University of Colorado Boulder Top Questions

It's hard to describe what all of my classes are like in a general sense - even my freshman year, there was a lot of variety in my schedule. Communications is a pretty popular major, so some of the entry level classes are really big - I had one class that was probably 375 students last year. But, at a school of 25,000 undergraduate students, entry level classes in broad, popular majors are somewhat expected to be like that. I haven't had any other classes that big, and on the other end of the spectrum, my freshman writing class (required of all CU students to graduate) was 20 students, max. And I can genuinely say I really enjoyed both of those classes. Communications is within the College of Arts and Sciences so I'm also required to take a number of science courses, something I have no interest in (contrary to my writing class), but there are a significant number of basic sciences courses provided here because of that. In my Weather and Atmosphere class, my professor acknowledged that a number of us are probably not Atmospheric Science majors, and while the quality of the course hasn't faltered, I can tell she keeps in mind that a lot of us are not science-minded students. My Nutrition class is also fulfilling a science requirement, and so far it's been surprisingly interesting. Both of those science classes are larger - 100 to 200 people, but they are popular classes for people who have little interest in science so that is to be expected. Luckily, I've found the classes that pertain to my major to be awesome so far, solidifying my confidence that I'm in the right field of study, and I can tell you that in Communications, the size of the class continuously decreases as you progress further into the major and class subjects narrow. I've gotten to take some really interested courses that fulfill certain requirements, like historical context or language/humanities. The university offers a vast variety of classes, some specific to certain majors, but many of them are offered to everyone. Classes like the "History of Nazi Germany" and "Social Problems" have become some of my favorites. Those courses both had around 50 people in them, a really comfortable size. The curriculum of each class is quite different as well. This semester, my final grades will be almost all based on tests taken throughout the semester, and a few projects. Last year, I had more weekly assignments and just more opportunities for points in homework. It really varies from class to class, but so far my Comm classes have had more assignments outside of tests/quizzes.

Wonderful. The teachers are so passionate and the variety in courses is immense. My major is sociology and there is huge variety in sociology classes towards my major. You can also explore other interests through classes for non majors, such as photography, dance, acting, violin, guitar, piano, and the list goes on. I did have one class with 400 other students which I was nervous about at first, but I ended up learning a lot and doing very well in the course..

Since my freshman year here, I have had some great classes. Some of these classes were challenging, and some were decently easy. My freshman year I was part of a Residential Academic Program. This is a very unique opportunity that CU Boulder offers to its students. A “RAP” program is a program in which a student can take classes in their residence hall. Many of the residence halls on campus have classrooms on the main floor. My freshman year, I took art history and nutrition through the “RAP” program. I absolutely loved it. Even though the classes are more challenging, the class sizes are tiny and the teachers are always available to help you with anything you need. Another reason why I loved the classes offered through the “RAP” program is because I got to live with the people I was taking classes with. For example, if I had a question on my nutrition homework, I would just walk down the hall and ask my friend who was also in the class with me. Besides being part of the Residential Academic Program, I also took many classes normally on the CU campus. I was in a geography class and a writing class. In my geography class, it was in a lecture hall that housed over 250 people. This class was pretty straight forward. If you attended lecture, read the book, and studied the notes, you would have done pretty well on the exams. On the other hand, my writing class was very challenging. In the writing class, there were only about 24 people. We had lots of papers to write and the professor was a very hard grader. Even though it was a tough class, being in the class has improved my writing significantly. This year, I am taking a bunch of classes but my hardest class would be Biology. The sciences here at Boulder are very challenging. It is a known fact that the chemistry, biology, and physics programs here at CU are very very difficult. Thankfully I am a communication major and only have to take 2 semesters of a science!

Teachers here are really passionate about the world and what their role is in it. They desire for you to succeed and actually function in the world we are going to soon be large contributors to, so they don't just base everything off of a non-sense textbook. They share personal stories and you learn more than you would in high school.

Teachers here are really passionate about the world and what their role is in it. They desire for you to succeed and actually function in the world we are going to soon be large contributors to, so they don't just base everything off of a non-sense textbook. They share personal stories and you learn more than you would in high school.

Interesting. Professors are always engaging students. I've learned (and retained) more at 1 semester at CU than in my 4 years of high school.

They're definitely tough, attendance is absolutely mandatory, and once you get further into your majors, the class size shrinks.

Classroom before final