Yale University
- Academics

It Is What You Make It

It's easy to find guts, and sometimes difficult to get really good seminars. As with most large universities, it's hard to avoid taking a lecture at some point (especially in sciences), but there are often multiple levels of intro classes to accommodate students with different levels of preparation or interest. Seminars can be competitive to get into when the topic is popular, but there are enough classes available that overcrowding tends not to be a big problem in upper level classes (I have never been denied a seminar, so long as I stayed with it all through shopping period, but I know people who have.) The registration process SUCKS abysmally. It's important to have backup plans in case you can't get into a class (and often you don't know until two weeks into the term whether you are in), and shopping period is the worst kind of limbo for students and professors-- nobody knows who will end up in the class, or what the atmosphere, size, or sometimes even the final syllabus will look like. The class you see during shopping period is seldom the class you get stuck with for the rest of the term.

I have actually found the seminars at Yale a little disappointing. Professors are usually great (though sometimes it's easy to tell they are overworked and don't really have time for your class), but discussion can be a letdown. The 36 course requirement means that many people are taking 5 courses per semester, and there's a lot of pressure to take on an "above-average" extracurricular load, so without a "fifth class" (something a little lighter), it can be difficult to be thorough with all of your classes. This means that you often have to discuss books with very vocal people who only read analyses, peer review "drafts" that look more like short outlines, and tolerate incredibly vague, incorrect, but bombastic monologues about things that happened "all throughout history" or what makes something "so human." It's really frustrating to take a junior seminar (a core requirement for your major) with people who decide they just won't do several of the assignments, because they can still get away with a B if they don't turn in this or that. (Grade inflation, by the way, is a real thing. Easy to get away with a B in most classes. Credit-D is kind of like a sport for a lot of people: how low a grade can you get within the C- to A spectrum? It's actually really difficult to get something below a B in some classes.)

Great Opportunities

The Psychology Department at Yale is excellent and some of the best professors belong to it. There are several labs on campus that students are able to become involved in during the year or over the summer. The curriculum is also flexible and enables students who want to be pre-med to major in psychology.

Helpful for the Most Part

Yale University, being an Ivy League school has high expectations but there is always help when you need it. There are tutors for just about every main subject within each dorm (residential college) and most professors have office hours or the teacher assistants do. The professors are often extremely intelligent but lack the ability to teach the material to students who are new to the subject. However, most of the small seminar classes have extremely helpful and devoted professors who encourage students to attend extra help and office hours.