151. Picking A University

Marco: Hello, everyone! And welcome to EnglishPod. My name is Marco.

Catherine: My name is Catherine. And today we have an intermediate level lesson about education and university.

Marco: That's right. Today we're trying to find a university... We want to get some information about how much it costs and all that sort of stuff. So, why don't we jump into the dialogue and see what's going on today?

A: I've never heard of AmLion College. Could you...

B: Of course, sir, let me give you a brief overview. AmLion College is located in the center of New York city. The school covers a wide range of academic subjects; and 80% of the courses are transferable to other state universities. And last year, AmLion College was ranked number one in terms of graduate employment.

A: Interesting!And what about the tuition fees, then?

B:You'll be looking at somewhere around fifteen thousand US dollars per semester.

A: Okay, well...

B: And, did I mention our on-campus housing? Students can stay in our newlyrenovated dorms for as little as three thousand dollars per month!

A: Sounds good! Well,I'll just grab one of your flyers.

B: Sir, you got the wrong flyer. Sir, sir...

Marco: All right, we're back. So, now let's take a look at some language on 'language takeaway'.

Language takeaway

Catherine: So, first up, Marco, we've got this word 'transferable' in the dialogue. The representative from AmLion College said that 80% of the courses are transferable to other universities.

Marco: Okay, so, before we talk about 'transferable', what is the difference here? We have two words, college and university, so why is he saying that you can transfer your courses from AmLion College to another university?

Catherine: Well, college and university are words that we use in English to describe higher education, that means education after high school. The college is usually just for bachelor students, students who are doing their first 4 years out of high school. But a university,it's usually a larger institution that has bachelor's degree students as well as master's degree students and PHD candidates. And so, while a college is for 18 to 22 year olds, a university can have students of all ages who are doing sometimes very advanced degrees like postdoctoral work.

Marco: Okay, very interesting. And so, this is why the person mentions that 80% of the courses are transferable to other state universities. So, transferable means that you can transfer, you can move to another university. So,everything that you've studied, you can take with you. 

Catherine: That's right. So, a lot of people like to start at a college or vice versa, like to start at a big university and transfer to a college. And so, it's important to know that your courses can be transferred as well. So, if I studied Spanish for two years, I can transfer that that... I can transfer those courses to my new school.

Marco: Right. So,you don't have to start over.

Catherine: Right.

Marco: Okay, very good. And obviously one of the big questions when you're picking a university is the tuition fee.

Catherine: So, tuition is the amount of money it costs to attend a university for usually a year. Tuition fee is the actual money you have to pay, so you can say I can't afford my tuition fees this year, so I will be getting a part time job.

Marco: So, this is what tuition fees are, you... In school, you call it tuition, you don't say how much it costs. You ask "What is the tuition?"

Catherine: What's the tuition? Exactly.

Marco: And he mentioned that it was around $15,000 per semester. So, this is interesting. Is this the year?

Catherine: No,a semester is half of an academic year, all right? So, an academic year is usually September to May or June. And a semester is half of that. So, first semester or fall semester is the study period between September and December or January.

Marco: That's right. So, basically what we could deduce is that this university costs $15,000 per semester or about 30,000 per year.

Catherine: That's right.

Marco: Okay, very good. He also mentioned about the on-campus housing.

Catherine: All right, so, on-campus is pretty straightforward, it means that this housing option,where you live and sleep is on the campus. And a university campus is not one building. It's many many buildings together. Sometimes there are classrooms and there are laboratories and there's a cafeteria, but there's also housing. And most housing comes in one style. What's the style I mentioned in today's dialogue?

Marco: A dorm. This is where university students usually live. If they live on campus, they have dorms.

Catherine: So,dorm is short for dormitory, and it basically means that it's an apartment building for students or even sometimes workers,that's very close to where they'll be studying or working.

Marco: So, the difference, what is the difference between a dorm and an apartment?

Catherine: I can give you an example. Some dorms are very fancy, but my dorm at university was very simple. So, I lived in one bedroom with another girl. There were two beds and no bathroom. And so,everyone on that floor of the building shared bathrooms and the bathrooms were... You know,there's six showers and four toilets or whatever.

Marco: Okay, very good. Yeah, I think this is the main thing with the dorm is usually... You don't have a kitchen, you don't have usually, uh, your own bathroom. And so it's just basically a room and a bedroom, and then you share everything else with other people. All right, very good. A lot of great things related to college. I think this is very good vocabulary, especially if you're considering going to college or something like that, especially if you're considering going to college or maybe you want to continue your studies. So, why don't we go back? Let's listen to this dialogue again and we'll be back with 'fluency builder'.

A: I've never heard of AmLion College. Could you...

B: Of course, sir, let me give you a brief overview. AmLion College is located in thecenter of New York city. The school covers a wide range of academic subjects; and80% of the courses are transferable to other state universities. And lastyear, AmLion College was ranked number one in terms of graduate employment.

A: Interesting!And what about the tuition fees, then?

B:You'll be looking at somewhere around fifteen thousand US dollars per semester.

A: Okay, well...

B: And, did I mention our on-campus housing? Students can stay in our newlyrenovated dorms for as little as three thousand dollars per month!

A: Sounds good! Well,I'll just grab one of your flyers.

B: Sir, you got the wrong flyer. Sir, sir...

Marco: All right, we're back. So, now let's take a look at these three phrases we've picked out for you on 'fluency builder'.

