Well, at least at Michigan, you basically have 2 kind of "regular classes," that you go to lecture for and have tests in etc. that are of moderate difficulty. But then you've got Studio all 4 semesters, which is 6 credits each time, and then 2 out of 4 semesters you've got Construction, which is 4 credits each time. And Construction is basically the same amount of work as studio.
Studio is basically one whole semester spent on developing the same project, with maybe one or two week long smaller projects thrown in at the beginning to get you started on the large project. The final review of the project... I can't really put into words how much work it is to produce schematic drawings and 3D models and physical models and renderings and diagrams and etc etc etc. There's just so much stuff, that there's no possible way to get it all done. The reason is because the professors have you changing things until the very last second. And if you change one part of the project on one thing, you have to do it on everything. And then of course you have to plot your drawings, mount them, get or make stands for your models. It's just a massive amount of work. And I'm not joking when I say people literally do not sleep for days to get it all done. I've had people in my studios miss their review because they seriously just pass out. They can't help it.
So then, add to that two other classes that you've got finals to study for, or maybe another small project to do with a group or something, plus Construction, which is basically like studio except for everything actually has to make physical sense. And yeah. You're not sleeping lol.
tl;dr -- You get assigned more work than is physically possible to complete, but you still have to try to complete it all. The only thing I can really equate it to is law school. It's hardcore but you feel really accomplished when it's done.
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http://img.imgcake.com/crimjpgpe.jpg Mo' buildings mo' problems
ocean kinda grew on me like a flesh eating ...fungus. -BIGPUN9999