<p>I think Berkeley, as a public school, almost functions as a (for lack of a better term) charity to a certain degree. It accepts a wide range of students of different academic calibers to offer a high level education opportunity for all these students. It just so happens that Berkeley’s prestige will attract the students who have had better foundational education before coming to college as well as the students who have had a less solid foundational education. However, with the way the grading system works, more often than not the less solidly educated students will end up at the lower end of the curve, which means they will flunk out eventually. I do not think the fault can be of the students for being less solidly educated or the admissions officers for not being able distinguish between the students who will succeed and those who will fail, but on the structure of the school system as one where there will be those who succeed and those who fail. </p>
<p>Yeah, I agree that this problem with competition for success within the win-lose system will be eliminated if Berkeley had a small student population of high caliber students but Berkeley just can’t do that. It’s a public school funded by the tax dollars of all Californian residents not the tuition of individual students who choose to attend to Berkeley (excluding out of state students). If Berkeley was too selective, imagine the public outcry.</p>
<p>Other than that, I do not think it is impossible for a student who is of a less solid academic background to improve him/herself to ensure that he/she does not fail. And if such a person is willing to try to achieve their potential, then Berkeley provides the perfect opportunity. I believe strongly that an individual’s success largely depends on the individual rather than the institution the individual attended for secondary education and safe that institution was for them.</p>
<p>I guess the way to get pat this is to firstly make sure the departments where students have the hardest time are very tough to get into. For instance, engineering. At least in L&S, you have several majors out there to try out. Also, I think an increase in selectivity wouldn’t cause so much of an outcry, since after all, nobody can really feel <em>entitled</em> to a Berkeley education. Perhaps if less selective UC’s started being as selective as Berkeley is now, that’d cause more of an outcry. But Berkeley has long been an academic powerhouse, and I think as long as things didn’t get completely ridiculous, people would be fine with it. I guess I could be wrong, but seriously, I don’t believe anyone but the most high caliber students should really think themselves entitled to a Berkeley education. </p>
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<p>So I guess it’s not necessarily super easy to tell who will succeed and who won’t as much. But frankly, flunking out is flunking out – I know plenty of people who weren’t very impressive to me as students, who manage to stay in Berkeley engineering and do pretty well. I’m sure you know the same, Dill! </p>
<p>The ideal solution would be not to admit those who flunk out, but the most practical one would be to allow students to transfer out of engineering easily. I, like you, believe that a smart individual can look after himself/herself fine at Berkeley with a little effort, so I’m fine with the current system overall, but I guess I see no reason not to allow for the extra flexibility, so why not :)</p>
<p>mathboy, your statement is way too idealistic. it would lead to less people making it to college, period. that is not a goal any UC should chase after, even if it is Berkeley. would you rather have a whole bunch of top engineers making tons of money or a spectrum of them, with those with around 3.0 GPA’s getting hired at places paying less-than-ideal wages? </p>
<p>There are a lot of smart people who do not get accepted into certain places because of a whole plate of reasons. We shouldn’t go down this road during this discussion, because it is not a problem only UCB faces.</p>
<p>I said UCB does not need that MANY good engineers because they already produce a lot, in terms of absolute numbers, in comparison to top elites. I never said they do not need any.</p>
<p>“Also, I think an increase in selectivity wouldn’t cause so much of an outcry, since after all, nobody can really feel <em>entitled</em> to a Berkeley education.”</p>
<p>I’m not so sure about entitlement, but there is a certain feeling that people feel that they should have a better opportunity for something that they paid for. Certainly the tax money goes to all UC schools, but Berkeley as the flagship UC would be one of the most sought after UCs. If it suddenly became more selective, I imagine people would feel somewhat cheated because of the stratification between Berkeley and the other UCs which everyone is paying for. There would a lack of that equal opportunity feel that has always characterized the public education system.</p>
