<p>Yes, replacement of Evans is on the table. See page 38 of the Long Range Development Plan (attached) for a conceptual drawing of the new replacement… Much better:
<a href=“http://www.cp.berkeley.edu/LRDP_2020.pdf[/url]”>Planning Documents | Capital Strategies;
<p>BerkeleyOrBust - I liked your reply to OP. Berkeley is definitely not for everyone. And the post is important because students need to visit a campus to know if the “fit” is right!! Forget about the prestige, the rankings or the desire for the sticker on the back of the car.
KeelyMK - you haven’t visited any other UC campuses? Sounds like you should - or should have. Each campus is unique - with its own positives and negatives, physically and culturally. Sorry to hear you think Berkeley is so awful that you think you need to tell new students to stay away. I hope they can make up their own minds about how Berkeley fits them!</p>
<p>Amazing to see this discussion on first world problems. A real life and a career throws far more problems at your likes/dislikes of people/campus. The key is to like what you do and not worry about the college environment. If there are sniper bullets flying across and you may step on the next landmine, then you have to worry about the environment. Until then, don’t let the negative energy from worries get under your skin. Real life is a lot tougher than that!</p>
<p>My S is finishing his freshman year. He has been very challenged with his coursework but he is a Mechanical Engineering major and classes are tough. He has had to better manage his time in order to survive. </p>
<p>Aside from that, he absolutely loves Cal. He still has found time to pledge a fraternity and enjoy many weekends hanging out with friends. He was also able to get a summer intern job in his major because of the school’s reputation.</p>
<p>I am kinda surprised by this as well. I am a Cal Grad and lived in the co-ops all four years. I was stunned when I went back to see the campus with my D who will be attending, having not been there for many, many years. It looks amazing! New buildings everywhere! If you think it is “dangerous” or “dumpy” you should have seen it when I was there. My other D goes to UCLA and she is regularly hounded by aggressive homeless guys and a rapist attacked a girl last year near the apartments off the “hill.” At USC, two engineering students were murdered, and four others robbed at gunpoint just in the last month. So, at every college campus you attend, there is risk, and you have to be smart. But Berkeley has all the usual safety features, like the shuttle buses, guys who walk you home on call, and emergency phones. My older D carries pepper spray on her chain that has her Bruin card…</p>
<p>As for Dwinelle, heck, it was bad when I was there, but that is part of its charm. I lived in that building. What matters is the quality of the education you receive. </p>
<p>You are either a Berkeley person or you are not. But for those of us who went and loved it, you will bleed Blue and Gold for the rest of your life. Promise. It gets into you and never leaves.</p>
<p>The OP probably spends most of her time in the most neglected buildings. If I remember correctly, English classes are mostly taught in Dwinelle, Wheeler, Evans and Barrows? I may be wrong, but those buildings are old and lack updating. Moffit is run down, but is set for a bug retrofit soon.</p>
<p>The Engineering Library is amazing. I love that place. I have my first class this summer in the Li Ka Shing building and that building is gorgeous. I spend most of my time in Kroeber, and that building is one of the older ones. As much as I like the newer renovated buildings, the old ones are what give Berkeley its charm. </p>
<p>Welp, back to procrastinating on dead week!</p>
<p>okay, do they use “physics chalk” or “math chalk”? that is the defining question and will determine my final decision about whether i should attend UCLA or Cal!</p>
<p>Haha @ comparing Berkeley campus to Stanford. we really need to let the inferiority complex go. Stanford is a much prettier, much safer campus. As for class size, I hear they can be large there too but I would guess that it isn’t as big of a hassle getting the classes you want than it is here.
Seriously, my first semester here completely soured my outlook. Late financial aid meant I couldn’t buy books. No one had any answers. At Calso, we were given an option of two classes (total) available to us in the major.
And yes, my classes have all been in the dumpy buildings so I can’t really comment on the newer ones. The place needs to be improved in nearly every aspect. I can only count one time where Cal has handled an issue I had properly.
The students are generally dull/ boring, either completely consumed by their studies/arrogant. Or completely frivolous. Very few balanced students. </p>
<p>Really, Cal is definitely not for everyone, and I think people like me are in the majority.</p>
<p>Lmao Stanford’s campus is not prettier than Berkeley… it’s also surrounded by ugly foothills.</p>
<p>New buildings, pristine manicured lawns, open spaces,the rodin statues, the church, and a vibrant energy that permeates the entire campus. Berkeley has old dilapidated buildings, uneven cracked pavement, it’s on a hill that is grueling to traverse. Maybe if Berkeley had better upkeep it could match up with Stanford. Some parts of our campus look post-apocalyptic.</p>
<p>I love Berkeley. Honestly, there aren’t many schools out there with the same energy. And everyone manifests themselves and their motivations here so differently. It’s extremely variable and dynamic. </p>
<p>I’ve read a bunch of misattributions, ‘chalking :)’ others up to being pretentious or boring or frivolous, and establishing this to be the collective attitude around here. It just depends on the people you hang around. </p>
<p>Damn Berkeley, it’s been good. I can’t believe undergrad is nearly over…</p>
<p>You want all those pristine whiteboards, shiny window cornices made of diamonds; you gotta pay up like stanford students do =)</p>
<p>I’ve enjoyed my 4 years here. 
