Academics
The benefits of going to a large, well-established state school, such as the University of New Hampshire, are exactly what one expects—its low in-state tuition, firmly established reputation, and place in the system allow it to offer “many resources to help students out in life.” Located in tiny, beautiful Durham, the school “emphasizes research in every field, including non-science fields,” and a lot of importance is placed “on the outdoors and the environment.” The small town really fosters “lots of school spirit,” and the laid-back denizens of UNH make it known that “having a good time” is a priority in their lives: “Weekends are for the Warriors.” Most professors “truly care” about the students’ learning so that “you never feel like a number at the school but rather a respected student,” and professors “will get down and dirty when it comes to experiencing what they’re teaching firsthand.” Though there are definitely complaints that some can be “sub-par,” a student “just needs to possess the initiative to go to their office hours” and they will get all the help they need. Some of the general education classes “are huge,” and TAs can be difficult to understand, but for the most part, students report that they’ve had a “good experience” and that their academic career has been “very successful.” The Honors program is particularly challenging (in a very positive way) and offers “great seminar/inquiry classes that have about fifteen students.” Students universally pan the administration, claiming it “is a massive bureaucracy that gets little done,” partially due to poor communication, or one student puts it that “the left hand has no idea what the right hand is doing.” “The school is way more challenging than I thought it would be because the administration makes things harder than they need to be,” says a sophomore.
Student Body
This being New Hampshire, people are “very politically and socially aware.” Students here are mostly middle-class and hail from New England (especially from New Hampshire, naturally), and a main point of contention among students is that there “is not a lot of ethnic/racial diversity,” though the school is working on it. The size of UNH means that “even the most unique individual will find a group of friends,” and even the most atypical students “fit in perfectly well.” Most of these “laid-back” and “easy-to-get-along-with” Wildcats party, and it can be “hard to find one that doesn’t.” “Everyone skis or snowboards,” and in the cold weather “Uggs and North Face fleece jackets abound.”
Campus Life
The school is just “fifteen minutes to the beach, one hour to the mountains, and one hour to Boston,” making the world a Wildcat’s oyster. Partying is big here, and the weekends are crazy; “Everyone goes out pretty much every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night.” The small number of bars in town “makes the age limit pretty well enforced.” After a hard night out, “there are many late night convenience stores and food places to go to.” In fact, it can be “difficult to find activities to do on the weekend that don’t involve drinking,” though UNH does a good job of bringing in “popular comedians, musicians, bands, political figures, etc.,” and the school has tons of “amazing” a capella groups, so there is “almost always something to go see.” Sports are also big here: “We love our hockey and football,” says a student. Though there’s a pretty big housing crunch, the oft-used athletic and recreational facilities here are both convenient and excellent, and since everything on this “beautiful” campus is only about ten minutes away, “you walk pretty much everywhere,” though public transportation and school-provided buses run often. Students do a lot of socializing over meals at the “eight cafés or in any of the three dining halls.”
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