When I am walking around campus, it is quite often that I hear students do not like it here.

I sometimes hear people say that going to class here is not really important, or that there degree is not as meaningful as other schools.

So, basically people are paying money to attend Eastern to brush off their degrees as if they are nothing?

That is honestly just a ridiculous thing to even think about, but there are people who think like that.

Some students take coming to Eastern for granted, and they do not realize that this is one of the best public universities in the Midwest.

A recent report from U.S. News and World Report listed Eastern as No. 5 among public schools in the Midwest region.

The same report also listed Eastern as tied for the No. 30 spot among all Midwest regional universities.

The fact of the matter is that Eastern is a really good university, and more people should be taking advantage of the opportunities of being able to attend the school.

I came as a transfer student from a larger university with a student population fives times as much as Eastern.

The size of the university can make a huge difference while in a lecture or classroom environment.

The thing that Eastern does so well is the classes have smaller class sizes.

The same report listed above also said that 47.4 percent of classes have fewer than 20 students and 49.7 percent have between 20 and 49 students.

The small class sizes are a great way for students to interact with professors and other students in the class.

Students are able to ask questions and have a discussion with professor.

At my previous school, I attended lectures with up to 300 other people.

If you had a question, it would more difficult to have a question answered or just have one-on-one time.

With lecture also came discussion sections, which were classes with about 20 students.

This would be ideal situation to become more acquainted with the professor, but the professor would not teach these sections.

Graduate students and teacher assistants taught these types of classes.

These type of classes were helpful, but they without the professor being present, the classes were not as helpful as they would have been.

To get to know your professor you had to attend office hours, which were usually held weekly, but they would be in there for about an hour once or twice a week.

At Eastern, we are privileged to have such accessible professors.  They are at lecture to answer as many questions as they possibly can to help students.

They are here to talk, and that goes for most of the faculty.

There is a reason Eastern is so highly rated, and it may not be as large of a university as the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, but should not mean anything.

Eastern is a great school, and you should be proud to be attending here.

Chris Picazo is a senior journalism major. He can be reached at 581-2812 or denopinions@gmail.com