<p>I, like silentsailor, am a recent grad, so I guess we kind of have the perspective of Rice before it increased it’s class size as well as after. I just wanted to say that there is virtually no school where you are going to get into the small interesting electives as a freshman, including Rice before the increase in class size (unless of course what you think is an interesting elective differs from the mainstream popular classes). The great thing about these classes is their small size, a lot of people want to be in them, and freshman register last, so you just have to wait your turn and take it later on. Also, like silentsailor never had a problem getting into a class if I explained to the prof why I was interested in being in it (although I will admit I didn’t try for those really small elective classes early on because I knew I could probably just take the class in a later year). And while a few of my classes did start with people without seats, that was always resolved by the end of the shopping period, either with people dropping or a room change. The only thing in Bubba’s post that concerns me is the fact that you had to drop a 2nd major due to scheduling, I feel like this wouldn’t happen if you explained to the prof the issue (not implying you didn’t try, just saying this is surprising based on my personal experiences).</p>
<p>Finally, with regards to housing, I really enjoyed my year off campus (although I was happy to move back on the next year) and I feel more confident with my living situation now since I’ve been through the whole apartment, paying rent/bills thing once before. So, I don’t really think it’s a major problem that Rice can only guarantee three years of housing (and as people have mentioned, you can try to avoid it by being part of your college’s govt).</p>