<p>As for increasing selectivity in certain departments, the engineering school has definitely sought to do that in certain areas, such as EECS and BioE (though perhaps not selective enough). However, I get the feeling that there is not a huge amount of success in more selectivity. I feel like sometimes the paper applicants must be much better than the human applicants that actually end up attending. There is also no reason why the reverse may be true. I have a friend who is incredibly smart and loves to learn (and loves engineering billions of times more than I do) who told me that he applied to L&S because he was pretty sure that the engineering school would not have accepted him since his papre applications was not impressive. I am aware that this is just an individual case but I don’t know if the benefits of increased selectivity outweigh the consequences. Furthermore, increased selectivity means more homogeneity of students. Maybe a few black sheep will slip through but most of your admitted students will probably of a similar strain. One of my professor told me yesterday that part of the reason she liked Berkeley so much was because of the diversity. She told us that when she taught at Oxford and Princeton most of the students there were all perfectly polished and disciplined academically that they sometimes were lacking in original thought.</p>
<p>“I guess I could be wrong, but seriously, I don’t believe anyone but the most high caliber students should really think themselves entitled to a Berkeley education.”</p>
<p>I’m not a big fan of the word entitlement. Personally, I don’t think anyone was ever born entitled to anything, including being born in the first place. However, I do believe that everybody should feel like they may have an opportunity to get a Berkeley education if they really want to learn and make something of themselves. I really take issue with the students who are perhaps of high caliber but care more about their ego than learning. </p>
<p>“The ideal solution would be not to admit those who flunk out, but the most practical one would be to allow students to transfer out of engineering easily.”</p>
<p>I totally agree with you on that, and perhaps give students some leeway gradewise in their first, two years here. Though I must admit I feel like engineering lower div class grade distributions have been improving in recent years. Most of my professors have been more concerned that the classes learn and feel encouraged to learn more than to let grades discourage us from learning.</p>
<p>I’d rather there not be extremely mediocre 2.0 (or sub 2.0) GPA students. 3.0+ students are all more than fine, and are actually doing something with their education. As elitist as I may sound at times, I don’t believe only 4.0 engineering students should exist. I am not sure how hard it is to <em>practically</em> pick out who is going to flunk out, but I’m saying ideally these students would never be admitted. You on the other hand seem to think “this is life.” I don’t see any reason why anyone would buy into that philosophy. A school should make an effort to keep its students going, and at that as much of an effort as possible. If you disagree with this, then I’d have to make the condescending statement that you’ve not actually been to college and felt what it’s like, a direction I’d rather not go. </p>
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<p>Well here’s my take on this – I do agree the public school system should offer something somewhat distinct from a private school system. Private schools, pretty much by definition, could do whatever they like. I think one of the virtues of Berkeley as a public school is that it’s somehow more predictable with its admissions process, like other UCs are. So are many other public schools in the U.S. So if you really really work for it and do what it expects, I believe it IS possible to make it into Berkeley for anyone. Not so with many privates – nobody knows how to get into those anymore! I think the best Berkeley can do is to be straightforward. But I think one can be pretty tough and still be straightforward. </p>
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<p>This is where I disagree, though. I think they should have many. Would you or would you not agree MIT needs many top engineers? If you’ll agree that, then Berkeley should too. So should Stanford. There can be ordinary engineers too. But frankly, I don’t think there should be mediocre-poor engineers. They can go elsewhere. Honestly, these engineers probably aren’t going to be learning very much from Berkeley (as opposed to another school) anyway.</p>
<p>As mathboy98 said, by increasing the selectivity, you could actually reduce the competition. The whole reason why Berkeley is so competitive is precisely because the school admits too many students of relatively subpar quality and hence has to weed them out. If you’re going to weed students out anyway, why not do it during the admissions process? I think there is little dispute that it’s better for your career future to not have gone to Berkeley at all than to have gone and then flunked out, for employers and (especially) grad school adcoms aren’t going to care why you flunked out. All they will see is that you flunked out. </p>
<p>{Note, it’s perfectly fine to go to a school and then voluntarily drop out, as long as your academic standing is still good. The problem comes when you are involuntarily dismissed, for that ugly fact will be stated clearly on your transcript forever.} </p>
