TUITION: Another thing about American universities--they are very very expensive! First, it is very difficult to be accepted. Some are very elitist and only offer the opportunity for education to those who can afford the high price, for example Haverford College tuition costs $50,000 per year! It is no wonder that so few students attend that institution, and must all come from prestigious American families.
DIVERSITY:Something else that upsets me about American universities is the manner in which they boast about their percentage of diverse students. University of Pennsylvania's website lists %42 diversity, and Haverford College lists %31 diversity. This confuses me because the kind of diversity they are referring to is the color of one's skin! This does not in any way reflect diversity of ideas, backgrounds, politics, or religion. In fact, I found colleges like Haverford and Swarthmore to be quite homogenous!! It seems to me that because these percentages of diverse students are so low and because the tuition is so high, the only ones who can attend university in America are rich and white!
HONOR CODES: What's more, I was shocked to find that many American colleges, Haverford for example, operate under an Honor Code. The Haverford students had to pledge allegiance to the Honor Code, yet the codes prescribed there were virtues that all people should live by anyway, and should not need to be written down and ratified. Furthermore, many students did not even seem to follow these guidelines. The exam I took at Haverford was not proctored by professors and students could cheat as they please! The Honor Code is supposed to encourage confrontation between students, but I found it to be quite stifling--students were often so afraid of overstepping the boundaries of the Honor Code that even if they disagreed about something, they kept silent. I discovered that reaching consensus at Haverford was essential to decision-making, yet many went against their beliefs so that consensus could be reached! Does not the prophet Muhammad say that it is blasphemous to reject your own beliefs?
Well, those are my feelings on universities in America. I was glad to have had the experience of studying there, but I was very grateful to return home to Syria at the end of the year. Please leave me a comment and let me know what you think!
شكرا Thank you
فريد حسين Farid Hussein