<p>Which one you will choose and why?</p>
<p>It totally depends on what you think your college experience should be like. Personally, I wouldn't go to Harvard undergrad because i dont see the point. Its a great school obviously, but the enviroment isnt what I want for the first four years. Columbia has amazing location, if you are into that part of manhattan and NYC in general, but if you dont like the core, it isnt your thing. berkeley is a huge huge huge huge public school, but dont think it cant keep up with the glitzy ivys as far as departments are concerned. personally, I would choose Cal, with Columbia as a close second, maybe.</p>
<p>These schools are a lot alike, but it depends completely on your personality, your future goals, your academic/EC interests. Just like shopping for any other product, who you are and what you like will make a difference in what you should buy. If you care to tell us about yourself, it would help.</p>
<p>Hm... i plan to go to grad school in econ once i graduate; perhaps pursue government-related career in econ. i am an international student and i have no chance to visit berkeley, but i did visit SHC which i think pretty similar in size with Cal. the tuitions between state university and ivies do not differ a lot for an international applicant and i do not really care about college life, frats, parties or whatsoever. But I really care about the quality of the education and i want to pick a college where i could get the most out of my study abroad opportunities in my college year.</p>
<p>thanks all for helping.</p>
<p>Well, Berkeley and Havard both have great international reputations, with Harvard being first in that area. Probably fewer people from your home country know of Columbia. Don't know that this really matters since you plan to get a grad degree and that will be the school that will make or break your career opportunities.</p>
<p>All three colleges will have fantastic professors. Columbia's core program can seem limiting to some students. Harvard's required classes are looser in terms of selection, as are Berkeley's. I think I'd have to give Harvard the edge for overall student quality. They truly draw applicants from all over the world and can afford to choose only the most interesting, accomplished. Many Harvard students and grads say what they liked best about their college experience is the peers. </p>
<p>Berkeley is by far the largest uni of the three and there is no hand-holding (though I don't think Harvard or Columbia are known for superior student support either). I think this can be an advantage for assertive students because it is closer to the real world that you will experience when you leave college. Class sizes at Harvard and Columbia will be smaller overall. But there will be brilliant professors and teaching assistants at all three.</p>
<p>All three offer incredible opportunities if you seek them out. You can't really go wrong with any of them. Apply to all three!</p>
<p>This is easy - Follow the common widsom</p>
<p>H > C > B</p>
<p>thats just by reputation though... not necessarily by the experience you get out of it. sure USNWR ranks them in that order, but you can't just use those figures to determine where you belong. someone might not enjoy harvard but might thrive at cal (or some other combination). don't let reputation-whores sway you into thinking that because harvard is number 1 means its the number 1 school for you.</p>
<p>H>B>C............is what I would've done 4 years ago if I had your options. Knowing what I know now about Berkeley, and talking to my friends who went to Harvard (one transferred to Stanford after a year and the other was seriously thinking about transferring to UCSD or Berkeley for a while), it'd be:</p>
<p>B>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>H>C</p>
<p>"Common knowledge" seems to be the result of what ever US New dictates to people who can't evaluate information for themselves. US News uses non-academic criteria that favor rich, private schools....and they use retention rate+graduation rate to account fo 25% of their assessment (perhaps Berkeley.....and MIT suffer in this regard because they actually force you to study while other schools are more like elite clubs). Also, there are other discprencies that aren't accounted for: like the fact that UCs look at SAT scores in a different (and disadvantageous) way than most other schools do.</p>
<p>Here's from US New's explanation of the ranking methodology: <a href="http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/about/06rank_brief.php%5B/url%5D">http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/about/06rank_brief.php</a></p>
<p>Peer assessment (weighted by 25 percent). The U.S. News ranking formula gives greatest weight to the OPINION OF THOSE IN A POSITION TO JUDGE A SCHOOL'S ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE. The peer assessment survey allows the top academics we contact--presidents, provosts, and deans of admission--to account for intangibles such as faculty dedication to teaching. Each individual is asked to rate peer schools' academic programs on a scale from 1 (marginal) to 5 (distinguished). Those who don't know enough about a school to evaluate it fairly are asked to mark "don't know." Synovate, an opinion-research firm based near Chicago, collected the data; 57 percent of the 4,098 people who were sent questionnaires responded.</p>
<p>Are you kidding me? The opinion of those in "a position to judge a school's academic excellence" is only given 25% weight?? </p>
<p>Here is an interesting link:</p>
<p>It's from 1996 but the arguments still hold.</p>
<p>And in terms of academic reputation alone, the order would be:
H>BERKELEY>C, and the differences are very very slight at that. </p>
<p>Here's an interesting article:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard's required classes are looser in terms of selection, as are Berkeley's.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Momof2inca, what're you referring to at Berkeley? Classes you can use to fulfill breadth requirements?</p>
<p>Sorry, that didn't come across well. Columbia's core curriculum is more rigid. You have to take certain classes, with a focus on Western Civ, as you do at Chicago. At Harvard, the core seems more flexible, and at Berkeley, there is not a core, per se, but breadth requirements, which seem to be more flexible yet (and can be waved through AP classes sometimes).</p>
<p>My point was supposed to be that some students want to do a lot more exploring and would not like the rigidity of a Columbia (or Chicago).</p>
<p>Of course, the extreme opposite of this is Brown, where there are no required classes and I believe you can create your own major.</p>
<p>Oh, alright, that's more clear. I don't know about the other colleges on campus, but for Letters and Sciences, breadth requirements cannot be waived with AP credit- other college credit, if transferable, yes, but not AP credit.</p>
<p>I would choose either H or B, probably go with H in the end.</p>
<p>i have actually heard it's probably a better idea to save cal till grad school. after all, it is arguably the best grad school in the world, and i have heard that the quality of undergrad education cannot even compare because of the gigantic class sizes.</p>
<p>Well, CalX posted the breakdown of class sizes at Berkeley. I think what most people ignore is that they will be in large intro classes at most big-name schools. I bet a lot of the intro classes at Berkeley fare well compared to the Harvard classes (not those in the core, thouse outside of it). I think that Harvard and probably to some extent Columbia can be said to have better graduate than undergraduate programs than undergrad. And it'd be nice to "save cal for grad school," but few get accepted.</p>