<p>Besides, let me put the situation in a historical context. Harsh as it may be today, Berkeley is clearly a far kinder place than it was in the past. In the early days of Berkeley (i.e. 100 years ago), the school was a notoriously savage school, with less than half of the undergrads graduating, maybe less than 1/3. Berkeley was also open admissions during that time: anybody who wanted to come could do so. I doubt that is a coincidence. The tighter your admissions, the less harsh your school has to be to the students who you do bring in. The problem is that Berkeley, for all its improvements, is still too harsh relative to its peer schools. Which leads me to my recommendation that you should probably prefer to attend one of those peer schools if you can get in, if for no other reason, then for the safety. Like I said, it is practically impossible to actually flunk out of Stanford. Why take risks if you don’t have to? </p>
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<p>Like I said, a far more humane way to provide that information is to simply not admit those people in the first place. After all, I could just as easily argue that not everybody can get into the top schools such as Berkeley, and that would also be the way that life works and people would learn an important life lesson by being rejected. Berkeley admits only 25% of its freshman applicants and I believe an even lower percentage of its transfer applicants, and those applicants are already part of the highly selective pool of UC-eligible students. {If you’re not even UC-eligible, you can’t even apply to Berkeley at all.} Since the school is already rejecting the vast majority of its applicants, would it really be so outrageous to reject even more? Put another way, why is it perfectly fine for Berkeley to reject 75% of its applicants, but rejecting 80% would somehow be controversial? </p>
<p>Besides, one can also perform a comparative analysis among schools. Like I said, it is practically impossible to flunk out of HYPS. Does that mean that their students are not learning valuable life lessons? Seems to me that their students enjoy extraordinary success despite never receiving the sort of ‘valuable insight’ that Berkeley provides to its students by threatening them with failure.</p>
<p>Well, like I said, Berkeley runs a far far more selective undergrad program than it did in its early days when the school was effectively open admissions. Keep in mind that Berkeley is the most selective public school in the country, even for instate students. It is easier for the best students in the state of Michigan to go to UM and the best students in the state of Virginia to go to UVA than it is for the best students in the state of California to go to Berkeley. However, interestingly, UVA actually boasts a higher overall graduation rate than Berkeley, and UM’s is the same as Berkeley, and UM also has a significantly higher 4-year graduation rate, despite the fact that those two schools are actually less selective than Berkeley. </p>
<p>Besides, Berkeley already has tremendous experience with running small programs of elite students, that being the Berkeley graduate programs, especially the PhD programs. Those programs don’t admit a whole bunch of relatively weak students and then flunk them out. Those who are admitted to Berkeley’s PhD programs are clearly among the very best graduate students in the world. And yes, these programs are all public in the sense that they are all supported by taxpayer dollars. </p>
<p>Furthermore, none of the PhD programs seems to practice in-state preference. I’m sure mathboy98 would agree that the Berkeley Math PhD program isn’t going to lower its admissions standards for you just because you’re a California state resident. And certainly none of the PhD programs are mandated to admit a certain number of state residents every year. Heck, there are programs that have admitted zero state residents in some years. </p>
<p>Yet, not coincidentally, Berkeley’s PhD programs are among the very best in the world, and are certainly more highly regarded than the undergrad program. In fact, it is precisely the strength of the PhD programs that has made Berkeley so famous. </p>
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<p>I don’t know that that’s really true, but even if it is, so what? After all, what exactly is the point of going to college only to flunk out? You don’t go to college simply for the sake of going to college. You go to college because you want to graduate. </p>
<p>Furthermore, I doubt that higher Berkeley admissions standards would mean that fewer students would make it to college anyway. What it would mean is that more students would be sorted to schools that are more suited for their abilities. After all, it’s not like applicants who are currently rejected from Berkeley don’t go to any college at all. Those students who are rejected from Berkeley because they wouldn’t have graduated anyway will now head for a lower UC or a CalState from which they are more likely to be successful. You want to match the students with the proper schools according to their ability to successfully graduate from those school. </p>
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<p>I too am curious as to why you believe this to be so. I don’t think the problem is with Berkeley producing too many engineers, for it that were really true, then they would be earning relatively low salaries due to oversupply. In fact, Berkeley engineers (and CS majors) earn the higher salaries of any of the majors, and so the market is actually indicating that it wants more Berkeley engineers. </p>
<p>The problem is not with having too many Berkeley engineers, but rather with too many Berkeley engineering flunkouts. Lots of students at Berkeley try engineering and perform poorly. At the same time, there are many other students who might have succeeded in engineering but who won’t even dare to try because they refuse to risk their GPA’s. </p>
