<p>So I have just been admitted off of the wait list to Berkeley for Chemistry. If I don’t commit I will be going to Cal Poly instead. I’m honestly having a tough time deciding. My sister went to Cal Poly so I’ve been down there a few times, however I live very near to Berkeley too so I have visited Berkeley just as often. I love both places, its just a matter of their vibes being completely different, relaxed smaller city vs big city.</p>
<p>The thing that I am torn about is the style of curriculum. Its been made an even tougher choice due to the incredible new Chem facility that Cal Poly has just made with their new science building. That and the smaller class sizes appeal to me. </p>
<p>However Berkeley is world renowned, especially for its Chemistry department. Yet of course it is a much larger university. I’m very torn between the two decisions. I feel like I’ve been working towards Berkeley because of grandeur, but now I’m having trouble finally committing to my decision. </p>
<p>My son is a chem major at SLO. He’s a freshman, very happy, doesn’t have large classes, his teachers and advisers know his name, and he’s had opportunities that he wouldn’t have had at a larger university. He interviewed, was selected, and volunteered his first quarter semester doing polymer research, and is receiving credit his 2nd & 3rd semester. This summer he will be working on campus (for pay) doing research. This simply wouldn’t have happened if he had attended a large college. Not all students will get this opportunity, but he was fortunate and knows this wouldn’t have happened elsewhere. </p>
<p>And the new Math & Science building is real nice :)! </p>
<p>The delivery of Undergraduate education at a school whose focus is graduate and especially Ph.D. research is a tricky proposition. Would you rather see a Nobel Prize winning Chemist on the faculty, whose graduate class you will never take, and whose research you will never participate in -or- a run of the mill Ph.D. Professor in chemistry who knows your name, has true office hours, will assist with recommendations for employment, and actually cares how undergraduates are learning? If your goal is graduate research, then I would choose Berkeley. If your goal is to gain employment with an undergraduate Chemistry degree, then Cal Poly, in my view, is the choice.</p>
<p>The thing many people who have never been at Berkeley, or UCLA, or Michigan, etc. dont experience first hand is that prestige at the Ph.D. level has little correlation to the quality of undergraduate education. It is almost like a bait and switch – almost everything that makes the University prestigious and a thought leader is derived from Faculty prestige and the quality of its Ph.D. students, and is irrelevant to, and from a budget spent per undergraduate student perspective, counter to the undergraduate experience.</p>
<p>With regard to your wait list status, do you really want to be scrapping and fighting for grades against premeds when they are likely more qualified than you to succeed at Berkeley?</p>
<p>I don’t know much about the major but I would think you might need some kind of graduate degree? If so, you could go to Cal Poly for undergrad before moving on elsewhere for your masters or doctorate. Or you could start at UCB as an undergrad, knowing you have a pretty good chance of getting into their graduate program. There is a possibility that you could change your major, maybe extending your undergraduate stay, so think about which school will offer you many alternate majors. If money is an issue, remember you will have an additional 2-5 years of graduate school to pay for. If you live close to UCB, commuting from home would save you some money, if you don’t mind being so close to home. Best of luck as you have some great choices.</p>
<p>Tough call for sure. My kid turned down offers from 5 UC’s for Cal Poly and never gave it a second thought. It was the hands on teaching methodology at Cal Poly that he fell in love with. He is a mechanical engineering major and loves the school. He too has had unbelievable opportunities and is now the manager/president of the Cal Poly Supermileage club that beat UCLA and Berkeley this year in the Shell Echo Marathon in Houston.</p>
<p>Having said that, UCB has a well earned reputation for being a world class institution. For sure you will get far more individual attention at Cal Poly. But, if you are interested research and willing to pay you dues, UCB could be the ticket.</p>
<p>Ask yourself what your priorities are. Are you interested in a job or research? Do you want a school that is focused on research, publishing and academic pursuits or do you want a hands on education that is focused on undergraduate education? Do you want to be near home or do you want to move away? Do you want a larger city or a smaller town? What does your gut tell you?</p>
regarding OskaDad: If you are a College of Chemistry (CoC) major at UC Berkeley you are not allowed to go to grad school there. This is true at many of the top tier schools- they see grad students more like peers to the faculty and think the relationship transition is problematic for the profs, and they want to force Phds to get a breadth of experience.
