<p>I'm trying to decide where to go to college and it's down to those two.</p>
<p>I would love to attend Barnard and have the oppurtunity to live in New York City, but is it looked down upon by Columbia students? Is the relationship between Columbia students and Barnard students awkward or weird at all?</p>
<p>As for getting into graduate school, does Barnard have a high percentage?</p>
<p>Please let me know what you think of both schools.</p>
<p>Two things: Are you a CA resident, and is money a factor in your decision?</p>
<p>Yes I’m a CA resident and I want your opinions without thinking about the money factor. Think more about getting into grad school.</p>
<p>I think you’d have a decent shot at grad school, either way. I just took a quick search of “Barnard vs Columbia,” and it looks like the relationship between the two schools (student attitudewise) is somewhat similar to Berkeley vs Davis. Almost all Berkeley students I’ve met, who I dared to divulge to that I’m a Davis student, are very respectful. I’ve met other Davis students who say that the Berkeley students they met are condescending and have superiority complexes, but that hasn’t been my experience.</p>
<p>Have you visited both schools?</p>
<p>Yeah I’ve visited Cal and I really like it, I didn’t mention it but I am still sorta considering UCLA as well but I think I like Berkeley over LA.</p>
<p>As for Barnard, I lived in New York City right in Manhattan for two weeks and really loved it, I love big cities, and I stay in Tokyo with family a lot so I know I can handle big cities. However, I did not see the campus because that was when I was in 7th grade and not thinking about college.</p>
<p>If you are headed to grad school, you don’t want a lot of college debt hanging around your neck. Even if you would be fully funded for a Ph.D. in an STEM field, when you finally finished that degree, you’d be headed off to a horribly underpaid post-doc position and have to start paying down your undergrad loans plus whatever debt accumulated while you were in grad school.</p>
<p>Sit down with your parents, your offers, and this calculator, and see what you think: <a href=“Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid”>Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid;
<p>Now if money truly is no object, I’d say Barnard. But that is because I graduated from one of the other “sisters” and I’m just a huge fan of all of them. Is there anyway you could visit Barnard before you have to decide?</p>
<p>What is your intended major, social science?</p>
<p>Unless you’re super wealthy then you have to consider money that IS a factor for most people here - whether you like it or not. This thread is not just for one person - others will read it, so have a little respect - although based on your posts you name fits some of your snippy responses.</p>
<p>happymomof1 - Thanks for your reply, that’s a really handy calculator. The reason I said earlier not to think of money was because I’m getting a generous grant from Barnard and I have recieved some other local scholarships from my area, so actually the UC price and Barnard price come out to be around the same. The only thing would be the airplane tickets to and from New York.
Unfortunately, no I won’t have time to visit Barnard before I have to decide. :(</p>
<p>RML - I’m going to be undeclared my first year year but I am hoping to figure out whether I want to major in cultural anthropology and eventually get my PhD and become a professor, or go more toward the path of pre-med and become a doctor. I know, haha two really different things, but I’m hoping to figure it out!</p>
<p>SISTOKID - No, I’m not super wealthy and the reason I said not to consider the cost was because with the financial aid Barnard is giving me, the cost comes out to about the same as a UC. One thing would be the airplane tickets though. I’m sorry if I sounded like I wasn’t respectful, I’m not sure what I said offended you. I didn’t mean for my answers to sound snippy either, I’m confused as to which ones you think sounded that way. Snippy is just a username I chose because there’s an inside joke to it amongst my friends.</p>
<p>Given that the costs are equal and you don’t have to pay for cross country flights (which get tiring - I know from personal experience) I would opt for Berkeley.</p>
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<p>You can take the pre-med courses alongside most majors, including cultural anthropology.</p>
<p>For example, the [anthropology</a> major at Berkeley](<a href=“http://sis.berkeley.edu/catalog/gcc_view_req?p_dept_cd=ANTHRO]anthropology”>http://sis.berkeley.edu/catalog/gcc_view_req?p_dept_cd=ANTHRO) requires 12 courses. Pre-med would add about 10 courses, for a total of 22. Considering that you’ll probably take about 32 courses over eight semesters, that still leaves space for about 10 more, although you may have to use up to 2 for reading and composition and up to 4 for additional breadth requirements, which would still give you at least about 4 courses worth of schedule breathing room.</p>
<p>Very definitely Barnard. </p>
<p>I’m the parent of a Barnard grad & also went to Berkeley for grad school & live in the bay area, so very familiar with both. The personal attention and support you will get at Barnard is simply incomparable to what you would get at Berkeley, especially with UC funding cuts. I’d note that even if my d. had not gone to Barnard, she would have turned down Berkeley (which did accept her) for either UCSB or UCSC based on talking to her friends about the undergraduate experience. </p>
<p>If there was a significant cost differential between the two, I might have a different view. I don’t think that ANY college is worth +$30K over the UC campuses – but I was very willing to pay a cost differential (accounting for financial aid at both schools) of +$10K.</p>
<p>I really cannot begin to express how different your experience will be in terms of your relationships with the faculty at Barnard as compared to Berkeley or any other UC. There are other issues that might be different – for example, I think that campus life overall is more vibrant at Berkeley – but I think academically you will have a much richer experience at Barnard.</p>
