<p>Both are the same for money. I am going to major in Computer Science. </p>
<p>Brown is #20, and UCLA #14 in the rankings for CS.</p>
<p>I've gotten great reviews all from CC and Private messages about Brown's CS department. UCLA also seems really great, but it's a HUGE school, which is the the turnoff. </p>
<p>Am I making the right choice with Brown for CS? Will getting a job/internship/summer job at like Microsoft or Amazon be harder if I end up going to Brown?</p>
<p>Did you attend Brown’s STEM and ADOCH events the past two days?
My son is also considering these two schools as well (CS). Frankly I don’t think the ranking should be a factor because both of them are great schools.</p>
<p>From Brown’s STEM session on Monday, it seemed like its job/internship/summer job’s opportunities are on par with UCLA. If you don’t like big classes, you should just go to Brown, no doubt of that.</p>
<p>^Yes I went to ADOCH. I didn’t get to go to STEM, sadly. What about the job opportunities specifically did you hear about?</p>
<p>Go to Brown.</p>
<p>I turned down Princeton and Brown to come to UCLA (for financial reasons) and I’d do it again in a heart beat. Yeah I might be a biochem major, but I also work for admissions and have gotten super involved in the UCLA community. As far as your big school comment, UCLA does a really good job of making a big school seem like a small school. And there’s sooooo much school spirit here, which is severely lacking in other top schools.</p>
<p>Getting a job somewhere coming from Brown or UCLA will make no difference. They are both top-notch schools. </p>
<p>Go with whichever you prefer and like more. Personally, I would go with Brown, but that’s just me.</p>
<p>Academically both are strong but the student experience is likely to be quite different. You need to figure out what is right for you. Also I see under your name that you live in LA now; personally I think its a good idea to get away for college.</p>
<p>I don’t know much about Brown and am sure it’s a great school, but UCLA is great for CS. I’m friends with a lot of CS engineers here who get a lot of opportunities provided they keep on top of their game. As for the common misconception that UCLA will be huge and you’ll get lost here, it is exactly as I stated - a misconception. Once you start socializing and making friends (joining orgs is the best thing you can do for your undergrad experience), you start finding out that everybody knows somebody that you know. I kid you not, just last night I introduced two friends that I randomly bumped into in the dorms and not only were they both in UCLA Radio but one had gone to high school with the other’s roommate. You start seeing people around that you know you’ve seen before, it really isn’t that bad and I’d like to think of the larger number of students here as more opportunities to make a diverse set of friends.
Especially within CS you’ll find this to be true; the department is fairly small so you’ll have classes with the same people numerous times. CS seems to be their own, fun, little circle and from what I can tell they often have group projects in the upper divs so you get to know people better. Even for regular College of Letters & Science, although the lower div lecture sizes will be in the hundreds, breaking into smaller sections of 20-30 people lets you actually meet your fellow students and upper divs can often be small seminars too. Don’t let our numbers discourage you!</p>
<p>
This. UCLA is a great school, but many students have lived in LA or SoCal their entire lives, and being surrounded by thousands of other such students only exacerbates the issue. Get out of your comfort zone.</p>
<p>Brown’s noticeably smaller courses, relative undergraduate focus, relaxed grading (no +/-, unlimited pass/fail, drop until last day of classes), and open curriculum are very appealing as well.</p>
<p>“lower div lecture sizes will be in the hundreds, breaking into smaller sections of 20-30 people lets you actually meet your fellow students and upper divs can often be small seminars too.”
