Arkansas Tech University

The academics here are overall very good. The professors here are generally very open and very helpful if you need anything. They try very hard to learn everyone's name, even for the general education courses where there can be 70-100 students in one class. After the gen eds the student-teacher ratio is very nice. Most professors will really make an effort to have educational discussions with the class rather than just lecturing at a sleeping audience. I feel like you learn a lot more this way because people ask questions that you may not have even thought of and it leads to gaining many more perspectives, also it helps you be more alert in class. I am majoring in Speech Communications, and I have loved every class and professor in this field so far. It really helps you open up as a person and a leader. These are skills that will help you no matter what career path you take. I also love that there are a ton of elective credit hours required which would make it ideal for double majors or for multiple minors. I am paring my Communications major with minors in Psychology, Sociology, and Religious studies, all of which fit right into the electives I need to graduate. These departments are also very intriguing. I am particularly fond of the Sociology classes I have taken thus far. They just teach me so much about life. Every day I go to class I really feel like I've learned something and that I can apply it to not only my future, but my day-to-day life. It is usually very easy to get ahold of professors, which is great if an emergency comes up before a test or presentation, or if you just need a little one-on-one time to better understand the material. Many upperclassmen are almost friends with the professors in their majors, which makes learning more fun and helps you to retain your knowledge. My favorite class so far would have to be Oral Interpretation with Dr. Eshelman. In this class you recite different types of literature as a performance and you get to be creative with it so your audience will better understand the piece as you interpret it. The reason I loved this class is because it was so interactive, and it really helped me to get comfortable talking in front of people. It got me out of my comfort zone and let me present things to my class that were really important to me. It was also always great for a good laugh; I would always leave class in a higher spirit than when I came in.

There are many diverse students at this school, it is a small campus with ample opportunity. It's a growing campus in not only numbers but also popularity. The parking is the worst thing about the campus. To me, the campus is just right and is where I feel comfortable. The staff and students are all knowledgeable and helpful. I love my campus!

I have friends on campus that come from all different religions, races, genders, and backgrounds. I don't think that any student could feel out of place at Arkansas Tech. We have people that were born and raised in the same town as Arkansas Tech and we have people from the Middle East and Asia. LGBT students would not feel out of place at Tech either. I have yet to see or hear about discrimination of a LGBT student at Tech. All types of students interact at Arkansas Tech. Tech even encourages this by assigning roommates from different ethnicities. My first year at Tech my roommate was from China and we are still good friends to this day. If there were four tables of students in the dining hall I would say that one table would be jocks, one table would be band people, one table would be the people from frats, and the last table would be scattered groups of people that don't fit in these groups and teachers. The majority of people at Arkansas Tech are from the United States with a fair number coming from Arkansas. The students are very politically aware and active. We have clubs for republicans, democrats, and a group for people who just don't really like government. I would say that overall these students are pretty evenly spread. The financial background of most is middle class, although some have enough money to join fraternities and some have to work full time to pay for their college. The students at Tech talk about how much they will earn some day and thing about it even more. Money is one of the greatest motivators for students in colleges everywhere.

It looks modern, and you can always see people working to improve the university. A student isn't overwhelmed by the size, but it is not super small either.