<p>Berkeley is strong in almost all of its departments. You can look at the [NRC</a> Rankings](<a href=“http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/nrc41indiv.html]NRC”>http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/nrc41indiv.html) to see that Berkeley is rated in the top 10 for virtually everything. (Rankings are a little old, but universities don’t change that drastically over 10 years.) We have good economists, including Christina Romer, Obama’s pick for Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors, good philosophers, including John Searle and Hubert Dreyfus, and the list goes on. The people teaching here are solid and accomplished individuals who are often on par with the people at top Ivies. The big issue with Berkeley is how much you’d get to access them as undergraduates.</p>
<p>Oh, and the GSIs (Graduate Student Instructors) here have been excellent so far. After all, Berkeley is a top-notch grad school, so you have top-notch grad students.</p>