smaller? haha. Big class (only a few ) at Brown would be 100 (almost none in “the hundreds”). 20-30 would still be a “big class” and smaller sections would be more likely to be <10. And at Brown you would not only “get to meet your fellow students”, you would know them, and your professors too!</p>
<p>If they’re the same amount of money, I don’t know why you wouldn’t pick Brown. I could definitely argue for UCLA if it was significantly cheaper, but…</p>
<p>If you liked the feel of Brown, ‘go away’ to college, which means just not down the street where you’ll find a bunch of high school classmates.</p>
<p>One year, UCLA put nearly all of our HS kids in the same dorm. Yuck.</p>
<p>It’s a misconception to think that just because you go to UCLA, and live in LA, you’ll just be around people who think the same way you are. UCLA isn’t Rutgers, in the sense that it’s the school “everyone goes to after high school.” UCLA’s California acceptance rate, i read recently, is like ~17%. And getting interaction with students from places like norcal if you’re from socal, or vice versa, isn’t much different than getting interaction with people from a different state. Not to mention that plenty of people from different states and countries go to school here. Heck, two of my roommates who were just living in westwood, and not even going to school at UCLA, or trying to, were from India and Russia. You’ll find people like that in any major city.</p>
<p>At least from the people i’ve talked to about it, the norcal-to-UCLA/socal-to-Berkeley migration that many californian students make every year, is made in part on the basis of independence from parents, rather than increasing diversity opportunities. But i’ll stop my digression here.</p>
<p>To answer your question, i doubt UCLA will open up any opportunities that Brown will lack. Brown, after all, is one of the oldest institutions in the US, so it’s had time to develop its reputation. Brown’s advantage will probably be in smaller class sizes, better counseling, etc. You’re fine with both, so i’d just say go with fit.</p>
<p>OP, this is what a Brown CS junior told me: last year, more than 1/3 of their graduates came to work at west coast’s companies (big and small), 1/3 went to graduate schools and the rest stayed in the East coast and went into financial field. So the job outlook is pretty good.
If my son is not so in love with USC’s CS/Game program (he is still debating, no decision yet), he will definitely choose between UCLA and Brown. He likes both of them.</p>
<p>I really want a B.S. in CS, but I’m wondering if a Brown CS degree would open up job opportunities for big companies like Microsoft, Amazon, or Facebook. </p>
<p>I’m 95% Brown right now.</p>
<p>What companies come to Brown, and how often? Is there a way I can get into contact with the recruiting companies at Brown? Are there like meeting for Brown CS students or something? Thanks so much.</p>
<p>I’ve talked with you on the Brown forum, but I do know that Google recruits at Brown as does MS and Adobe. YOu will get internships if you want them. My daughter did research instead, so she got into top 10 grad school. You are overconcerned that employers don’t know Brown. It’s just the man on the street who doesn’t know that CS is a great dept.</p>
<p>At Brown you will have good access to your professors, and many many chances for undergraduate research, which employers value as well.</p>
<p>Both Brown and UCLA are highly ranked for the PhD program. I’m not sure how that translates to undergrad at UCLA, but at Brown you will be working alongside those grad students in many cases. The profs will need you to participate since the grad school is so small. </p>
<p>My daughter was accepted to Berkeley and turned it down for Brown as an undergrad. She also applied to UCLA for PHD and was accepted. But she found the department very insular as compared to Brown which has an interdisclipinary culture, and she goes to another grad school. They also didn’t make a good money offer so that was a moot point. It just solidified what she loved about the Brown CS dept.</p>
<p>Anyway, she has had 2 internships at google and one at a solid startup.</p>
<p>My best friend was accepted to both Brown and UCLA, he went to Brown because it’s Ivy league. I went to community college and transferred to UCLA and I loved it. When people talk about school no one is ever interested in Brown…sad, but true…it’s a great school but it’s not Harvard. On the other hand UCLA always sparks conversation because of basketball, football, Los Angeles/Hollywood, larger alumni base, etc.</p>
<p>Also, regents has some great perks…you will get every class u want, housing you want, parking you want.</p>
<p>Years from now when you’re interviewing and in the workplace, UCLA will still be a topic of conversation.</p>
<p>Also, there are more UCLA grads working for Google and Apple.</p>
<p><a href=“HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost”>HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost;
<p>Also it doesn’t matter if companies come on campus to Brown or UCLA, such companies have recruiting programs and use phone interviews more often than not.</p>
<p>^^^ Good point, really can’t go wrong either way. Go where you’ll be most happy.</p>