<p>How competitive is it? Are people hiding books to hinder their classmate's progress? Do people share notes or study in a group often? How hard is it to get academic help (tutoring etc.)? For Berkeley in general and the College of Engineering specifically. Thanks</p>
<p>If you need help, there are plenty of ways to get help: office hours for professor, gsi, slc (tutoring), residence halls tutoring.</p>
<p>Strangers usually won't share their notes (aka borrowing a night to copy). Given that, once you make friends you can share amongst yourselves freely.</p>
<p>Engineering courses are rather time consuming and difficult. Team work is key!
It's time consuming in the sense that the amount of time you spend each week studying and for projects/homework does not correlate to the number of units the course is worth.</p>
<p>I am one opinion and perhaps have information not so relevant for your query. I went to Berkeley as a liberal arts major at a time when I heard stories about this stuff happening. It seemed to happen in very isolated incidents -- the dark sides of competition, I mean -- and was said to happen at other schools in the same majors (esp. pre-med) too. I certainly am sure this happens, but I also believe there is an urban myth quality to these stories, at least as regards their frequency. </p>
<p>Now I welcome someone to confirm what I have said -- or flame me with specifics proving me wrong.</p>
<p>I have experiences in many departments at Cal.</p>
<p>Engineering is competitive grade-wise, but the students do a great job of working together. I formed ad hoc study groups all the time and students were very friendly in explaining things. There is plenty of academic help from TAs, Profs, HKN tutoring, and fellow students.</p>
<p>MCB is as competitive, but the students don't help each other nearly as much. Groupwork is not forced (as is in EECS projects) and some students go the whole semester without talking to anyone else in lectures and discussions. You do get lab partners sometimes, but I haven't seen as much cooperation.</p>
<p>The humanities and social sciences are really chill. The business school is as friendly as it'll get. Everyone is easygoing and weeders aside, not very cutthroat.</p>
<p>I really haven't seen or experienced any deliberate sabotage.</p>