We also had a very hard choice between College of Chemistry at Cal or Department of Chemistry at CalPoly. At CalPoly my son requested to meet with ‘someone from the department’ and the Head of the Department met with him, toured him through the labs and the ‘popped into’ a few classes. She was a CalPoly undergrad, Phd from Berkely. He definitely got the vibe that he would be a known quantity- she was awesome. (At UCSB is was an admissions person who was not a chemist, would not show him the labs, and was basically useless). We just got back from CalDay at Berkeley and they do put on a good show. The Dean of Undergrad College of Chemistry is amazing, attending the top program in the world, in an institution that has a College of Chemistry vs a ‘department’, a College with so much history and leadership for almost a century, and just the campus vibe/ big time college vibe is hard to turn down.
In the end he is choosing Cal.
I actually think CalPoly is a better fit, but what do I know, I am just writing the checks…
For him he just had that feeling of excitement and belonging and a big part of this four year decision (for the kids) needs to be ‘can I see myself here.’ CalPoly, UCSB, UCSD, UCLA, Berkely- there is no wrong answer in that group (he got into Berkely/ UCSB/ CalPoly but not SD or UCLA)
Hope this isn’t too late! I ended up committing to Berkeley, and have just three weeks left of my first year as a Chem major. Anyway, both decisions are great, as you said there is no real wrong answer in the situation. Seeing that he also chose Cal I’ll give a bit of advice if you/he is interested.
It is hard. No doubts about it, even if your son was a top student in High School, it’s going to be hard. As you noted the staff in Berkeley is well renowned and have great connections, but the main difference with Cal Poly is that they won’t go out of their way to interact with the students. This is purely derived from the fact that the school is so large, luckily the Chem department is a small subsection of the school so that helps a bit. But establishing a relationship with GSI’s or Professors is critical. Most are welcoming too if you go to office hours, even if its just to chat about some research you’ve heard of. But establish this early, If your son starts slipping and getting lost at the end of the semester it becomes very hard to navigate at Berkeley in my own opinion.
Don’t expect any opportunity to be handed to you. Your son needs to be the one going out and getting what he wants. He is going to be surrounded by extremely brilliant people and at times it will get overwhelming, no doubt. But this is really what Berkeley is about. If your son can see himself there, I’m sure he’ll do well. With the overwhelming amount of different people on the campus, he’ll find a group. But I’m biased. There are parts I don’t particularly enjoy about Berkeley, its a lot of stress, but hey I’m just hoping it’ll be worth it at the end.
Tell your son congratulations, it’s a big achievement getting in!
ChemBound, thanks for your update and glad you are doing well. It’s refreshing to hear what students decided and how they are doing at their current university, valuable information that can help incoming freshman decide which university to attend.
This is a very useful thread. My son will be a chem major. He got into Cal Poly SLO and waitlisted at UCSB, which was his first choice. From all the research I am doing, it sounds like SLO may be a better fit for him but he is anxiously awaiting waitlist decisions, based in large part I think, on UC prestige.
I never understand this. There seems to be a frequent disconnect between prestige and actual student reported experiences, yet students (and parents) still flock to those schools. For example, both Berkeley and Harvard are widely cited as having less than ideal undergraduate instruction, both relying heavily on teacher’s assistants and large classes. Berkeley in particular has a reputation as a bureaucratic nightmare, referred once to me by a UCB student as like “going to school at the DMV.” The defense is always the brilliance of the others surrounding you. Is it just me, or does the emperor(s) really just have no clothes?
My son just decided on cal poly slo yesterday as a chemistry major. He was admitted to UCSD, UCSB, UC Davis, Pepperdine and SLO. He was pretty set on UCSB out of the UC’s and we went to the spring insight student day. I suggested he go to cal polys event for prospective students and check out the new science building and see what he thought about the school. After the visit to cal poly UCSB wasn’t a sure thing and he went back and forth until yesterday. It was a very tough choice for him.
I agree that the decision-making is brutal for a teenager. It’s almost certainly the biggest decision a teenager has ever had to make. I sort of hope UCSB says no so that it is out of his hands.