<p>I’m sure this has been asked many times, but does it?
Particularly engineering from UCLA UCI or Cal Poly Slo.</p>
<p>I’m sure I can hold a higher GPA at UCI, but they don’t hold an engineering reputation like UCLA or Cal Poly.</p>
<p>UCLA’s competition would probably strangle me and my GPA (average engineering GPA = 2.8) and I barely got admitted. There’s some research opportunities here too, but usually students need a 3.5 to participate.</p>
<p>Cal Poly is underrated by a lot of people, but I’m sure I’d really really learn there and I can probably hold a high GPA too. Most people see it as an engineering school too especially employers and with that I would have a lot of internships when I go there, but I can find some internships around UCLA and UCI too im sure.</p>
<li><p>So between these three schools would the prestige/reputation (in engineering particularly) matter in applying for a top graduate school? (Like UCLA UCSD or maybe Berkeley)</p></li>
<li><p>Like would a 3.6 from Cal Poly > 3.3 at UCI > 3.0 at UCLA when it comes to graduate school from a strictly GPA perspective?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Strangle you? Barely admitted? Where are you getting this from? There is admitted and there is declined. There is no ‘barely admitted’.</p>
<p>You sound like you underestimate yourself (unless you are a grade grubber type.) There is no formula like you mention, however grad schools do know which undergrad schools have tougher departments and that is respected in the admit process. I think the schools you mention are about equal so your formula makes no sense, they just aren’t that much differentiated. And to project your gpa at each is a joke, right?</p>
<p>Go to the best school you can get in, where you are most comfortable being in. If you can go to an undergrad school where you can participate in research, do that. All the schools you mention are good and you can get into any grad school from them.</p>
<p>Grad school admits are about much more than gpa. If you have 3.0 (or 2.8 from hard program) you are good to go. But you have to look at research, recco’s, LOR, PS, GRE.</p>
<p>So, congratulations on your fabulous acceptances. When you are ready to go to grad school, you will find out there are more options that you can believe.</p>
<p>Firstly, SLO is a world-class engineering university for undergrad. You will not attain a 3.6 there and only a 3.0 at UCLA. I wouldn’t underestimate the competitiveness at Cal Poly. </p>
<p>In general, UCLA is a very laid-back place; people assume it’s cutthroat because it’s a good school, without really having any real idea what it’s like. People here study in groups, engineering students make at least some attempt to be social, and people care about being involved in the UCLA community at-large. I think you might be surprised about how fun it is to be a student here, even though your engineering courses will be tough. I honestly don’t know one engineer here who hates it.</p>
<p>So go to whichever school you like best. Those are all great institutions, and attaining a strong GPA at any of them will prepare you well for whatever lies in your future. Congrats on getting into three strong schools!</p>
<p>So would UCI still be a good idea since they don’t really have an engineering reputation? In the usnews rankings they only had one rank as 44th overall engineering. Would going there put me at a disadvantage reputation wise?</p>
<p>UCLA and Cal Poly have better reputations than UCI for that program. If you aren’t up for a challenge though, you shouldn’t go to those schools, because they will challenge you. I also agree with the above poster, that if you’re this worried about GPA already, I’m not sure grad school is for you, in which case you should go where you want for undergrad.</p>
<p>I’m up for it, but I just wanna figure out everything before I pick a school since it’s basically a once in a lifetime decision.
If reputation doesn’t matter too much I may just go to Irvine because I think I’ll enjoy it more there. Not too big, not too small, and they have materials engineering with a specialization in bio-materials which I might like.</p>
<p>it’s not a once in a lifetime decision though. you can always transfer universities at any point in your undergraduate career. you could start at UCLA and if you’re struggling, move over to UCI. or you could start at UCI and then decide, in your third year, that you really want to try for a competitive grad program, so you transfer to UCLA or Cal Poly.</p>
<p>and i agree with the other posters. if you’re this stressed about what your GPA is now, grad school is a long way off for you. pick a program you think you’ll like, in a town you think you’ll like, with research opportunities you think you’ll like. in 4 years, your life and plans may have changed completely anyway.</p>
<p>Take a breath. Now take another. And then a few more.</p>
<p>Graduate programs will be well aware of the differences in difficulties between the programs you’re considering, which means they’ll understand that a lower GPA in a more difficult/competitive program is (for lack of a better term) equivalent to a higher GPA in a less difficult/competitive program. So instead of looking through a bunch of applications and ranking students on where they went to undergrad, they’ll simply consider this information as they look very closely at your entire application packet.</p>
<p>Chances are, if you were to put in the same amount of work in different departments, you would get different results. You can look at it another way: a student who is working very hard to compete with the students at a large, super-prestigious research university might have been the shining star of a small liberal arts college, having been given wonderful opportunities for standing out as such a bright scholar.</p>
<p>There are many considerations one must make when choosing a college to attend, but as long as all of the schools you’re considering have good enough programs in what you want to study (which looks to be the case from the responses you’ve gotten so far), I would say that the best advice for you is to pick the school where you think you’d (1) be the happiest, (2) have the best opportunities, and (3) be in a work environment that suits your style. Putting yourself in the right environment for your undergrad studies will help you when considering graduate school.</p>
<p>If you want to go to UC-Irvine, go to UC-Irvine.</p>
<p>What you do in undergrad is far more important than where you’ve gone, and if you are more comfortable at UC-Irvine, you will be more involved; you will likely perform better and be more likely to access the kinds of experiences that you need to gain admissions to graduate school.</p>
<p>UC-Irvine is a great school; it will prepare you well for graduate school AND you will not regret your choice because it was based solely on prestige.</p>