Fluency Builder

Catherine: So, again, when the person who was speaking for this college was describing it, they said that the school covers a wide range of academic subjects. Now this phrase wide range is something you'll hear in a lot of different contexts. What does it mean, Marco?

Marco: That's right. It means that they have a very big variety of subjects. So, they don't only focus, for example, on business, they may have arts, they may have engineering, business, etc.

Catherine: So,if you are studying at a university and they offer one course, they offer English, is that a wide range of subjects?

Marco: No, that's not a wide range. Basically a wide range of subjects would be that...you can have many many many choices. Okay.

Catherine: After that, we also had a great phrase when we were discussing tuition fees. So, the visitor asked what about the tuition fees? And the answer was you'll be looking at somewhere around 15,000 US dollar. Now, "you'll be looking at" is a very very strange phrase, right? It's not strange, but it might sound strange to non-native English speakers.

Marco: It's actually a very common phrase, especially when you're talking to salesmen. They don't want to say you'll have to pay or you have to pay or anything like this. They'll say you'll be looking at somewhere around $15,000 and that means you are expected to pay this amount of money, but they don't really say "pay", so this is the key thing.

Catherine: All right, so, this is the price, this is the price tag, and this is something that like you're saying...sales people say, so that you don't have to say "Well, the price of this is $30,000."So, another good context for this phrase would be like a car dealership... If I'm buying a car and I see a beautiful new Ford Mustang, and I say "Well, how much is this cost?" What would you,as the car dealer, say?

Marco: I'll say "Well,you'll be looking at around $30,000."

Catherine: I don't know.

Marco: That's right. So, this is a way of saying you'll have to pay. And the guy wasn't really convinced. I think it was kind of expensive, because dorms were also $3,000 per month. He was like "Well, sounds good. I'll just grab one of your flyers."

Catherine: All right, so this phrase sounds good is something that English speakers use all the time.I personally use it very very often and it's another way of saying okay.

Marco: Yeah, so if you agree with someone, you say sounds good.

Catherine: Should we meet at 7:00 for the movie tonight?

Marco: Yeah, sure, sounds good.

Catherine: All right. It's another way of saying "yes/good/okay/very well".

Marco: That's right. So, sounds good. Great stuff. Why don't we take a break? Let's listen to everything one more time and we'll be back in a bit.

A: I've never heard of AmLion College. Could you...

B: Of course, sir, let me give you a brief overview. AmLion College is located in thecenter of New York city. The school covers a wide range of academic subjects; and80% of the courses are transferable to other state universities. And lastyear, AmLion College was ranked number one in terms of graduate employment.

A: Interesting!And what about the tuition fees, then?

B:You'll be looking at somewhere around fifteen thousand US dollars per semester.

A: Okay, well...

B: And, did I mention our on-campus housing? Students can stay in our newlyrenovated dorms for as little as three thousand dollars per month!

A: Sounds good! Well,I'll just grab one of your flyers.

B: Sir, you got the wrong flyer. Sir, sir...

Marco: Universities in the United States, they have a... they're infamous for being very expensive.

Catherine: That's right. And so we discussed the difference between colleges and universities, but I think it's important to also talk about the difference between public and private schools. Public schools are schools that are paid for by the government or that are subsidized, so the government pays part of them.These are schools that tend to be cheaper than private schools. So, private schools can be as much as $50,000 for one year of study.

Marco: So, for example, the famous ones like Harvard or Stanford, those are private schools.

Catherine: Those are private schools. But the University of California is a public institution. The University of Illinois, for example, is another public institution. So,there are many different options in the United States.

Marco: I think usually the state universities have the name of the state in them. So university of Florida is probably state university.

Catherine: That's right. We have to be careful, because the University of Pennsylvania is a private university.

Marco: Really?

Catherine: Yeah,it's an Ivy League school. So, it's one of the oldest schools in America, and it's like Harvard or Yale,it's very very high quality.

Marco: This is something that they always mention when talking about universities in the States. They always say it's an Ivy League school, just like you said right now, what does it mean if a university is Ivy League?

Catherine: League is just a group, right? And so,some of the first universities in the United States formed this group called the Ivy League. And I thinkit used to have to do with the sports. These teams will play each other in sports, but I could be wrong. Anyway, these were in the 18th century. These are schools for men, and there were, I think, seven Ivy League schools for men, and then they were the sister schools for women, like Wellesley, Radcliffe, these are the sisters schools. And so, nowadays both men and women can go to all these universities. And so we just talk about them as the Ivy League. And the Ivy League schools that are most famous are Harvard, Yale, Brown, the university of Pennsylvania, Columbia, things like that.

Marco: So, talking about universities and colleges, I have heard also the community college.

Catherine: Yeah, that can be a lot more affordable. That's something that's... Because it's community college, it's usually something you go to back near your home... You know, colleges and universities, sometimes people travel very very far to go to these schools. But community colleges are available to people in your own community. And you can take night classes. You can do a lot of different things with them.They're great resources. There are a lot more affordable than other schools and a lot of people like to go to them because they don't have to pay these expensive fees for housing, like dorms or for travel. And there are great option for people. So, community colleges, colleges and universities are the major distinctions.

Marco: There is a lot to talk about on this subject, especially if you're a student or you're a professional,considering doing a masters abroad, or you want to go to the State, to Canada to study,there's a lot of things to take into consideration. So, this is a great topic ,we really want to hear from you if you have any other questions or doubts. You can always find us at englishpod.com.

Catherine: We hope to see you guys there, until next time...

Marco: Bye.

Catherine: Bye.