One of the most crucial point in life is after I completed high school, because I wasn’t sure what do I want to do with my life, if I should follow a family tradition or do something new. I have many ideas in my mind that make every single decision very difficult, but at the end I went for what I though was what I love to do, but as always the challenge wasn’t enough just to study something different, the new challenge was to study in a different country with a different language, culture and get the best experience that I could get from it. I moved to New York couple years ago and from the moment that I arrived I knew that this time everything will be different, because this time I come to study and not to have fun. The research for school with a good programs was the most difficult part because I didn’t have the enough money to pay it but also I didn’t know much about the US academic system. But my mind it was always setting to find something related to technology, and after a long research I found New York City College Of Technology with a good curriculum. Like every single college, city tech have the best and the worst but what I love about it is that they always trying to bring the last equipment in technology so the student can be familiar with it.
The Architecture Technology department is my department and I feel proud of it, as I said I don’t think the programs has reach the top as other departments but I feel that they are trying to get there soon. In my personal experience I fell like the department should be more than one floor, for many reasons. That I will mention in other parts of the essay.
My ideal department will be one that we could have one building just only for us because we just have one floor, for all the equipment that we have, although the rooms are big doesn’t mean that all the student can be there, sometimes in one classroom is going to classes with different levels. Also I know the interaction between all the students is good but I believe that student should have a different in order of the years that they are, because one from second year will not be as one in the four year, maybe is something personal but I believe that they should be separate but years or at least buy programs.
Class size and faculty, I think the architecture department manage this very well. We have a very good professor from different part of the world with different approaches and knowledge that is given to us. I believe that having professor from other counties and with experience in different areas in architecture made this schools unique. They always teach us the most excited thing and what it made the class more interesting is the size because for the studio classes we are just 18 student so we always get the reviews  from the professors and something we even get to experiment with other professor that they been invited for the finals presentations.
Mentoring and internships, I think in these two subjects the school have to work more hard, because mentoring a students is the most important step for the future, I know that from the architecture department only one professor is qualified for be a mentor for the school and I don’t agree, we have one elite of professional that they have the capacity of be mentors. Also this will help to bring the grades and the preparation of each student above the requirements. Now also the internship is very important for each department not only for the architecture, but I believe that each student should be obligated to have an internship and have an amount of hours before graduations, this will bring experience to the students and will made them ready for the professional world. Many universities have his programs and I believe that is one of the main point that they may those successfully.
Advising is another pain, we have a couple of professor that they do advising but in general is only two professor that they really can help you, because with the change of the curriculum and between programs that y always have some problem, and this professor call, email and do everything that is possible to fix it at that moments, they seat with you and help you to fallow the step by step program and they always there for anything. But the others are the opposed they don’t know much about the changes and if they do they just said that we have to email or we just need to wait until the register office fix it.
Technology is something that I cannot complain about it , we have the most advance technology that we could have every year the computer and the monitors are change for new ones, we have printers and scanners in every simple room all the classes have computers projectors and everything that u can imagine for made the class more interesting. We have laser cutters, 3D printers, CMC machines and everything that we need, even the most basic materials. Maybe the only thing we need is one or two more rooms for modeling, because we only have one and it’s not enough for all the students.
The big problem about the architecture department I believe is the labs because all the labs are really hot because of the computers and all the students that we are inside, those room are the worst, in the midterm and the finals those classrooms are like hell, you cannot be there for more than one hour because they are really hot and the AC doesn’t work properly, we don’t have the enough ventilation for cool the labs. Now that other really cool thing that the schools should have is the lab 24/7 because in midterms and finals if the student don’t have a computers he or she will not be able to finish the work on time. I have friend that they went to others schools just to finish they work on time some of them got in serious problems but at the end they finish they projects and now they graduate.
I research many schools and programs before choosing City Tech but as I mentioned before I always want to do something related to technology and that why I choose City Tech, I know MIT is a very good school in technology but somebody said to me “doesn’t matter where you start out in life; it only matter where you end up” I do want to do my master in M I T, they have very good programs and they have more advance technology than Cooper Union, in the case of Columbia they have a good program too but the program that they offer is not good as MIT.
Reference
Columbia http://www.arch.columbia.edu/
MIT http://architecture.mit.edu/architectural-design/degree/march
Georgia tech http://www.arch.gatech.edu/academics/masters/msarch_ddf
