What Students Say
Likes
- Factors that influenced me to choose UMBC over all other university were surrounding cities, living cost (which is quite cheaper compared to other cities with such highly ranked university), University campus, facilities provided in campus and to international students, availablity of On Campus jobs. Apart from other aspects, university offers multiple options for a single course, you will have at least 5-6 options for a single course, this gives a freedom to choose and explore multiple pathways.
Dislikes
- Some students may not be fond of UMBC's location in suburban Baltimore, feeling that it lacks the urban vibrancy found in other college towns. UMBC is located in a Baltimore county area, which I feel have few areas that is not as safe for students as it should be.
Required Exams for Admission
My experience here was good, I would recommend students to join UMBC for Under Graduation or Graduation.
Course Curriculum
Course structure is extremely good, we get several options to choose from. Each course will be of 3 credits and student will be provided with minimum of 8 courses from which they can choose their courses.
Faculty
Class strength depends on the course, it will vary from 15-20 students per class with a single professor. Professors are extremely helpful, you can email professor at any time of the day for any help. Since class strength is low, you can ask as many questions as you want.
Campus Life
WIFI is available all the time on campus, it's free! We have a huge 6 storey building all dedicated to Library, you may see it's picture online. For sports, we have indoor and outdoor court for all sports. When it comes to clubs, UMBC has multiple clubs for all communities, for Indians we have HSC, Hindu Student Community, they organize events quite frequently to keep us connected with our roots.
Placement
University abroad do not offer placements like we have back in India. We have career fairs where companies visit and students need to come up with a resume and meet companies, introduce themselves briefly, enquire about the opportunities, drop resumes.
Accommodation
UMBC provide on campus accommodation as well. But we choose to live outside but near the campus, rent will be around $280-$350 monthly for a shared room, without utilities like electricity and water bill. Two people sharing a room. You can find rooms with 2 Bedrooms, 3 Bedrooms or 4-5 bedrooms around the campus area, they all include basement. Almost all apartments have all kinds of facility, some may lack a laundry unit and dish washer.
Exams
My scores: GRE 141 Verbal 154 Quant 3.5 Writing; TOEFL 90/120. Reading 22, Writing 25, Speaking 23, Listening 20. I had to submit 3 LORs and 1 SOP. I took one LOR from my manager in office and two from College Professors.
Fees
Total fees of the program will be approx 34-35 Lakh.
Scholarship
I received 25% scholarship on the complete tuition fees from Syracuse University. Application fee for UMBC and Syracuse University was 75. I had applied a fee waiver code for UMBC because of which I did not pay any amount for application.