<p>Hence, Berkeley could run both a larger and safer engineering program, and without even changing the admissions process. How? Simple. Berkeley could simply cancel the engineering grades of those students who try engineering and then switch to some other major. After all, if somebody isn’t going to major in engineering anyway, who cares what his engineering grades were? Let him walk away with a clean slate. A similar proposal is to grade the engineering weeders on a P/NP or, even better, a P/NR (no grade recorded) basis, with a ‘shadow’ grading process. That is, you could still tell the students, by private communications, what their letter grade would have been under the regular grading process. But the grade will not be recorded on your transcript. {This is akin to MIT’s P/NR system for all first-semester students, not just engineers.} Students would then have the information to decide whether they want to remain in the engineering major, and if they decide they’d rather switch to something else because their shadow grade was poor, their transcripts would not be harmed. </p>
<p>The major problem that I see is that Berkeley doesn’t offer you the opportunity to just ‘try out’ engineering. The weedout courses are the first courses of any engineering sequence. Hence, you are forced to go ‘all in’ before you even really know what you’re signing up for. Why not let people try without penalty if they find out that it is not right for them? Like I said, right now, plenty of people like slicmlic2001 don’t dare to even try. Maybe he would have been a superstar engineer. We’ll never know. </p>
<p>I’ll proffer the example of Jennifer Granholm, current Governor of Michigan, and Berkeley alum. For 3 years after high school but before coming to Berkeley, she pursued an acting career in Hollywood, but failed. Yet that failure didn’t haunt her academically. She was able to go to Berkeley, graduate Phi Beta Kappa, and head on to Harvard Law and an eventual career in politics. Berkeley didn’t hold her failed acting career against her by ‘punishing’ her with a string of failing grades on her transcript. She didn’t succeed in acting, and so she moved on with her life. So why can’t people try out engineering and then, if they don’t succeed, be allowed to move on? Why should failed engineering grades be permanently inscribed on your transcript if you’re not even going to be an engineer anyway?</p>
<p>I don’t know that any majors at Berkeley are really producing ‘too many’ graduates, but if there are some, I would say it would be something like PoliSci, which graduates about 500 students a year. One could reasonably ask how many poli-sci graduates does the economy really need? {Note, I am not advocating that Berkeley try to reduce the number of poli-sci grads. All I’m saying is that there are plenty of other majors at Berkeley that are far larger than any engineering major.}</p>
<p>It’s not like all the applicants to berkeley who were at top of the applicant pool are always going to remain at the top in their respective majors. By admitting more than the number that will ultimately graduate, it kind of gives second chances to those who “barely” made it in.</p>
<p>I don’t get how weeding out the lower third of berkeley’s class will REDUCE competition. Professors will still not want to give out A’s and B’s the way Ivy professors do, and this will lead to a higher “average”, resulting in more competition for the top students. I don’t think that is desirable.</p>
<p>And you admitted yourself that Berkeley has already been kinder to its students than it has been in the past. What are you trying to do? Make Berkeley as hard to get into as Stanford? THat would be a nightmare, and I would not even have made it. As a student who has tried very hard in high school, I just don’t see how that should be the ultimate goal of a public school. The goal of the UC’s is to provide places of higher learning for as many as it can (granted, maybe even at the cost of providing more competition). Good students will shine regardless, so i don’t see the source of your dissatisfaction. EVen a school as “great” as Stanford will have those who flunk out–why not make S even HARDER to get in to make it a 100% retention rate then?</p>
<p>^^ For this, you’ll have to come to Berkeley and see the caliber of the students from the eyes of an actual student. You, like me, will probably notice that there is a pretty vast divide between the type A and B that I mentioned.</p>
<p>I don’t think either Sakky or me advocates making Berkeley admissions like Stanford’s. Stanford is a private school, and NOBODY can be certain of getting into Stanford. You don’t hear of the “I had a 2350 SAT and A+'s in 15 AP classes but got rejected” stories as much from Berkeley. We’re talking of being more academically selective. Blueducky, under the system I find desirable, you would make it into Berkeley. You were, like you said, a “Type B” student – i.e. one of Berkeley’s better students, presumably. </p>
