A century old debate that may never see the end of the tunnel: Marshall University vs WVU. If you are from WV, there’s no doubt you had a lot of influence by seeing a lot of WVU gear sported by other people who, theoretically, mostly saw WVU gear growing up. It’s a cultural thing, of course, and that’s a good thing. Back to the classic debate of who’s-who. Now, before we delve into the debate and before I give personal insight, I’d like to quickly say I wholeheartedly believe the debate is wholesome and serves a great purpose. I mean, why, for over a century, has Marshall and WVU butted heads? There has to be a solid reason.
In my hometown, everyone talks about WVU, about going to WVU, about WVU football, and WVU parties. Curiosity got the best of me, as it mostly does, and so I took to the streets of Morgantown to see what the fuss was about. I spent one summer as a student at WVU, and no doubt it was a learning lesson. Now, I study at Marshall and absolutely love the time I spend here. Here’s what I’ve learned while at both schools, from the faculty to the student body.
I’ll start with WVU. The first and obvious things I noticed:
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it was a large school. Student body wise and campus wise. The campus itself is large because it is incredibly spread out. Most of my WVU classmates either drove to class or rode a bus. I had to leave one hour before class just to make it by the thread of my hair.
Honor’s Dorms are nice, however, and a lot closer to the school. Like a block away, but there’s still a lot of hill walking. They are also really quiet, private, and just general “clean” feeling.
A lot of traffic on campus, both students and vehicles. PRT is generally packed.
My friends/classmates who chose to live off campus lived in deplorable housing. In fact, most of the housing units for your average WVU student are horrendous. Dirty, old, and being held together by just a nail. I swear my friends apartment looked like it was about to collapse any moment.
Morgantown is filthy. Walking to class I saw trash everywhere, beer cans on the roads, couches and furnishings on the streets.
Too much partying. Seriously, too much. People even brought vodka to class and drank. Almost everyone I knew was partying daily, constantly. I went out to the bar once on the weekend, and found myself surrounded by hundreds, if not a thousand, people just lining up to waste their money. Cops were luckily there, I counted 7 or 8 cars. A helicopter flew right over us and had it’s lights on the crowd. I can’t say for certain if this was a hospital helicopter or the police. I could only imagine all the underage consumption and illegal drug use happening on WVU campus and surrounding by the students.
Everyone I know who is a WVU fan, mostly sticks to their hometown folks at WVU. If they make new friends, it’s accidental or through someone they know.
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In short, the campus has a nice view once or twice, if you get the right angle. The education I had was alright. It felt very professional, like a boss/employee relationship. Morgantown is very dirty.
Now with Marshall: I’ll be quick here.
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campus is small, especially compared to WVU. It’s in the shape of a block and dorms are right next to the classrooms. The farthest dorm is just a few blocks inland campus.
campus housing and campus dorms are relatively nice. Freshman dorms are actually the best. Private, quiet, reserved. I can count how many times I even heard people in my dorm on both hands, in 1 year.
professors feel more homely. they had no problem helping me, working with me, or generally taking care of me.
class sizes are very small. My smallest was 8 people and largest was 80, just one.
you do not have to walk off campus to get to class
incredibly safe, clean, and very quiet campus; lots of pride.
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Well, that’s just my observation.