engineering. That being said the rest of the school, specifically engineering, is horrible. Most teachers are out to make you fail and I'm not talking just trying. There are several classes with a combined drop and fail rate of around 20%. Almost any TA you get will be foreign and is incapable of answering a seemingly simple question. The math deparment it HORRIBLE. I have never had such bad teachers in my life. I had to teach myself calculus 1 and 3 because my teachers sucked so bad. There are a few good teachers but if you can, take math somewhere else. On average I had 6 hours of useless homework a night while I was doing aerospace engineering. I could pass the classes but all the teachers made me hate what I was doing so much I quit.

The biology and history departments are by far the best on campus. I knew pretty much all of the bio professors within the first 3 weeks I was in the department and they are all really pleasant and knowledgable people to be around. The history department is about the same way. I have never heard of anyone having a bad history teacher there and I loved all of mine. Also, most of them are pretty well regarded in the acedemic community and several of them have some pretty major books.

The student body is either Frat boy drunks or WEIRD. Picture your idea image of someone working at NASA in the '50's and I have seen him at Rolla. I have also seen a few kids wearing chain mail and caps. Keep in mind this was no where near Halloween, it is a regular occurence. There is a very large foreign population at Rolla which always got me because the professors always talk about stopping engineering jobs from going over seas. Also there are no good women. Well maybe 1% of the whole less thatn 25% female population but they are usually there to find husbands. The rest of them suffer from a commonly referred to condition there called "Rolla Princess Syndrome". That is they feel they are pretty much too good to talk to you if you don't have money or aren't going to graduate and have a job soon. One of my best friends from high school joined a sororiety down there and I maybe see her twice a semester now. Most students are from Missouri around St. Louis from an upper middle class background. Most of them just go there because their dad did and he wanted them to. The only thing that keeps most kids going there is the thought that they will make a lot of money when the graduate. Deep down there are only about 2% of the people there that would not perfer to be somewhere else if they could afford it or it was as close to home.

Social life either involves playing games over the high speed internet or DRINKING. I am much closer to the second. And I am not talking typical college drinking and alcohol tolerance. This is more like the drinking capabilities of Irish dock workers. One time my friends drank with some Aussies and Germans that came for some competition and even they were impressed with there abilities. Frats are a huge part of campus. Every one that does things is either in one or good friends with somebody in one. All the years events lead up to the annual St. Pat's day Celebration, which is pretty much a big drunken 2 weeks when the size of the town doubles. Every other type of social activity besides parties is pretty much nonexistent. Almost everyone who goes to a sports game is either drunk or is friends with one of the players. There is NOTHING to do in the town and it is full of backwoods hicks for lack of a better way to descibe them. You're stuck pretty much an hour and a half from anywhere fun/normal. I'm from a small town myself and didn't really think I'd mind it but it sucks.

Students are book smart but lack almost all common sense applications. Language and communication skills are almost completely lacking. Everyone is either a complete nerd and tool or they go get drunk all the time. Oh and there are these people called swampies that smell like ass. If you have seen the World of War Craft episode of South Park it nails them to a T.

All of these are completely true.

DO NOT GO HERE IF YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF NORMAL! I let the place suck my soul out for two years before I decided to switch majors and transfer to MIZZOU. Also it's not as great of engineering school as they say. Sure it's the best in the region but they aren't even in the top 75 polls for most of their departments. If you want to be an engineer you will make plenty of money. Spend some extra for college and don't regret being there everyday