<p>Stanford doesn’t have a perfect system by any means. Enough students who’re unfortunately academically not that amazing also make it in there. Though, fewer by far than at Berkeley. Notice – Stanford is on average not as harsh a school in terms of failing students out, as both Berkeley and Stanford students know. When Berkeley runs a lot of its coursework at the level of elite schools, I think Sakky and I think it really should be as academically selective. It need not be selective in the sense that you have to write this essay that makes the admissions officer cry to get in. Making Stanford harder to get into wouldn’t make fewer people flunk out. Making it more academically stringent may, but I think we all know that schools like Caltech, not schools like Stanford, are truly reputed most for academic selectivity.</p>
<p>A straightforward, yet more rigorous system will ensure that those who make it here really have what it takes to make use of it. I understand, blueducky, that you’re concerned that standards of professors needn’t change, and such. Well, let me tell you this – in advanced courses, a math professor I know hands out tons of A’s; courses where he believes students are already at a high cut in level. On the other hand, he had a somewhat low grade average in intro calculus courses. Now if you met this guy, you couldn’t imagine his failing students. He’s SO nice. But the truth is, a lot of grading guidelines are set by the university, not by the professor. </p>
<p>Berkeley is already “perfect,” I’d say, in some of the the more advanced curricula. For instance, it treats its graduate students immensely well compared to its undergrads. Why? The professors actually respect many of the grad students. And, more importantly, they can do whatever they want in terms of running classes at that level. </p>
<p>Contrary to what some may believe, not all professors want students to fail. Most don’t. I know an EECS professor personally who doesn’t like the average GPA he is required to keep. What we’re looking for is a <em>university-wide</em> commitment to shifting the burden on the incoming student, and lessening the burden on the accepted student. It is <em>not</em> impossible. All it takes is for the school to decide to do it. Doesn’t require much more than a paradigm shift.</p>
<p>What I don’t completely understand are the low acceptance rates for Berkeley graduates who apply to engineering grad schools. I’ve come to understand that graduate admissions are at a tier above undergrad admissions (despite all the fuss over undergrad) in terms of difficulty. On one hand, I hear that Berkeley’s engineering department is highly regarded and sports a good curriculum. On the other, I see the numbers and achievements that past Berkeley grads have needed to get into the top grad schools. Putting the two together, I just end up seeing that many students who aren’t aware of the harsh reality will be disappointed a couple years down the road.</p>
<p>Is Berkeley engineering’s pride spilling over undeservedly to its undergraduate half? There are people with impressive ability. But the average senior isn’t going to make a top employer or grad school say “wow” either, despite the “wow”-factor that Berkeley is supposed to have.</p>
<p>Grade inflation aside, what can Berkeley do to increase the success rate of its graduates? There’s already enough intensity with exams and silly autograders, so perhaps nourishment outside of the classroom would benefit students. Or is Berkeley an institution that helps those with potential grow, and those are the ones who continue on?</p>
<p>You’re missing the point of what I am saying–i didn’t put it clearly enough. What I am saying IS what you’re saying–if UCB ups its ACADEMIC standards to the level of S, not those other ones, a lot of “barely made it in” students would be excluded completely. Some of these students probably didn’t take high school as seriously as others, but I still feel that they deserve second chances at a good college, where they will be able to find majors that do interest them, given incentives to work harder. Just because you were at the top of the applicant pool academically going into college does not necessarily mean you will graduate at the top of Berkeley’s class four years later. A lot of factors come into play, and I think even a 2/3 retention rate is fair, humane, whatever. </p>
<p>People at the top still are able to enjoy the benefits UCB offers, you said so yourself. </p>
<p>Standards set by professors/university-- does it make a difference which? It’s all relative. The higher the average caliber of the students, the harder it becomes on all of us. </p>
<p>Berkeley does not help out its students as much as the privates do, I know that. It’s good practice for the real world.</p>
<p>Well, this comes down to principle, really. The issue for even good students is that you face a much more ugly competitive grading standard. Once, say a salutatorian gets to Berkeley, the fact that this person was salutatorian is washed away, and the salutatorian competes with everyone else. </p>
<p>I don’t see why these decently good students can’t do well at other universities. There are so many schools out there. Berkeley is, in terms of academic departments, one of the best schools in the U.S., and outshoots most Ivy Leagues in several areas. It HAPPENS to be a public school. For this, I will advocate maintaining a straightforward, less-than-whimisical admissions system. What we’re doing is admitting several students who’re not really that great to a school with some of the best departments, then forcing professors to screw a large portion of their classes. </p>
