University of Texas at Arlington

The Details

The University of Texas at Arlington is a 100-year-old, comprehensive research, teaching and public service institution located in the heart of the dynamic Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. It is the second largest component of the world renowned University of Texas System and the sixth largest university in Texas. It is located in the heart of the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, one of the fastest growing areas in the nation. U.T. Arlington has emerged as a comprehensive teaching, research and public service university. UTA offers 58 baccalaureate, 60 masters and 22 doctoral degrees within nine academic units and a graduate school. A modern 390-acre campus a few blocks from downtown Arlington offers easy access to museums, concerts, ballet, theater, family recreation, professional sports and other interests.

With an enrollment of approximately 20,000 students, U.T. Arlington is the second largest of the 15 institutions in The University of Texas System. The student body has become increasingly diversified with students representing 47 states and 89 countries.

The University's academic units include the School of Architecture, College of Business Administration, College of Engineering, College of Liberal Arts, School of Nursing, College of Science, School of Social Work, School of Urban and Public Affairs, and the Center for Professional Teacher Education. Additionally, the Graduate School oversees the administration of academic programs beyond the baccalaureate level.

In response to societal needs, U.T. Arlington has evolved into a university of renown within the state and of emerging position nationally and internationally. The University's history of achievement can be attributed to a faculty of increasing competence and accomplishments; a student body of higher qualifications and greater diversity; a record of growing success by graduates in their respective disciplines; and the maturation of the Dallas/Fort Worth area as a nationally and internationally significant metropolis.

Founded in 1895 as Arlington College, a private liberal arts institution, U.T. Arlington has undergone a succession of names, ownerships and missions. The University was elevated to senior college status in 1959 and was transferred from the Texas A&M System to The University of Texas System in 1965. Its final name change came in 1967, when it became The University of Texas at Arlington.

Personal Experiences

I atended UTA between Fall of 1998 and Spring of 2001, and had a chance to see how many of the different departments operate after changing my major 7 times.

Like any budding programmer fresh out of high school, I started out in their Computer Science department. Within 8 months, I completed 48 credit-hours, well on my way to graduating in 4 years. The third semester is when it started to get nasty: I'd already studied my way through all the weed-out courses (Chemistry, Calculus, Physics, etc), and was beginning to hit the middle-level programming couses. At the advent of the Y2K panic, my C++ Instructor (the same one from here) decided to have my class code some fixes for problems encountered in the school's antiquated computer systems.

This is all well and good for them, but I'd rather be learning new material than donating services anyone else would have to purchase. That class started off with 300 students. After the first Exam, it was down to 150. The second exam brought the number to 100, the third exam saw another 50 leave. Of the 50 of us who took the final, 20 passed, 4 with 'A's. That professor was fired later that year for incompetency. This is when I transferred to the Management and Information Systems department. This was a total joke. After one week of the "This is the keyboard, this is the mouse" class, I walked down to the office and changed my major to Business.

The business department at UTA is one of the few truly good things that keeps this school floating. Alongside Accounting and Nursing, it's one of the most popular schools in the university. Once I realized that I didn't want to live aiming for upper lower middle management, I gave up and changed to Philosophy. It was one of their smaller departments, but it was nice enough. Halfway through that smester, I added Classics as a major, later dropping Philosophy. Two semesters of Classics were about as dissapointing as they come. I learned my Latin, Greek, and ancient culture, but with 2 Professors and 5 students, there was no way for me to schedule all the classes needed to graduate in less than 7 years.

After one more fruitless semester studying Anthropology, I decided this small state school is most definitely not the place to study what I want to study. Thanks to univers and chanbara, I learned more about my synaesthesia, how it is that languages are so easy for me to learn. I then transferred out of UTA pursue a degree in linguistics, my current field of study.