How good is Iowa State?

mezzian
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 15:49:35 +0000

Hi Empireapple -

I have a freshman in engineering at ISU. We’re from the Chicago area… about 5 hours away. There are a good number of kids from Illinois who choose the school. My son has noted that besides Iowa, Minnesota and Illinois, most of the kids seem to be Midwest based, which makes sense. But there are kids from other states, just not in as big of numbers. He chose the school, despite personally knowing no one else going there. Wondering if he’d make new friends was high on his anxiety list, but now he has a large circle of kids that he does things with and he’s totally past that worried stage! He only comes home for school breaks really, but seems to have plenty to do on campus over the weekends. He’s not a party kid, but there are free movies, sports, clubs, things at the Union, concerts, etc. all the time!

The school is big overall, but the school works to make the size manageable and non-intimidating! The Destination Iowa State event for freshmen, just prior to classes starting, was great. Small groups are formed to let kids meet people one on one, and do team activities together. My son is still good friends with many of the kids from his DIS team.

As for class sizes, there will be some large lecture classes, particularly for freshmen. In my son’s case, the large lectures have small group breakout classes later in the week. If you have the option, signing up for a Learning Community has been invaluable to work with those classes. They get together in smaller groups for review and study. Again… a great friendship and study habit builder.

Hopefully your student is open to looking at the many, many, many extracurriculars available on campus. There’s an activity fair in fall where the kids can talk to different groups and try them out if they like. Also, go online to check out all the student organizations. There are hundreds. Some academic, some just for fun.

Feel free to toss out any other questions if you have them!