</p>
<p>Not everyone has a negative experience.</p>
<p>Actually at Stanford if your family makes under $100,000, you get free tuition. Dayumn.</p>
<p>Haha I don’t believe that everyone will have a bad time, I’m just saying…it’s not for everyone. A lot of people’s positive experiences at Berkeley can be attributed to spending their formative years there. There’s nothing innately “Berkeley” about that. you’d have similar experiences anywhere there is a critical mass of young, motivated and intelligent students. Which, is actually a lot of places.</p>
<p>I am “from” the real world, I needed a more fostering atmosphere. Not being able to get into the classes you want. Waiting 2 hours to talk to a professor for 5 mins…not for me. Berkeley is an assembly line. some people don’t enjoy being cogs.</p>
<p>You can leave Berkeley right now and no one will miss you.</p>
<p>You can say that pretty much about any campus. It goes without saying, which really leads me to question why you said it. In fact, I’m sure if you keeled over and died right this instant, berkeley, and life itself would go on. Not to be misconstrued, I am not wishing anything ill to happen to you, I am just following your lead in saying truisms that are unrelated to the topic at hand.</p>
<p>PS I’m graduating, so I actually AM leaving Berkeley close to “right now”</p>
<p>Doesn’t make my criticisms any less (or more if we’re being honest) valid. I would like to know what part of my post you take issue with. Is the bureaucracy not byzantine? Is it not difficult to get the classes you need for many majors? Is it not true that many buildings/facilities are haggard? Can we address the issues. I would love for Berkeley to not suck as much for the next crop of students.</p>
<p>So Stanford invited me to their graduate school interview weekend, and I went even though I had already been accepted to my top choices. Haven’t ranted about it on CC yet so let me do it here!</p>
<p>First off, Stanford’s #1 priority is affirmative action. I had visited Harvard, Yale, Columbia, UCSF that same month and none of them made a big deal out of it at all. Stanford was the only school to make you write an essay on your application about how you contributed to “diversity”. The first thing you get when you check into the hotel is a giant packet filled with flyers about diversity and African American associations and such. There were minorities at the other interview weekends I went to, but none of them had seemed at all incompetent. First night at Stanford I was talking to other recruits about interviews and was surprised when one of the girls said that the only interviews she was offered were Stanford, University of Oregon, and something in Texas. Learned her name later and realized it was somewhat Hispanic. During lunch there are people sticking “I <3 Diversity” stickers onto you. And then right there in the middle of interviews, you’re forced to go to a ‘Diversity Assembly’!! And you get to listen to 2 hours of speeches about how wonderful affirmative action is and just how much Stanford cares.</p>
<p>So I had meetings with six professors at Stanford. Almost every professor I had met at other schools had tried to convince me to choose their school and told me stories about why they loved it themselves. The kind of stories Cal professors say all the time. But nobody at Stanford had anything positive to say about the school. If you tried asking them they would say something about the Bay Area or just shrug off the question. One professor’s face lit up when he found out I was from Berkeley and started telling me about how much he had studying there. Another professor had recently moved from Harvard (because his wife wanted to come to California) and told me about Harvard’s program and Boston instead. </p>
<p>The grad students were a whole other story. But no one here cares so I won’t go into that. I did meet a bunch of Stanford undergrads at interviews for other schools who admitted that they no longer liked Stanford and were happy to get out of there.</p>
<p>Oh and their campus. Looks like a resort, no wonder most people like it when they first see it. But it’s just so artificial, every tree looks like it is trimmed daily so it’s perfectly symmetric to every other tree. And there’s huge lawns everywhere for no reason that make it impossible to get anywhere by walking. Everybody must bike! And I went up their tower from which the only thing you can view is more stanfurd! Oh and they like to tell you that it’s “convenient to get to SF”. A once every hour unreliable Caltrain that you need to take a shuttle to get to is convenient? And campus is nowhere close to a freeway.</p>
<p>Yeah, I left early and threw my Stanford lanyard and pen into the trash. Came back to Berkeley and appreciated it like never before <3</p>
<p>If college students are not active in political and cultural sphere, who will? Society needs to evolve continuously and only young people can drive that. It has always improved from one generation to the next. As we age, we tend to resist change. When young people resist change, it is not a good sign.</p>
<p>You will find all kinds of people at work as well as when you have interactions with your customers when you get employed - be it in theoritical research or as a teacher or as a software developer. Life is continuous stream of such engagement with weirdos, misfits, socially challenged engineers, rude, in-your-face types and all kinds of behaviours that you may dislike from others. Pick up valuable experience in engaging with such people during your college life even if you are not a student of psychology or anthropology (BTW, I am an EE from eons back). This experience will guide you during your work life. Having only a rosy and stress free life is not the best preparation for real world! Just don’t let it get under your skin.</p>
<p>I have existed in the “real world” I have a lot of work experience. The real world is a horrible horrible place, especially considering the jobs a young person can get without a degree. I wanted a break from that. Some colleges actually provides that, Berkeley doesn’t.</p>
<p>I really don’t feel like I should have to fight for everything when I’m paying 30k a year to the school. What exactly are they doing with that money? Revamping the stadium I guess…meh.</p>
<p>The atmosphere for students needs to be improved.</p>
<p>Quick story to illustrate. I’m walking through my housing unit, and there is this loud music blasting from one of the rooms. A young Hispanic student is sitting outside of his building, ostensibly to get away from the noise. He looks at me and says “We worked so hard just to end up back in the hood.” I laughed my head of at his statement, but unfortunately, I feel like that far too often. I should be getting more for my money.
That’s just an anecdote not to illustrate a problem with berkeley (they of course don’t control kids listening to loud music) us to give you a little insight into how I feel sometimes.</p>
<p>This is how I feel.</p>
<p>Now I can understand if you’ve been babied all your life, never seen struggle, how berkeley might appeal to you. I just expect more nurturing from a “top” university.</p>
<p>And your problem is… someone playing loud music in a dorm room.</p>