<p>That is NOT good for even the good students, who’ll have to deal with the ultra competitiveness. When you’re given massive exams, and the goal of the professor is to bring down the grading scheme, invariably even good students can get screwed pretty easily. So contrary to what is said, I don’t think good students escape unscathed. </p>
<p>I myself escaped because I never had to take multiple big courses with huge examinations, etc. The most students in a math class I took <em>ever</em> was < 15. Most motivated students don’t have this luxury, and I see that a lot of the frustration they go through could be avoided. </p>
<p>The cost? Some students who were less than ultra-motivated in high school will go to schools other than Berkeley. Well frankly, if they wanted to go to Berkeley that much, they should suck it up and put in the work. Let’s no forget, this isn’t like a public <em>high school</em>. This is Berkeley, home to some of the biggest geniuses in the world. Home to a CS department that is arguably the best in some regards in the country. Home to a <em>SCARILY</em> brilliant math faculty. </p>
<p>As long as it’s straightforward in its admissions process, Berkeley <em>DOES</em> let many students have an impartial chance at getting in and having a good education. It doesn’t practice the same kind of hyper-selective nit-picking that many elite privates do. I think it’s doing enough of a service as is, and holding prospective students to a <em>straightforward</em> standard doesn’t really hurt. </p>
<p>To be fair blueducky, I kind of used to say some of the things you do now before I actually came to Berkeley. Your own opinions may not change, but mine certainly did after I thought hard about it.</p>
<p>How did you avoid those huge classes? I mean, I guess you had AP Calc BC credit, but how did that prevent you from huge math classes altogether?</p>
[quote=KitKatz]
Please do! Organic chemistry I do want to take because my dad said that it’s really interesting and not so boring as the inorganic chemistry I had to learn in high school. Oh and I also love art, so I don’t want to pass up on that. Everything else…fire away!..please…<a href=“Late”>/quote</a> Id argue that organic chemistry is inherently more boring than inorganic chemistry. Its also generally easier in undergraduate curriculum, given that its usually taught before physical and advanced inorganic.</p>
<p>Organic chemistry is focused around only a few types of atoms: Carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, sulfur, phosphorus, and halogen some argue silicon also. Carbon is at the center of organic chemistry, and it tends to always form 4 bonds not very exciting if you ask me.</p>
<p>Inorganic chemistry focuses on all the other atoms in the periodic table, and it isnt limited to the silly 4 bond rule. There are so many interesting exceptions that incorporate advanced knowledge. Metals are so diverse, and they are the subject of much research this day. </p>
<p>Of course, Im oversimplifying everything, but thats how I feel about the subject in a nutshell.</p>
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Theres a lot of truth in this statement. I dont think you should limit your analysis to just UCB. In fact, although this is a 6 year figure, the numbers suggest a pretty high graduation rate in 2006. The jobs that students obtain after graduation are for another discussion. The job placements, as far as I can tell, run the gamut of job prestige. </p>
<p>1 year retention rate 97% for both UCLA and UCB, 94% from UCSD and UCI, 91% for UCSB, 90% for UCD, 89% for UCSC</p>
<p>I would extend that argument to talk about how difficult the UC system is. The graduation rate at UCB is higher, and, as far as I can tell, the average GPA is higher than UCSD and UCLA, as well (I couldnt readily find any statistics on the other UCs). You can argue that generally less qualified students study at UCSD and UCLA is more focused on other things besides academics, but that doesnt take away from the fact that UCSD+UCLA are still difficult, in general. My point is that UC Berkeley isnt special in its difficulty in this regard. The entire UC system is built like this.
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<p>You seem to be answering your own question about the flaws in the UC system. Private schools can pretty much do whatever they like. Public schools cant do whatever they like. As far as I can tell, it isnt entirely Berkeleys decision to cut down or increase admissions. The state of California gives the UC system to provide an education for California residents. The goal, in general, seems to be to provide an education to the masses, as dillscout has alluded to. </p>
<p>I could be completely wrong in my assessment here but the reason why it seems the UCs dont coddle their students as much as private schools do is because it would be too expensive. The state of CA “forces” them to provide an education to the masses. Since they admit so many people, it would seemingly cost too much to provide many of the benefits that you see at private institutions. The overhead for each student at a private institution is much higher than at a public institution. Private institutions can afford to do these kinds of things for undergraduates. Private schools and public schools are inherently different.</p>
<p>Ive always liked the idea of the Pass/Fail system at a place like MIT or Caltech. I think sakky has a good point in addressing that issue. Im not sure if it would cost more to adopt this system.
