Hi, my student is looking for advice to help choose from these schools- any thoughts or experiences would be great! We are CA residents and qualify for Cal Grant A. He likes analytics and numbers. He’s been admitted to:
UCLA- Pre-Econ
UCSD- Econ
Cal Poly SLO- Econ in business school
UCSB- Statistics & Data Science
UC Davis- Econ
What is he looking for in a college? Urban or rural/small town?
Has he visited all of these campuses and does he have a preference?
Academically they are all good schools so no bad option. What about costs? Cal Poly SLO should be less expensive than the UC’s but not always. Have you gotten your FA packages?
Great choices! A spring break tour is in order. Have you visited any of the schools?
I’m curious. Why did he apply for Statistics and Data Science instead of Econ at UCSB?
We’ve had tours at UCLA and Cal Poly. Drove through UCSD, we live in SB, haven’t been to Davis. He signed up for admitted days coming up- he’s open to location and either small town or city. He would like some school spirit vibes. He applied to Stats and Data science at SB just for something different , his alternate major there was Econ.
The UCs are coming out cheaper than Cal Poly by about $4000-$5000 because the Cal Grant covers more for UCs. We think the CA middle class scholarship could be added on too but it’s not showing up yet.
School spirit vibes will be most present at UCLA which has a thriving sports culture and school spirit identity. It’ll likely also feel the most competitive (not saying that’s a bad thing). these are all fantastic schools - congratulations!
I have never met a person who didn’t love their time at SLO or UC Davis…fun college towns with happy kids. I’m a UCLA alum so am biased 
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I’m hoping the admitted students days will help with finding the vibe. Davis and UCSB (hometown school) are lower on his interest list but worth considering! He didn’t let himself really love anywhere before he knew he got in- which frustrated me but now I think it was the best approach!
We’re from San Diego. Our daughter LOVED Davis!
Our kids all got into UCSD, none of them wanted to go there. They considered it their “safety”.
It is competitive.
When you visit any of the schools, look at the student’s faces. You’ll see lots of happy faces at UCLA, CPSLO, SB and Davis.
Is anyone familiar with the Econ programs at any of these?
UCSD is probably the school lowest on this. San Diego is a beautiful area and the school has limited housing; the result is many students after frosh year end up living in areas like Pacific Beach or Mission Beach and commuting to school.
At all the rest students live on/near campus and with friends a walk or quick bike ride away will have much more of a college feel.
Since you live in the SB area it might be a better experience for your kid to get away from the home area.
Your son should be sure he understands the requirements for the major at each school and whether they must apply for formal acceptance to the major. At UCLA, for example, you must apply after taking the prerequisites (including 2 quarters of engineering-level calculus).
Economics major programs typically have similar basic requirements of introductory micro and macro economics, intermediate micro and macro economics, econometrics, and the math and statistics prerequisites for the intermediate economics and econometrics courses. Additional usually elective upper level economics courses fill out the major.
Where differences exist tend to be the following, which can be checked on college / department web sites:
A student intending on graduate school in economics should plan to take substantial upper level math and statistics courses beyond those specified for the basic economics major (e.g. real analysis, upper level linear algebra, probability theory). UCLA offers a math economics major that caters to these students.
I was a UCLA Econ major a thousand years ago…the world has changed since then and so has UCLA. Take my experience w grain of salt. Back then it was top notch and I’m sure it still is. It is more theory focused with some strong accounting, stats and corporate finance classes (more theoretical though when I was there). I got my butt kicked in I-banking interviews compared to kids coming out of business specific programs.
I guess I would ask a more practical/pre-professional question…is your student focused on a specific industries? I-banking? Strategy consulting? Equity research? If yes, then prestige/rank matters more for those recruiters…and UCLA will be a brand up. For folks going to tech, or big 4 acctg, or grad school, or likely 95% of the other careers kids choose all these programs will be great.
Thank you!
With this analysis, you can compare the economics departments of these schools by faculty scholarship in the field: https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.usecondept.html.
Lots to think about, thanks! UCLA seems to be the front runner, we’ll see what happens after admitted days. So appreciate the feedback!
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