<p>Hi guys!
So here's the thing. I'm an Indian student applying to these 4 universities. I want to study english with political science mostly..Im really confused about which college is the better one. From what I've heard, all four are great universities.
Keep in mind, im an international student so cost is pretty much the same for all four, and neither of them offer financial aid to international students...so thats not a deciding factor. Neither is location or weather..coming from a hot place like India, I doubt I'd find either place warmer than the other :P
The main considerations for me are(in order of importance)-
1.Academics
2.Friendliness/general atmosphere
3.Social life (not extremely important, but it shouldn't be a study 24/7 thing..)
4.Campus(it should be a reasonably pretty sight :P )</p>
<p>Im really confused!!
I'd really appreciate any feedback!! Thanks! :)</p>
<p>Don’t underestimate the differences in weather between these schools. Winters in New York and Pennsylvania are much different from those in California. Not just in terms of temperature, but in the number of cold/cloudy days of the year and the amount of snow fall. Weather here in the states varies quite a bit from region to region.</p>
<p>Of course, don’t let weather be the deciding factor, either. Good luck with your decisions!</p>
<p>From my experience as a politics student at NYU:</p>
<p>(1) NYU politics is very methodological - meaning we use math. Namely game theory, voter averages, blah blah blah. Our department is host to Beuno de Mesquita, one of the world’s most renown political methodologists. </p>
<p>(2) I’ve taken classes at NYU which were host to students from Georgetown and some of the UCs. When it comes to things dealing with methodological politics, these students clearly had not had much formal training in quantitative politics. Maybe this was because they had not yet taken any courses in political methodology, I have no idea. However, they usually seemed quite surprised when politics classes started to delve into things like the different types of terrorist groups (i.e. a “true belief” terrorist). Am I saying that these schools are not good for political science? Of course not, they are excellent. I just don’t seem them as having the same type of curriculum. </p>
<p>Thus, I think it comes down to whether or not you’re interested in more political theory vs. political methodology.</p>
<p>1.UCLA has a great academic program. Perhaps not as good as berkeley’s for grad, but i imagine the difference for undergrad is negligible.
2. UCLA has a ton of friendly/cool people.
3. We party hard here, and study harder. LA is an amazing city with many amazing things around it. So you can do anything from going to the beach, to hollywood, to disneyland.
4. UCLA is one of the best looking campuses in the UC (probably bested only by UCSB)</p>
<p>so overall i’d say UCLA has the edge. You’d probably really enjoy it here :)</p>
<p>You make it seem like Berkeley is leaps and bounds above NYU for politics. But that’s simply not true. For English, yes Berkeley is excellent, it’s hard to find anything better. And of course for politics as well, but it isn’t by any means leaps and bounds above NYU, especially considering NYU curriculum is varied from UCB’s. In NYU’s area of politics, they are one of the absolute best. If OP wanted to study methodological politics, NYU would be their best choice.</p>