Hudson Valley Community College gets a bad reputation for the lack of education most people receive from the school. Let's be realistic here, YOU are responsible for your education. It's your job to research out the Teacher's for the classes you'll be taking and challenge yourself. There are a ton of great Professors on Campus and their Office Hours are always more than accommodating especially since you can just e-mail them as well. Each semester I check RateMyProfessor.com to see which teachers for my classes will help me expand my knowledge and gain better understanding of the subject. If people stopped picking easy classes, they might find that HVCC is a pretty good school. For incoming students, GO to the Orientation, it's so helpful and it's free. You get a chance to check out everything at the school and you get free stuff from the college for your Freshman Semester from USB Drives to free t-shirts! For the price of tuition, the amenities, activities, discounted tickets, trips, clubs, fairs and all other student activities offered, this is a pretty great school. I'm planning on transferring to SUNY Albany after I've finished my A.S.S. here and I think attending this school has been a great decision and a HUGE money saver. read more

See all

The college professors are OK but the financial aid office is a mess , they kept telling me I owe a balance from last semester in fall come to find out I don't owe any balance plus they take forever to disperse your loan refunds or any type of refund . when emailing or calling you get a different excuse or a different story I've gotten attitude. It is not good at the financial aid office beware. I've also talked to other students and they said the same thing that that amounts do not add up on wired.. read more

I have spoken to Clem and he was always very polite and knowledgeable. I would highly recommend this college based off of my conversations.

Everybody says HVCC nursing is the best but can be misleading. I like the course material, simulation lab and the opportunities to go to hospitals. But they don't spend much time in teaching lab skills. Usually less than an hour per week by laying out a few stations and having students going through them in groups. There are 2-4 open labs each week at different hours including evening and weekends. But it's usually crowded and one teacher can't go through everything with you. Some students don't mind this because they already work as LPNs. If you don't have experience working in the healthcare field, it's easy to get lost. Skill exams can be brutal. A lot of students came out crying. In some skill exams, teachers will fail 3/4 of the students during their first try. Having somebody watch over your shoulder and try to find fault with your skills is very stressful. If you don't perform well under stress, chances are you will make mistakes even you know your stuff. They can fail you if you make one mistake. They give you 3 chances. But the 2nd and 3rd time are more stressful and easier to make mistakes. And you may draw a totally different card that you are unfamiliar with. You are forced out of the program if you fail one skill exam even if you do great in other areas. The skill exam expects you to perform a lot of tediously detailed steps in order. And there are 12 skill exams. At the end of second semester, you need to draw from one of the 12. It also concerns me that the skill exam can't be completely objective. During the first semester very few students don't make mistakes. It depends on which card you draw and which teacher you have. A lot of students struggle with written exams as well. When I ask the admission officer about the graduation rate, she said it's about 75%. But the truth is, every year at least 50% of the students fail. Remember almost all these students are smart and hardworking with high HESI scores. The weekend program has the lowest retention rate because the program packs 3-4 day program into 2. Evening program retention rate is also low because students in the evening program usually have to work and the course load is very heavy. When you fail, teachers would encourage you to repeat another year. You have to make your own decisions because the 2nd and 3rd semesters are even harder. If you are not a good self learner, not good at critical thinking, don't have great memory, not very detailed oriented, or just don't perform well under stress, this program probably doesn't suit you. I spend time in writing this because I don't want anybody else to get misled and waste their time and money. I was under the impression that if I'm smart and hard working I should survive this program. Also, this is the kind of stress I try to avoid by all means. read more

Worst departments are cashiers & financial aid. Difficult to reach and standoffish - even to pay your childs tuition- which she had me (the parent who is paying) if i have permission. TO PAY A BILL? Never informed child of Excelsior program- should ALL FIANACIAL AID AVAILABLE be supplied to students a standard practice. read more

I don't recommend this nursing program if your skin completion is even slightly darker than the deans, and you happen to be a women. Little to no help from them, some of the clinical instructors care. They will change the nursing handbook on you just to get you out the program but they will break rules for others and not those who show up and put in the effort. Many other nursing schools in the area that will help you in succeeding. Look elsewhere. read more

Apparently HVCC faculty are paid even when they don't show up for class. We just paid $2800 for this semester and guess what? First class, prof never shows up. For a three hour class!! If you can, spend your $$ at a school where they care. No follow up email with an apology or an explanation. Brushed under the rug. read more

The nursing department at this school is kind of a joke. There are so many professors and there where times that one hand didn't know what the other was doing. I emailed the chair and the dean on multiple occasions and I have yet to get a response. Most surprisingly no response from the dean. It's truly disappointing because I did have some respect for them but not anymore. Don't get me wrong there are some amazing clinical instructores and some who really care but the ones with the most say apparently don't care at all. read more