Who cares if they are academically amazing or not? Cant they just be amazing? Stanford tends to admit these interesting applicants as well. They sometimes try to admit business/world leaders, not just academics.</p>
<p>Many powerhouse CEOs in the business world dont graduate with the highest academic honors. Academically, they were average students, but they are still pretty damn smart; its a different kind of ability. Stanford also admits these kinds of people.</p>
<p>Now, you might have meant that Stanford makes some mistakes here and there. Then yeah, I agree: nothing is perfect.
The second chance stories tend to be a very small percentage from my experiences, and Im very familiar with second chance stories in college. There are so many good colleges out there that offer the same majors and give similar incentives to work harder.</p>
<p>Youre presenting a highly ideal scenario, but it isnt the most probable scenario. I generally like this side benefit, but thats all it is a side benefit.
I would imagine that the disconnect between these faculty types and the students tends to be huge. It’s difficult for these professors to identify with the students and for the students to identify with the professors. Is this such a great scenario? Personally, I’m impartial to it, but I think it’s interesting.</p>
<p>Sure, SDTB that’s all I meant – every school makes mistakes here and there. I don’t think Stanford’s process should be changed. It is a private school, and it has different goals. And overall, the student body is of pretty good academic caliber. To be frank, though, in my heart of hearts, I think every student who attends any school should be amazing, ideally speaking, in a way that that school he/she attends is suited to bring forth his/her talents!! So for instance, I favor schools with good athletics recruiting good athletes. It doesn’t have to be all academics. But I strongly believe there should be a good reason a student is admitted to a specific school. For instance, I like that students admitted to Caltech are done so because Caltech sees, potentially, math/science brilliance in them. </p>
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<p>To be frank, though, has it not been increasingly harder to get into UC Berkeley? I know someone who is in his 30’s or so, once an EECS major at UC Berkeley, and he kind of gasps when he hears the situation these days.</p>
<p>I don’t mind it if public schools don’t coddle their students. But I do mind the fact that even among public schools, UCB has a notoriously ugly competitive attitude running through many disciplines. UCB academics are very high level, and there’s no reason in my eyes that there should be rampant grade deflation. It simply makes Berkeley a less desirable place for many students. A pass/fail system or something like that would make me happier.</p>
<p>Also, a huge issue with UCB is getting your classes. I avoided this issue myself, but none of my roommates has, and it’s a really silly one. </p>
<p>Basically, I find some silly issues with Berkeley that make it a much less pleasant experience for many, and I think these could be avoided if fewer students were accepted. And frankly, there are plenty accepted who would really be just as fine off elsewhere. They don’t have a clue that their professors may be Fields Medalists, and they just came to Berkeley cuz it’s a good public school – I don’t think their hearts would break going elsewhere. </p>
<p>Hasn’t there also been an increasing number of applicants? The school can only accommodate so many people. I still think it’s a money issue. Is it true that the amount of people applying to UC Berkeley is rising faster than the amount of resources UC Berkeley has? If anything, the UC’s are jam packed in the dorms now (3 to a room I hear). It’s clear that they are trying to maximize the amount of students they take in as much as possible.</p>
<p>I’d argue that UCB’s competitive attitude is a residual effect of the UC system in giving an education to the masses coupled with the fact that the graduate admissions is so tight. There’s a little bit of interplay between the two, I think.</p>
<p>The class issue occurs in most UC’s. It’s one of the side effects of giving an education to the masses.</p>
<p>What does a professor being a Fields Medalist have anything to do with an undergraduate’s future? In most cases, not much. It’s not like a Fields Medalist is a Fields Medalist because he/she can teach an undergraduate class well. I’d argue that they should come to Berkeley because it’s a good public school. This seems like a personal issue rather than a large issue.</p>
<p>In general, I think fewer students should be admitted, but not to the extent that you seem to imply. I don’t like jam packing dorm rooms. I don’t like the idea of Spring Admits all that much. However, I think I can see where the school system is coming from.</p>
<p>^I think mathboy’s just saying that a lot of berkeley students do not/cannot appreciate all that UCB has to offer. If this were true, then wouldn’t this be good for those who are able to do this?</p>
<p>I would argue that no one can possibly appreciate all that UCB has to offer. It would be a ridiculous claim for mathboy to say he appreciates the social activism, the community outreach programs, all the student clubs, the social science departments, etc…</p>
