Please help me with deciding which would be the best decision for college!!! thxxx!
May 1 is approaching…
UCB’s location’s nice, and I love the student culture there, but I’m afraid it’s too big cuz I’ve always been in a private school with about 10-15 students in a class.
Davidson is a awesome academic-focused college where people respect and obey the honor code. But i’m not sure if it’s too academic as I would like a rather mixed lifestyle for college than just purely studying.
Vassar has a great art atmosphere for drama and theater and more liberal than Davidson. But I heard that the career service wasn’t really good.
Plz help me to decide by providing pros and cons for these colleges & university!
My son is also considering Vassar for Econ. Their economics program is very strong based on course offerings, academic credentials of the faculty, and professor ratings on ratemyprofessors.com. There is a wide selection of courses offered. It’s extremely unusual to have four different econometrics courses offered. I should add that I teach economics at another university. Vassar’s economics program looks very, very good.
I don’t know much about their career services but I consistently hear that their alumni network is very strong and very helpful.
I have heard great things about Davidson but haven’t looked into the school, so can’t really comment on their econ program, etc.
UCB would be a very different experience–huge classes, limited interaction with professors, etc. At a liberal arts college, you will get personalized attention from faculty. But both the colleges you are considering are not in cities though both are relatively near cities. That is something to take into account, depending your preferences.
Are you in state or out of state for UCB? It is a very big school and can feel somewhat anonymous after coming from a small private school but if it is a fraction of a cost of the other schools, that matters.
Do you have a specific area of economics that interests you today? All of the schools will have a sound classes through intermediate economics. The difference may be in the upper level options. UCB will likely be strong in everything. The smaller schools may have limitations just due to size. But if they have faculty with interest in your interest area it doesn’t matter. You can’t study everything. If you are considering graduate school in economics, please remember that all but a few schools do a poor job at preparing students with just the base degree. The most important addition is math. It is also nice if you can take a more math intensive intermediate theory sequence.
All three schools have a basic intermediate economics and econometrics sequence that uses single variable calculus. UCB offers a choice of a more math intensive version using multivariable calculus, plus math-heavy upper level electives. Vassar offers advanced topics in microeconomics using multivariable calculus.
At any college, pre-PhD economics students are recommended to take additional math and statistics like multivariable calculus, linear algebra, real analysis, and calculus-based probability theory. For example, here are some recommendations: Preparing for a PhD in Economics