I’m currently a sophomore in high school and I want to go to either UC Berkeley, UCLA, UCI, UCSD, USC, or UCSB. However, I might end up with a few B+'s on my transcript. If I end up not being accepted to any of them, would it be better to go to my state school, Rutgers, so I would only have minimal, if any, student debt?
Any other good colleges in California that I could choose from?
I plan to go to law school for grad school.
It would be better to go to your State school period. UC’s don’t offer aid to out of state. You would possibly be cheaper at privates but still not necessarily affordable. Save money for law school.
PLENTY of people who go to less selective schools for undergrad go to great grad schools. As long as you maintain an excellent undergraduate GPA, have some good extracurriculars, get recommendations from professors who know and can vouch for you, and score well on the LSATs, nothing would prevent you from getting into a high-ranked law school.
It would be a better idea to go to Rutgers than to the UCs, IMO—it’s a respectable school, and the UCs are phasing out aid for OOS students. You’d be paying a huge chunk of money for a public school, and adding the debt from law school onto that would not be pretty.
By standardized testing, Rutgers students out-perform the students at, for example, UCI. So by at least this measure, the schools you referenced, including Rutgers, exist on a continuum and are without the obvious division implied by the question.
Standardized testing is misleading when you are evaluating the UCs because the UCs care more about grades and demonstrated achievement vis a vis your peers at your own school than they care about test scores. UC Berkeley would rather offer a spot to the valedictorians of the worst high schools in a impoverished, rural farm community outside of Bakersfield or the ghettos of South Central LA (even if their SATs are not high) than to the kid who was in the top 20% of his class in a wealth suburban area but smoked the SATs. The UCs view their mission as offering an opportunity to the achievers from across the entire state of California, including those areas where educational opportunities are limited.
People should be more aware of this when they evaluate the selectivity of the UCs. My kid is at an extremely rigorous prep school in California, and only the very top students in the class get accepted to Berkeley and UCLA each year, despite the fact that half the class has standardized test scores above the averages for those schools. A few B+ on the transcript can kill your chances, especially if you are an out of state applicant.
With that said, Rutgers is a fine school and I don’t see the point of paying out of state tuition for a UC. Go to Rutgers, achieve, and save your money for grad school.
Don’t go to a UC if you’re from OOS. Way way too costly. If you want to go OOS, I suggest looking at schools in the UNC system as well as schools in Virginia.
Any particular reason you want to be in CA (other than the weather)? What is affordable to you? I’d suggest you don’t start to amass big debt as an undergrad if you want law school down the road.
In addition to Rutgers you should look into TCNJ if you are in NJ. In addition SUNY schools (ex. SUNY Binghamton, SUNY Geneseo) have good OOS rates. Perhaps also consider private schools where your stats place you in the upper 25% or so and you may get merit aid.
If you are dying to move to CA for undergrad, check out some of the private schools: CMC, Pitzer, Scripps (if you are female), Occidental, University of Santa Clara, Loyola Marymount, Chapman, USC.
@washugrad you mean Santa Clara University?
I’d say Rutgers. UC’s are WAY too expensive for OOS($60K) although they are good. Rutgers is inbetween UCI & UC Santa Cruz academically(UCSC<RU<UCI) & overall is similar to UCSC.
Rutgers is $27K w/o financial aid.
@ASJackson923 I’d put UCSC equal with Rutgers, actually.
I would say check out TCNJ…it is not worth paying double for one state school over another state school.
I agree also to look at SUNY Binghamton which is a great value.
The OP is considering law school-which is a professional degree. In academics, grad school is often distinguished from professional degrees because typically they differ on certain dimensions, although there can be overlap. Professional degrees, like those obtained to practice law, medicine, dentistry are typically very expensive to obtain. In contrast, the term grad school is typically reserved for academic degrees, by which I mean a Masters or PhD in an academic subject (philosophy, history, etc). Students seeking graduate degrees, and especially those seeking the doctoral degree, are usually paid a stipend with a tuition waiver. Less debt is involved.
