Hi, I am from Canada and was admitted by UCLA and the University of Toronto, considering a major in Computer Science. I was wondering how good/prestigious UCLA is exactly in an American’s mind, but I am not friends with any Americans. I would be very grateful if you can share with me the general opinions the public has towards UCLA. Thanks a lot!
UCLA is very prestigious as is the University of Toronto. The only thing that UCLA has that Toronto does not have is nice weather.
Your parents must be affluent since as an out of state student you will be full pay: US$60,000/year for four years. Is the warm weather worth an extra US$40,000/year?
UCLA is undoubtedly one of the best schools in the world. And since you are admitted to CS, I wish to remind you that it is the place were Internet was born!
I didn’t know Al Gore went to UCLA! :-0
Okay, how prestigious is UCLA? UCLA is a highly coveted university and once again it was the most applied school in the entire country. For many, UCLA is their dream school. People take immense pride being a Bruin, there is no settling for UCLA.
I would say that UCLA is nearly as prestigious as U.Toronto. UCLA does indeed have better winter weather than Toronto.
The Internet was started by a colaborative effort. I remember MIT and BBN and ISI/USC people being involved. Apparently the first Arpanet IMP was at UCLA so I suppose that the point could be argued:
http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/internethistory/
https://www.internetsociety.org/internet/history-internet/brief-history-internet/
There are several ways to answer this question. One way is to do what you did, post a question to strangers on an anonymous Internet forum. Another perhaps more scientific way is to check the various rankings and surveys out there and aggregate them (i.e do a meta-analysis.) The rankings follow specific methodologies which you can quibble about, but at least they are transparent. UCLA ranks high in these rankings and surveys. I would say it is in the top 1% in prestige of all colleges and universities in the world.
Here is a Gallup poll of the general American public on what it thinks is the best university in the country. UCLA does quite well in lay people’s minds. It beats several Ivies. Some of it is due to sheer name recognition from constant media exposure. UCLA after all is located in the premier media market in the US and the world.
http://news.gallup.com/poll/3634/harvard-tops-gallup-poll-list-best-university.aspx
As someone who grew up in Toronto/Niagara Falls and in California, I can oddly relate to your post. UT is king in Ontario, I remember it was pretty much treated like the Harvard of Ontario in terms of reputation and prestige. But UCLA is a globally recognized prestigious brand. Everyone has heard the name, the amazing sports accomplishments have surely helped but academically everyone knows that UCLA is a premier institution. I wouldn’t pick a college solely on prestige tho, esp. if you’re trying to go to grad school. Also it’s gonna cost a fortune for you being that you’re an out of country student and all. But again, as someone who lived in Toronto and relocated to southern California, I can personally tell you that I’ll take southern california any day over anywhere in Ontario. Either way tho you’re in a great situation.
Ucla is the main rival of Berkeley … and is treated on par with Berkeley in States (more so in California). The same Berkeley which is internationally treated as an academic giant (top 3 or 4 in most world rankings)!
(And UCLA is holding to the10th position in world ranking, according to US News, which certainly is nothing to be ashamed of ?)
@happybird666…how good is UCLA? very good…so good that I am sending my only son there…he will be in CS program too.
UCLA alum here. Here are some links to lists made by and for Americans. These kind of lists fairly accurately reflect general thoughts on how elite colleges are here in the states, and as compared to schools throughout the world.
https://www.princetonreview.com/college-rankings/college-hopes-worries : UCLA #5 “Dream School” for college applicants
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities : UCLA #21 in National University rankings
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/2018/world-ranking#!/page/0/length/25/sort_by/rank/sort_order/asc/cols/stats : UCLA #15 in World University rankings (ranking above the likes of Duke, Berkeley, Cornell, Northwestern, Toronto, NYU, and Brown)
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/2017/reputation-ranking#!/page/0/length/100/sort_by/rank/sort_order/asc/cols/stats : UCLA #13 in World Reputation rankings (ranking above the likes of Penn, Cornell, Toronto, NYU, Duke, Northwestern, and Brown)
Also, this year UCLA accepted 14% of all applicants, which is less than Berkeley/. As mentioned above, UCLA was the most applied-to college in the country again, for like the 15th year in a row. (yes, really)
Best of luck, and congrats!
What was Cal’s acceptance rate this year? What about USC’s?
At this rate, all three will soon be taking under 10% 
@USCWolverine USC’s was 13% this year.
Yep. 64,000 applicants to USC this year. 111,000 to UCLA.
yeah all the UCs are pretty good because their libraries are interconnected with the Ivies so you can check out books from Harvard if they were the only place that had the copy that you wanted which is cool
@Lilbluejay Not sure if the ability to check out a book from Harvard is exactly the most compelling reason for why UCLA is a great school…
Actually Harvard does not even participate in the Ivy library consortium They will not lend to the other Ivies.
UCLA is a prestigious university. It’s world-renowned. A lot of the faculty there are extremely well-qualified. One of the professors there, Peter Clark, majored in 7 things at Cornell and then got a Ph.D at Cal Tech, if I remember correctly. Check out his resume lol.
It should be noted that this year UCLA was ranked #19 (up from 22) in the USNWR rankings (beating Cal, USC and Georgetown at 22) and the sole top public university. Someone once told me UCLA is just the jock school due to it’s long-standing successful sports heritage. Well, Stanford, UCLA (which go back and forth) and USC, with Cal not too far behind, are the top 3 schools for athletics and all of the schools are in the top 25 academically. Go Pac-12.
The Pac-12 conference is so far “down the tubes” that, at this point, I’d just emphasize the top notch academics at UCLA, USC, Cal, Stanford and UW. The Pac-12 should no longer call themselves the “Conference of Champions.”
Yes, without a doubt, UCLA is a prestigious university.