I hope I posted it in the right place. 
My son applied to 12 schools hoping to get into at least one. His GPA is not impressive at all. 3.9-ish weighted, 3.6-ish UC GPA, ACT 30, W 10, a lot of ECs. He only applied into schools in CA. He was so far accepted into CSULB (we didn’t expect it), SJSU, and SFSU. He also applied to a few UCs (long shot), Fullerton and San Diego State (SDSU is the same long shot probably). I know we should wait for all schools to respond but if you have to choose between CSULB and SJSU, what are pros and cons? Intended major is Applied Math/Statistics. Geographically SJSU is much closer to home but not exactly in our backyard.
Has he visited both campuses? If so, did he have preference between the two schools? Are both the same costs? I would personally wait until all acceptances are posted before trying to determine the “best fit” school at this point.
Costs about the same. He visited SJSU and liked it. We would definitely visit CSULB and wait for other schools but I just want to get an idea. And of course I googled it as doon as my son got an acceptance email.
For applied math and statistics, SJSU is a fantastic opportunity. Besides the academics, it’s an unbeatable location for job and internship opportunities.
Yes, location is unbeatable. Frankly, if CSULB wasn’t more selective and ranked higher I’d had no doubts. My son likes SJSU campus and location.
although I agree for the most part with the sentiment above, just to play devil’s advocate, the area to the immediate east and south of SJSU is relatively speaking not the greatest of areas. It’s a typical big-city urban school. A lot more positives than negatives for sure though.
Urban setting is not a problem. We are living in suburbs and my son wants to live in or close to a big city.
San Jose native chiming in. San Jose isn’t really a “big city”…Long beach would be IMO a “big city”. San Jose shuts down at 8 pm, and downtown is VERY VERY sketchy at night. There is a robbery, mugging, stabbing, shooting groping, and variations thereof nearly every single night. (More common is mugging and groping, less common is robbery, even more rare is shooting).
CSULB will be cleaner, nicer in presentation, with more things to do surrounding it. Prettier/less mentally unstable girls. More things to do, considering you’re smack dab next to LA and everything else.
San Jose is a sleepy town. Sure it’s a “big city” (Our downtown is booming, for some reason, lately). Outside of downtown, and even IN downtown, there really isn’t too much to do. We have a sprinkling of bars, which your kid can’t get into, some sub-par restaurants, and that’s it really. The “thing to do” in SJ is go to Santana Row, that’s really it, and it gets awfully boring. Until your kid can drink, then downtown opens up a little more.
South San Jose is a snooze fest, and east downtown, and near n. 4th st (near japan town, 2 miles from downtown center) is GHETTTTOOOOOOOO.
SJ’eans typically go to SF if they want to “do” anything.
So your son will live in a “big city” (we’re barely the 10th largest city in the U.S), but it’s fairly petty crime ridden in downtown with homeless people ON campus and everywhere around it. It’s a fairly boring city.
The school is oK. Public transport really works only if where you wanna go is near the light rail, and anything south of down town, you want to stay off it at night (Or north of downtown, depending on the time).
We’re a chain happy city, meaning, your son won’t be experiencing anything too different than what you get in the suburbs (we’re chock full of chain restaurants/fast food and other retailers).
But SJSU is a pretty decent school for what he wants to do. Outside of that, SJ ain’t a place you come to live up your 18-24 year age range.
Thanks a lot for your insight! I guess big city is a relative thing. We are from Sacramento.
We haven’t seen homeless people on the campus. Guess we were lucky.
I used to like SF and visit often. Not anymore. My son was accepted to SFSU but isn’t even considering it now.
Yeah. My son doesn’t want to stay in Sacramento and live with his parents. I don’t blame him. I attended university in my hometown.
In terms of STEM programs, SJSU is undoubtedly more well known in Silicon Valley. Selectivity in this case is across all majors and also reflects the population draws between the two areas, and selectivity drives rank in many cases.
CSULB is an excellent CSU. If he prefers that after visiting, then I would accept it, but other things being equal SJSU will beat it for job placement in applied math.
I am not one to select schools on rankings. Rankings cannot define the college experience for most students. He needs to select a college the fits him academically, socially and financially. He will get a good education at either school with access to internships/jobs nearby by. Living in any city be it Long Beach or San Jose, no one is immune to any type of crime. Awareness is always the key.
1 Like
MODERATOR’S NOTE: CC is not a debate website. I deleted a lot of posts.