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<p>Barnard (and, I think most elite colleges) is essentially geared to prepare its students for grad school or professional school. Your major will probably require a senior thesis. You will form close relationships with profs who will be able to write recs for grad school. Berkeley graduated about 130 anthropology majors last year – if you multiply that by 4 you get 520 students overall in the department (though of course first & second year students may not yet have settled on their major) – there were 32 anthropology majors at Barnard the same year (46 at Columbia). So you will definitely get more personalized attention at Barnard.</p>
<p>Also, Barnard seems to have more of a focus on cultural anthropology – if you look at the required courses at [Requirements</a> for the major | Anthropology Department](<a href=“http://anthropology.barnard.edu/majors]Requirements”>http://anthropology.barnard.edu/majors) you can see that they are focused largely on language & culture. (Also note that with the exception of the senior thesis seminars, all of the courses are joint Barnard/Columbia courses – the “V” designation tells you that)</p>
<p>The Berkeley major seems to be broader, requiring foundational courses in archeology & biological anthropology as well. See [How</a> to Declare Major/Minor - Anthropology Department, UC Berkeley](<a href=“http://anthropology.berkeley.edu/programs/undergraduate/declare.php]How”>http://anthropology.berkeley.edu/programs/undergraduate/declare.php)
Nothing wrong with that – i took undergrad courses in physical anthropology and archeology and loved my classes – but it seems to be a somewhat different focus than your interest, as you’ve stated it. The required intro classes are large lecture format (up to about 450 students). </p>
<p>Obviously you might change your major, but the point is that you are probably going to find that classes in general are going to be smaller at Barnard and you will have more of an opportunity to develop strong relationships with the faculty, especially early on. </p>
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Unless you decide to wear a Barnard sweatshirt wherever you go, there is no way at all that anyone can tell which women attend Barnard and which attend Columbia. So there is nothing awkward or weird, except for the minor annoyance of dorm entry. </p>
<p>When my d. was in college, she often griped to me over whatever was bugging her. If someone said something to her that made her angry, I heard about it. Not once did she ever raise any issue about Columbia students or the Columbia/Barnard relationship. She had more guy friends than female friends in college & was active in several Columbia associations.</p>
<p>Calmom - Could you please elaborate on what you mean by </p>
<p>“the campus life is overall more vibrant at Berkeley” </p>
<p>and</p>
<p>" except the minor annoyance of dorm entry" at Barnard</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
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<p>If you go to Berkeley any day of the week (or weekend), you are going to find the campus and Sproul Plaza full of students and others. All of the areas near campus are constantly full of activity. There will always be students & other people making some noise (like playing music, or sermonizing or making speeches or canvassing). The city of Berkeley itself is very much a college town, and the Berkeley campus is a cultural center for the area - with Zellerbach Auditorium, the art museum, etc. drawing patrons from all over. There isn’t a time of day or night that the activity stops, and your life at Berkeley is going to be centered around the campus. The campus also is fairly large, with lots of open space & hiking areas in the Strawberry Canyon area in the hills above the main campus. </p>
<p>Columbia/Barnard have plenty of cultural activities of their own, but definitely not the cultural center of the town --and while the streets around campus also are filled with restaurants and cafes that are open at all hours, it is not student dominated. I have found the campuses to be relatively quiet in the evening – and even during the day when I may see many students sitting on the steps at Low Library, they are talking quietly or studying. There is plenty going on, but it is not the constant hubbub of activity that Berkeley is. </p>
<p>The city is a different story: NYC is everything you expect it to be. Berkeley is a somewhat laid back, quiet town, with not much going on other than a smattering of restaurants. Some nice parks, definitely a kid & dog friendly community – but not a major urban center. </p>
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Columbia and Barnard students have CUID’s – an ID card with a magnetic strip that provides entry to campus buildings. Barnard CUID’s give entry into all Barnard dorms, but not Columbia; Columbia CUID’s give entry into all Columbia dorms, but not Barnard. As a first year student at Barnard, you’d live on the quad and all those dorms are connected anyway – between the dorms and the underground passage you could probably manage to go to class and come home most days without ever going outdoors (convenient on cold winter days). But if you go to visit a Columbia friend in their dorm, you wouldn’t be able to just swipe into the building and go up the elevator – in theory you would have to call your friend and he or she would have to come downstairs to meet you. (I say “in theory” because while I don’t have direct experience, in practice in most places the way that you get inside a building with a security door if you don’t have access is to follow behind someone who does – and my guess is that you are far more likely to be entering together with your Columbia friend than stopping by at random times for a visit). Even if I am mistaken, I personally don’t see a problem with the idea that access to some buildings is restricted that way – after all, in real life you don’t just go barging into the houses of your friends when you visit. You ring the doorbell or hit a buzzer and wait for someone to let you in – so I don’t particularly see why it would be much of an issue on a college campus.</p>
<p>This kind of ID-based entry is pretty common around the country I think. Several weeks ago when I toured Towson U in Maryland with Happykid, we were told that the ID would only permit entry to one’s own residence hall. During the daytime students staff the front desk to sign in anyone who doesn’t live there, and at night the desks are staffed by university security. </p>
<p>I’m still rooting for Barnard.</p>
<p>Berkeley is a top 5 anthro program nationally. This is a no brainer at ths point</p>