Today marked the end of my first official week as a graduate student at Northwestern University. For those who don’t know, I am enrolled in the university’s School of Education and Social Policy, working towards getting my Master of Science degree in secondary education with a focus on teaching social sciences.

Classes started last Tuesday, which means I’ve had a full week of class so far.

Overall, I’m satisfied with how Northwestern University is. I used to be a undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, so a lot of my classes had hundreds of students crammed inside a lecture hall, during which we would all robotically take the exact same notes on our notebooks or laptops, then leave the hall in unison. Northwestern’s classes are a lot smaller, and it has more of a personal feel to it.

I’m taking two classes this quarter, one history course and one education course. My history course seems a lot like a regular lecture, but with a lot more interactive and inquisitorial aspects. My education course is laid out as a complete discussion, where everyone is encouraged (and somewhat required) to participate in the class, which is laid out more as a conversation than as a lecture.

The environment at Northwestern has a different feel as well. It seems like students here are here to actually study, while students in Madison seem to be there to have fun and enjoy their time. It’s also a lot less busy, and the number of people exponentially decreases as the day gets darker (as opposed to Madison, where more people tend to come out during the night).

Another thing I’ve noticed is that Northwestern students appear to have a lot more pride, as noticed by their choice of attire. In Madison, there are a lot of people wearing UW-Madison-related clothing, but percentage-wise, Northwestern’s is significantly higher. I’m not sure if this is because it’s early on in the quarter or not, but the difference is so drastic that it was one of the first things I noticed.

One unfortunate thing about my situation is that I’m a commuter student. I chose to commute rather than to live on campus to save money, and because I’m taking classes only three days out of seven. The drive to Northwestern is over an hour, but when comparing housing costs versus gas and hour/investment costs, commuting is still significantly cheaper. I also have a parking spot that’s relatively far away from the main campus – about a mile and a half – but there is a free shuttle service that drops me off in the heart of the campus.

Being a commuter student does mean that I’ll be participating in a lot fewer Northwestern-related events because I’m not always there on campus, but the environment overall seems to be a lot more friendly and communication-inducing because there are a lot fewer people around.