Yup, we get the student version free through school. I've noodled around in Blender a bit and I've touched 3DS Max once or twice, but since I get Maya for free I generally stick to that. I need to start working on hair simulations for our senior project. We're doing a female character and our goal is to do real hair so we have a lot of work to do.
We used Maya in the course I did, and I managed to use it just fine, although I'm so used to 3DS Max that I never much liked it. I find 3DS Max much easier and more forgiving to use, although Maya appears to be the more widely used software in general, so I expected that would be what you're being taught.
How long have you been learning 3D?