UWM is what you make of it

Introduction
I chose UWM out of necessity, I was a few points shy of transferring to Madison as a sophomore. UWM is fairly diverse, people tend to be on the liberal side, which could be a problem only for the most sheltered of high school students. I would say stay away from UWM if you want personal attention. In my experience with advisors and teachers, people only notice you if you make an effort to be noticed. It's easy to get lost in the sea of people.

Campus Life and Social Life
Sports are what they are. I'd say a large majority don't pay attention to what's going on with the teams, but there are a few crazies like at any school. On average, the UWM student is there for a degree and little else. Turnout for voting for student government is slim to none. On the good side, there are a lot of parties around campus every night of the week, on the bad side, they're mostly hosted by a group of friends who followed each other to the same school. If you're a commuter or from another state, it's not easy to break into, unless you met some of them while in the dorms. Advertisement
Academics
The academics are whatever you make them. Some departments are known for their quality such as architecture and urban planning, possibly the business program. I had good luck in the economics program, every class I took was taught by a full professor, and the one class that wasn't, featured the best TA I had at UWM. The TAs in the math and science degrees were the worst as far as I'm concerned, although it's kind of luck of the draw with most programs. Some classes had just the right workload, but every once in a while you'll get a professor that thinks he's teaching at Harvard.

Student Body
Most students at UWM fall into one of four categories: the foreigner, the slacker who fell into college, the adult or returning student, or the self-supporting student who works a job or three to pay his or her way through college. There are plenty of people that don't belong in college that got in because of UWM's lack of entrance standards. But there are also a lot of hardworking dedicated students who are trying to better themselves.

In Closing...
To be successful at UWM you need some amount of drive and determination. The difficulty lies not in the workload or the academic standards, but putting up with the bullshit: bad professors and TAs, boring lectures, or useless textbooks. You can skate by without much trouble or work and get an average GPA, or you can immerse yourself in as much as you can and earn a good grade and actually learn something. It's what you make of it.