I would highly advise NOT attending Hudson Valley Community College. After attending classes at this school on and off (for my own personal development) for nearly 20 years it appears they have developed a new policy of attempting to charge their students for classes you didn't take. When you register for classes they are supposed to drop automatically for non-payment at a specified date. This does not always happen and HVCC will insist you pay them for classes that should have automatically dropped. Meaning they want you to pay for an education that you didn't receive and by the time you find out they would have already reported your account delinquent to a credit reporting agency. Yes, HVCC will turn over this unjust debt to Solomon & Solomon, PC, a local collection agency and ruin your credit in the process. Solomon & Solomon informed me that they have many HVCC students in collections right now. I would highly recommend looking for an educational institution that respects and helps their students achieve success. This school is clearly not it. read more

Nursing department is falling apart. They use COVID as an excuse for poor planning (ex: not having a reading list for the semester even 3 weeks in). Lab times cut in half, simulation time cut in half and yet mu tuition bill is still 100% Doing contact tracing as "clinical" instead of using the resources we have on campus to enhance our skills. Tracing may be a "community nurse" job but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to learn how to make phone calls. And it's certainly not worth the thousands of dollars I spent this semester. read more

Best community college in NY state. Affordable fees and great faculty and staff. Wide variety of course offered.

Have attended the sports complex many times for various craft and vendor fair events as well as sports events...what was surprise to his visit is that Prime is doing the "catering" for sports events. At affordable prices they had delicious salad w homemade dressing, children tenders that had real chicken in them w French fries for $7.00 each. Overwhelmingly popular they ran out of food and had delays to restock but it was good and nice surprise for a sporting event. That Angelo sure has branded himself and now can expand to all kinds of venues. read more

Depends what your needs are here. It gets the job done for you, but more often than not, it feels like an extension of high school rather than an actual college class. read more

I took General Chemistry II here in the fall of 2006, and the school left quite an impression on me. The majority of the buildings and resources are ANCIENT - they spent so much money on Bruno's stadium that they haven't updated the school AT ALL. It's old, crumbly and falling apart. The teacher was okay but I felt that the class was full of fresh high school graduates and call me an academic snob/elitist, I just don't have time for that (especially when it's a nighttime class). Definitely not a place I'd recommend to anyone. read more

Generally awful school, aside from the occasional professor whom can be nice and like-able individuals, the websites they have us use are clunky and non-functional, academic counselors are kinda a joke here, ive been complaining the entirety of my first semester that I can't use their website (blackboard) for the entirety of this semester, and only once we got into the last few weeks where it is impossible to study and make up 10 weeks worth of work they are finally getting back to me, I also had to deal with multiple of my online class lectures overlapping (each starting 10 or so minutes after the other started) and they outright ignored my requests or told me something along the lines of "your professor is taking way to much time, talk with him." And their online policies of forcing students for some classes to have a webcam which may not be a viable option for everyone, and another clunky application which they have us use (zoom) which barely works and is unfit for online learning, It is not worth your time unless you planned on just drinking tea and talking with your professors about how their day has been as that's the most you will get done. read more

I am a current student, about to start my final semester. I don't know how to accurately describe this school. There are things about it that are amazing and things that are horrible. Parking, social aspects, advisement, and certain professors fall into the horrible category. Unless you get there at 7 am or after 1pm, good luck parking. Anywhere. Your best option is either stalking students to their car and asking them if they are leaving, until you find one who is (not awkward at all...) or parking illegally or in a designated space reserved for chair and board and whatever else members. The wifi is an absolute joke. It barely even works in the library. There is a computer and help center upstairs. The computers are painfully slow. I've had to print things out last minute, and just signing in, going to my email, and printing something took 20 minutes. I'm not exaggerating. It's also very spotty. Blackboard used to be pretty mobile friendly, now not so much. I don't believe the administration cares much about student life or the quality of our experience as a whole. I highly recommend using ratemyprofessor. You have to be careful with prof choices. You can take the same exact class taught by 2 different people and have completely opposite experiences. I really can't stress this enough. Some of the professors are kind, caring,articulate, funny, you name it. Others are rude, sarcastic, patronizing, unorganized, forgetful.. some have certain "triggers", things that may seem unimportant but will set them off. My business prof seemed like a super laid back, nice guy the first week of class. I had read online that he had a mean streak and hated when people were late and used cell phones in class. So on week 2 when he flipped out because several people were late, everyone but me was shocked. I mean he really lost it. There aren't many opportunities to socialize. The events and perks they have you pretty much have to search out and stumble on by yourself. A lot of people know each other from high school and stick together. I think the location of the student center has something to do with the lack of socialization. It's just in a weird spot, not really an easy access point. I could write more but I've already wrote a novel lol. read more

HVCC is not a terrible school but in no way are they the best option in the area. If you are just starting out it is a great cheap alternative to a more expensive 4 year school. The only thing is if you plan to go to a four year school ensure that all of your credits will be accepted. I know plenty of people who have left hvcc and found out they took classes for no reason, just because hvcc said "oh yeah, you should take these." Also the Financial Aid department is pretty much a scam so dont worry they will try to pull many tricks, you just have to be prepared and knowledgeable. read more

I can't talk about HVCC in the present terms but I graduated from there in 1974. Sure its a 2 yrs college but I went a lot of kids couldn't get into 4yr school and went there to learn a trade. I graduated and worked in health care for 40 yrs just retiring 2 yrs ago and the new graduates I worked with from HVCC were well trained and motivated. read more