I transferred to D'Youville from a university in California. Spending a semester at D'Youville College has singlehandedly been the worst semester of my entire life. Yes, this tops semesters in middle school where I was repeatedly punched in the face by bullies.
There are many reasons D'Youville is a terrible college, and I will explain them all in this review.
D'Youville helped me a lot with money (in the beginning). They awarded me a TEACH grant, as I was majoring in Adolescent Education/English. This was the reason my parents allowed me to go to D'Youville, because of this generous grant. I was excited to go to a new school, make new friends, and be close to my girlfriend.
So finally, I moved up there. I was initially disappointed, mainly because the college was kinda boring and the area around was clearly dangerous (do not carry your wallet at night around D'Youville). The college area itself was pretty, but the second you step off the campus, it gets really trashy really quickly. Terrible area, terrible neighborhood.
Finally, move-in time. I was expecting to meet a lot of people on my floor, but nobody came out of their rooms. Literally. I walked around my dorm floor, and there was nobody. This happened every night. I still, to this day, have only met my roommate from my floor. Nobody is sociable, nobody is nice, nobody cares.
The dorms are alright, if you're lucky enough to get a room with a bathroom. But only two rooms per floor have that, so if you don't, you're out of luck.
Anyway, the teachers are terribly boring. It feels like high school all over again. Yes, the small class sizes are a plus, but that is literally the only positive thing I can say about D'Youville. But the teachers are mostly old, they are boring, they do nothing fun or fresh to make class exciting. I found myself dreading every class. And in no case should you ever sign up for an online class.... They are HORRIBLE. Especially if you're accustomed to a traditional classroom setting. The online classes were incredibly difficult to understand. And sorry, it's difficult to stay focused when you have to sit and listen to a boring woman lecture about psychology for an HOUR. Yes, her lectures were an HOUR and they were just an audio file, so you were stuck staring at your computer screen for hours at a time. How is that conducive to learning at all? How in the world is that a positive learning environment?
Also, say you want to drop a class. For comparison, to drop a class at my last university you could just log on online to your student account and drop a class, and that was it. That's all you had to do. Click a link, and boom, you're out of the class. This university, I found, was very different. First, get a form from the registrar. Then, fill out this lengthy form. Then, get a signature from your advisor, get a signature from a financial advisor, and run it back up to the registrar. As if that wasn't complicated enough, my advisor was only on campus for two hours per week... And guess what, one of my classes coincided with that hour! So to drop a class, I had to skip a class just to get a signature from my advisor. Very complicated, very unnecessary, very archaic. I mean, we're still using forms in 2014? You would think such an expensive university would perhaps use the money to create a useful way to do things at this university, but clearly that's too much to ask.
In late October, I got a random call from the finance office. They said, "Hey, we can't give you that TEACH grant anymore, sorry!"
I was astounded. Flabbergasted. So now, out of no where, I owe much more money to this university. That means I can't go to D'Youville next semester (a blessing in disguise). I found out that they didn't award it to me because I "didn't maintain a 2.5 at my university last semester" which just wasn't true. I ran up to the registrar, and she showed me my file. Apparently, my last college sent the transcripts before the second semester ended, so the second semester showed up as "in progress" on my transcripts. That's why they took the TEACH grant away.
First of all, I would AT LEAST expect a call from D'Youville earlier, letting me know that my college hadn't sent my complete transcript. But nope, no call whatsoever. They didn't even check. Second of all, why would you even award me the grant without seeing my complete transcripts??? If i had known that I wouldn't get the TEACH grant, I wouldn't have attended D'Youville! Absolutely ridiculous.
Finally, the worst of all... The cafeteria. The cafeteria was actually staffed with incredibly courteous people. But the hours were horrific. I mean, only open for an hour an a half? What if I have classes? (Which I did, had to go hungry on Mondays). I ended up having to spend a lot of my own money because the cafeteria was closed more often than it was open.
Listen to me: Don't go to D'Youville. Terrible people, terrible staff, terrible college, terrible waste of money and time. read more