The UCSD app requires you to rank the different colleges they have, but as a freshman applicant I don’t really know any differences between the colleges. All the threads I’ve seen have really just been about personal preference, but I was wondering if the fact that I’m applying as a sociology major might make one college better than the other?
There aren’t really any colleges that are better for any one major, and there are going to be students in all majors in all colleges.
Take a look at the GEs for each college. Every college has different sets of GEs, which you can find on each college’s website (there are some documents that do rough comparisons of them as well that I’m sure you can find through google). If you say what you’re looking for in GEs (like subjects you want to avoid/take, if you have AP/transfer credit that you want to use, or if there’s something specific you want to do in college), I might be able to comment on some colleges that are better or worse, or you can just look at the GE requirements for yourself. But just knowing your major doesn’t really help that much.
Every college has different “philosophies” so that’s what influences how they do their GEs somewhat, but for the most part, they’re all going to require you to take some courses outside of your field. Here is some of the basic things that set the GEs for each college apart, but keep in mind, I am NOT listing all of the GEs for each college so you should look those up for yourself.
Revelle is the “renaissance man” so they have a lot of requirements in different fields of study. Every college has their own writing sequence, and theirs is one of the longest (5 courses). They also have a good number of math and science requirements (3 courses of calculus and 5 courses of natural sciences, although you can take courses that are designed for non-science majors), so if you want to avoid math and science, you might want to stay away from Revelle. They also have a foreign language requirement, so if that’s something you don’t like, you might want to rank them lower.
Muir is “celebrating the individual spirit” so their GEs are very flexible and relatively easier (because there aren’t a whole lot of requirements and they are all lower-division courses, as opposed to some of the other colleges that require students to take upper-division courses for their GEs). Their writing sequence is one of the shortest (2 courses), and it’s pretty easy to avoid certain subjects if you absolutely don’t want to take courses in them (like if you want to avoid a foreign languages or math or something).
Marshall is about justice and creating engaged citizens, so their writing sequence focuses on diversity and justice in the United States. It’s three courses long, but two of those courses are 6 units (as opposed to the normal 4 unit courses) so they are more work than typical courses. Marshall also requires that students have disciplinary breadth so you have to take four courses in a field outside of your field of study. They also offer a public service option, where you can participate in programs where you do an internship or volunteer in a school or other similar things for academic credit, and they allow you to use this for one of your GE requirements.
ERC’s philosophy is something about developing world scholars so they have extra requirements like a regional specialization (you have to take 3 courses that focus on one area of the world). They also have a foreign language requirement, and one of the longest writing sequences (5 courses).
Warren (whose philosophy I totally had to look up!) is apparently “toward life in balance,” which I suppose makes sense when you look at their GEs. The big thing with their GEs is that you have to select 2 programs of concentration outside of your field of study (and they can’t be in the same field of study as each other). So since you’re in Sociology, you would have to select a program of concentration in a humanities department and one in a science/math department. Each program of concentration is 6 courses (3 of which have to upper division), and the idea is that you have to basically force you to “specialize” in fields outside of your own. This is good if you want to pick up minors in other subjects because you can substitute a minor for a program of concentration (a minor is usually 7 courses). They also have one of the shortest writing sequences (2 courses).
Sixth is about culture, art, and technology (which is actually the name of their 3-course writing sequence). Like other colleges, they basically require students to take a couple of courses in the same basic fields (social science, humanities, science, math/statistics, and fine arts). But keep in mind their fine arts requirements is 4 courses in art making, which is more courses and different than most of the other colleges’ fine arts requirement. So while in other colleges you could take classes in art history or classes where you listen to music or watch movies, in Sixth you have to take classes where you learn how to draw or where you write fiction or poetry or instrumental/voice classes or an introduction to acting or theater design, etc. I emphasize this because as a very non-artistic person that was a deal breaker for me =D I was fine with learning about music or art, but I didn’t want to make it. Sixth also has a practicum requirement, where you have to do a hands-on learning experience (like an internship or research) that usually requires ~10 hours of work/week and a final project (like a paper). They also require CAT 125, which is a Sixth specific class in Public Rhetoric and Practical Communication. I wasn’t in Sixth so I don’t know what that entails, but it looks like the subject might change from time to time?
EDIT: Sorry, I didn’t mean to write that much, but I felt bad just writing about one college and not writing about any of the other ones =D
No need to apologize for the length, it was super informative! Thank you for all the help 