People on this site often claim that where your undergraduate degree is from does not matter for the purposes of gaining admission to professional training programs like law or medicine. I disagree. A recent review of some of the top professional training programs suggested otherwise, with graduates from top private schools and flagships from states with strong university systems differentially represented. Some of the disparity is do to the fact that there is probably considerable overlap between the criteria required for the top privates and top flagships and those required by the professional training programs. The top privates and better flagships have a higher percentage of the high scoring students, for example. But that is not enough to explain why there are so few students from some of the largest state systems in these top professional training programs. As I recall, Yale law school has no SUNY grads in its recently admitted class, for example. None. As I recall that was true about UMass also. No UMass students. The better state systems were represented, however. Forida, Georgia, MIchigan, North Carolina, Texas, Virginia were represented. SUNY? UMass? Nope. Someone is bound to point out that they know grads of SUNY or UMass who attended Yale Law. I don’t doubt that has happened. But it is rare. Undergraduate institution matters. Can you overcome graduating from a less rigorous university? I am sure. But it will be harder than if you graduate from an excellent university.
Lucky you to live in a state with an excellent university system. Graduates of Berkeley, UCLA and San Diego were represented. PS. The OP did not mention Yale and there are plenty of other law schools. Yale is used as an example because it is a straight forward one-very clear. Is Harvard similar? The point isn’t that there are never any SUNY grads in top shelf law schools. SUNY educated a huge number of students and so outstanding SUNY grads are likely to gain entry into great law school. My point is that, in general, students at top professional training programs are less likely to have been educated in the less strong university systems.
Me too. It’s just ranked slightly higher but I would agree that Rutgers is equal to UCSC.
If you’re referring to the OP, that couldn’t be further from the truth. While Rutgers and TCNJ are solid schools, NJ public universities as a whole are poor academically (they attract mostly average students who couldn’t really afford/were unwilling/otherwise unable to head OOS) with mediocre value.
@liaxdraws I went to Rutgers (for free) as an undergrad and got into every grad school I applied to (including Berkeley) and got full funding at JHU and Cornell. So it’s doable.
I know a young woman who went to a very undistinguished state university in a western state (much lower ranked than Rutgers), did well, and got admitted to several top law programs (BU, Northeastern, Georgetown are the ones I remember). Got nice merit scholarships too!
My advice - study hard and get to know your professors. If you make the effort, they will remember you, even at a large place like Rutgers. In fact, they may remember you BECAUSE you made the effort.
The UC system is expensive for OOS students and is increasingly overcrowded and strapped for funds. Don’t get me wrong, UCB and UCLA are superb institutions. But I don’t think they are worth the upcharge if you have a quality alternative close at hand.
@lbad96 Take a look at the admissions statistics for 2015 for Rutgers New Brunswick. They seem well above average to me.
http://admissions.rutgers.edu/pdfs/Fall_MidrangesChart2015.pdf
Sorry I thought that the OP was from California. I guess I did not recall that original post as well as I thought I had. ahh the OP says his/her state school is Rutgers-don’t know how I transposed California into that.
@mamaedefamilia I said that Rutgers is solid…
Before all this, talk to your parents/ How much can they/are they willing to invest in your college education from savings and income? If they don’t know, or can’t produce a number, ask if they’d be willing to do a couple NPCs with you.
Do the NPC for USC, Chapman, TCNJ, Rutgers, SUNY Geneseo, Muhlenberg, St Lawrence, American, and Fordham.
Which among those are affordable? Which aren’t?
Go from there to determine what your budget will be.
If that budget is below 60k, cross out the UC’s entirely.
In addition, the UC’s from OOS aren’t a good deal. There are lecture classes with over 1,000 students in them. You won’t have an adviser. Library and tutoring hours are being cut. If you do have 60k, look into the California Privates and save your money for law school (at a UC?)
^I second the brilliant @MYOS1634 's advice as well. I’d also recommend Santa Clara and (as mentioned on the other thread) UNC Wilmington. Give UBuffalo and Christopher Newport a look also.