Northern Kentucky University — Attraction in Highland Heights

This would be one star had it not been for my professors who, for the most part, were pretty great people who were/are great at their jobs and who had to deal with the same administrative BS as I did. They all need raises for dealing with admin as long as they have.

To get right into it, The top administration here is a mess. There is a mandatory campus recreation fee that you can't opt out of even if you have never been to the the rec center. What happened was they wanted to build a rec center but no one was buying memberships to get in. Their solution? Require their students to pay for a membership every semester. By the time I graduate, I will have paid $1000 for a rec center that I've not been to once. I don't know why they decided to invest millions in a new rec center if they didn't know for sure that their students would use it. Another example: one of their last presidents was straight-up abusing school funds and instead of firing him and suing him, they paid him $1,000,000 to leave?!? Like go get your money back and stop charging us fees for breathing on campus!?

Additionally, their policies are out-right awful. For example: I'm a student that receives tuition assistance through my work; it takes a while to get to the school and NKU knows this. Do they provide the itemized bill earlier in order to apply for TA sooner? No. Do they make is easier for my work to contact them to let them know my TA is on the way? No. You have until the first day of classes to pay your entire bill or you get kicked from your classes and the reinstatement fee is $100. To avoid this, you can get on the payment plan which is $90; I literally have to pay them money for me to be able to pay them more money. To avoid getting kicked out of classes my first week I have to pay $190. There used to be a two-week grace period but they removed it for whatever reason. Another example is their parking pass policy, it's annoying that they increase the price every year, but with the cost of yearly maintenance it at least makes sense. The thing that particularly bothers me is that they charge their teachers to park. They literally have to be there, and unless they want to walk a half mile every morning they're stuck buying a pass. When I started going to NKU, parking was $286 a year for students and they charged their teachers $400...

Things constantly don't work on campus. There are the usual vending machines and school computers not working which isn't that big a deal, but the most frustrating example is the "NKU All Card". You have to pay $45-$60 bucks a semester for a mandatory food budget but whenever you try to use it at the student union or any of the vending machines, the All Card gets declined. This happens even if you have enough money on the card to cover what you're getting.

If something goes wrong (as it most likely will), dealing with the staff is hit or miss. Sometimes you'll get the most condescending Karen who looks down on you because you don't know the myriad of the school's useless policies. Other times, you'll talk to a talk a genuinely kind person that understands your frustration and really tries to help. One example being that at my last major, I couldn't get into any classes because I was kind of behind on credits so I was in one of the last groups to be able to register for classes. Now, this part was my fault and I totally accept that, what wasn't helpful is when I reached out to my adviser and department head for help, they sent me nothing but platitudes, no solutions. If I had stuck with that major, I would have graduated two years later than I originally planned.

At the end of the day, going to school at NKU is like getting your groceries at the dollar store. It's not the best option, heck, it's not even a good option, but it will satisfy the basic need at hand. If you want to open up more options in your life, try a trade or community college first, don't assume that you need a college degree to be successful in life. It's not worth the fees and the headache to deal with administration of a...

I'm at my second semester here. I transferred after getting my associates and about 110 credit hours from UC Clermont. UC Clermont is a satellite school and the quality of the Professors dwarfs the quality of the NKU professors whose classes I have been in, with the exception of one.

I'm taking online classes, and the instructions for most assignments are incredibly convoluted. Not only that, but most of the professors seem to hide assignments. I am not a 21 year old whose dad is paying for him to go to college. I work and I have a kid and a house. I do not have the time or lack of stress to hunt down assignments all day.

Additionally, the school charges you MORE to take online classes. This is pretty much the opposite of what most Universities do. I do not use any of their facilities or benefit from their campus. When I DO have to go to the campus for some reason, (like the ALLCARD that they intentionally force you to have by locking you out of your account after 90 days if you don't,) it's infuriating. Not only because I can't park anywhere for five minutes without paying a stupid amount of money, (there is no reason for that. It's in the middle of nowhere,) but also because I have to deal with a bunch of 18 year old kids working every desk or kiosk I'm forced to find. Don't even get me started on the "map" or the "website." Also, the audit system is terrible and barely works... And when it does (sort of) work, it only works on Firefox. What? The audit system at UC is so easy to use that you really don't need an adviser. But, you know, if NKU couldn't trick you into taking classes that you don't need, how would they make a gross amount of money off of people?

I wish that I had transferred to UC Main Campus. In retrospect, I would gladly pay the $2,000 extra per semester to go to a school with competent professors.

(Update) Moved my review to one star instead of two, as I have had nothing but...

This school has lots of pros and cons to it. Little things and big things. Overall it's a nice campus assuming you can get there on time. For a commuter school, they have no idea how to handle traffic, and instead of fixing things they push the dorms onto people (but never have enough). so leave early. Majority of classes are of a smaller size and most professors are decent to good. In my personal experience, I've had far too many horrid professors for my liking ( at least one per semester) who are either inexperienced or far from knowledgeable in their field or simply do not care about their students. On the other hand I have met many professors at the opposite end of the spectrum who I have become very good friends with. I've also met very successful people who graduated from NKU, including a NYT bestseller. Some of the "art" around campus is god awful, while others are very interesting. There's a 100% tobacco free campus rule starting January 2014 which is either wonderful or terrible depending on your preference. The parking options for a commuter school are also horrible, as the regular parking lots and garages fill up quickly and only gravel lots are left so again, get there early.

NKU is known for being cheap and within driving distance, and for the most part it still is. It's the entire reason I went to start with, and the same reason for the majority of students. However, tuition prices are going up because of projects only the minority want as opposed to the majority, who want to be able to afford a good college experience. Most students become disgruntled from time to time because of the rising costs of parking passes and tuition prices, while they have to park in gravel lots which damage their cars as well as for numerous other reasons.

It's still reasonably priced, but it keeps going up. So do your research...