College close to home vs far away

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
1

I’m stuck in the classic situation of UCLA vs Berkeley as an English Major.

I know I could be happy and fit into both schools well. I am, however, leaning towards Berkeley because of its prestige and liberal environment.

Here’s the problem: I live about an hour from UCLA, and my aunt’s house is only 15 minutes. At UCLA I would still live at the dorms, but I could go home on the occasional weekend or even meet my dad for lunch. If I need a quiet place to study, I could go to my aunt’s.

At this point in my life, I’m not sure if I’m ready to live without my parents yet. At Berkeley, I’d really only be able to see them during holidays. They are so proud of me and will support either decision, but are so so sad at the thought of me going away, and thus want me to go to UCLA. I want to be excited about college, not sad, and I’m rather prone to homesickness.

Any advice? Which college should I choose?

2

so funny enough, my family lives an hour from UCLA. My older brother actually went to UCLA, and I ended up going to UC Berkeley, which I thought was a better choice since it’s an opportunity to become more independent (though it’s a bit intimidating at first).

My brother would come home every weekend, and he was pretty much spoiled by the perks of living near home. My mom would come to pick him up, he didn’t have to worry about moving, washing clothes, or anything. I would assume you’re pretty close in proximity to your high school; pretty high chance if your high school friends are around, you’re going to just hang out with them (which could be a good or bad thing, depends on the perspective).

When I went to UC Berkeley, it was just a pretty heavy learning curve to be independent; in SoCal, everyone drives, but in NorCal, most people take public transportation, so that was a pretty new thing for me, and the weird thing is by the end of my senior year, I was super familiar with the BART and all the buses around Berkeley/San Francisco. It definitely sucked too since I had to make new friends, be in a totally new environment, and everything was just super new and different. Since I lived so far away from my parents, I could only go home twice a year, and to be honest, it was pretty liberating as well. I had to figure a lot of things out without my parent’s help, and I think that was very helpful in developing myself. I can’t say the same for others though, so it’s really up to you.

I actually graduated and moved back home to LA. However, the risk of going to UC Berkeley is that people tend to stay near what college they went to; I actually really wanted to stay in San Francisco really badly, but my mom wanted me back.

You should definitely check out both schools and see which one you like more. It took some time for me to like Berkeley, but I really enjoyed my college experience. Both UCLA and UC Berkeley have good opportunities, and cost wise, it would probably be a little cheaper to be at UCLA (their dorm food tastes a lot better too).