<p>I could argue that it is a shame that mathboy98 doesn’t seem to mention the amount of environmentalism that occurs at Berkeley! I hear it’s pretty good too.</p>
<p>“I’d argue that organic chemistry is inherently more boring than inorganic chemistry”</p>
<p>I would have to disagree. Personally, I was exposed to organic chemistry more because it’s what my dad did. He did tell me that there was a lot of memorizing at the beginning and it tends to be tedious, but after that phase, the subject is really interesting. I love watching my dad use just theses atoms and rules and conjure up brilliant chemical designs for the siRNA delivery system project he’s working on. I think the beauty of organic chemistry at the higher level is precisely the infinite possibilities derived from the 4-bond rule and a handful of atoms. Of course, I’m heavily biased </p>
<p>I was never a college student, so I won’t pretend that I’m an expert on this subject. But this sums up how I feel:</p>
<p>“Private schools and public schools are inherently different.”</p>
<p>This is probably why I never tried to compare them objectively, because they are in fact fundamentally different. Berkeley depends on its graduate school for any prestige; however, it’s not the case for elite privates. For elite privates, its vast resources depend much on its alumni, defined as graduates from the school’s undergraduate program. That’s why they are more selective and there are more handholding. </p>
<p>If Berkeley undergraduate could be highly selective in like Stanford, Harvard or MIT then the quality of its student would be more like that of those said schools. The key word is “if”. So in this sense, I agree with what Dill said. I don’t have a problem with how the system is set up. I personally think that Cal is doing its best with what it has. It has the large amount of students because it has no other choice. It needs to be brutal in the grading system to counter the side affect of that large student body. I think that if it tries to do handholding like HYPS, it would not only lose money, but it would hurt the students who were qualified in the first place. What would happen if a bunch of unqualified students has a Cal degree? A Cal degree will lose its value. </p>
<p>“They sometimes try to admit business/world leaders, not just academics.</p>
<p>Many powerhouse CEO’s in the business world don’t graduate with the highest academic honors. Academically, they were average students, but they are still pretty damn smart; it’s a different kind of ability. Stanford also admits these kinds of people.”</p>
<p>And that is a very smart route to go for privates. Anyone would agree that CEOs and world leaders would have more money than a brilliant professor. All these private schools’ vast resources stem largely from alumni (hence why there is the bolster for “legacies”). Therefore, this is the reason why private school funding is more abundant and it can take care of its student more. Berkeley needs to appeal more to those types of applicants. Yet, there is the problem that if they go to Berkeley, they might flunk out…There must be an alternative to this grading system without resorting to special privilege.</p>
<p>Right, I mean this is a point of different educational philosophical difference, maybe. I do not believe UCB need educate the masses, because I think it is the top UC center for academics. As a public school, UCB already is a lot easier to get into for CA applicants. It’s also much more predictable in its admissions process than other schools are. Frankly, I think if its average student were around as academically qualified as a top private school student, Berkeley would still be easier to get into than those top privates. Perhaps we draw the line at different areas. My line is not drawn anywhere specific – it is drawn exactly where we can get rid of the overcompetitive/grade-deflating policies legitimately. If that can be gotten rid of legitimately <em>now</em>, I don’t mind so much. Admitting too many students, and then posing severe competition that threatens students’ future careers doesn’t seem the ideal way to run a school to me. That’s not a public school service, it’s a public school curse! </p>
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<p>I understand where it’s coming from too, but I just don’t see things working out even close to ideally. I don’t have a tangible “extent” – as I said, I want the environment at Cal to be more student-friendly. Packed dorms, overcrowded classes, students not getting classes they want…lots of things I am avoiding entirely, and am incredibly happy to avoid. Like any student respecting his school, I want the best for it and its students. </p>
<p>I believe your point is that UCs, including Berkeley, should educate the masses to a good extent, and that if there are problems resulting from this goal, they should be endured. It is a noble thing to educate the masses, but I think any school owes something to the students it does admit which UCB isn’t giving its students. At that point, I prefer there be some change.</p>
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