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Faculty quality only matters in private universities?! What are they teaching you at the extension campus?</p>
<p>I had no problem getting access to my profs at Berkeley. Most profs were delighted a student came by for office hours. Perhaps those extra 1,500 undergrads ■■■■■■■■ the LA campus really do impact things… </p>
<p>Oh, and sentiment, of course my 2009 example was of casual observers. A hiring manager is going to make a distinction…because that’s his/her job.</p>
<p>Office hours aren’t the same thing. The times are often short and inconvenient and the majority of students will have ultimately never shown up to a single office hour session for a given class. At privates, you interact with your professors on a semi-daily basis.</p>
<p>Also, I don’t see why you would bring up casual observers in discussing the quality of Berkeley undergrad education. The chances are that they aren’t scrutinizing your credentials at all. Prestige or the quality of the program most likely never crossed their minds and it is rather irrelevant to this discussion. (They may have even forgotten your university and major 15 minutes later.)</p>
<p>sentiment, students interact as much with faculty at Cal (and other top public universities) as they do at any major private research university. LACs and “quasi LACs” are a different matter of course. Which is why I don’t think one can compare Cal to Brown, Dartmouth or Williams, but comparing it to Columbia, Cornell or Penn is perfectly fair as interaction with faculty would be identical.</p>
<p><em>shrugs</em> I’d have to re-read the thread to see the context. This thread is old. </p>
<p>
Perhaps at a lberal arts college. There is very little difference on professor interaction for a public and private research university. Large lower division lectures and small upper division seminars are found at both.</p>
<p>Alexandre, I really don’t want to go through this debate again, so I’ll keep this discussion short and simple.</p>
<p>student-faculty ratios
Columbia 6:1
Brown 9:1
Dartmouth 7:1
UPenn 6:1</p>
<p>Berkeley 15:1</p>
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<p>I dont know about Penn and Cornell but I doubt publics can match the level of interaction that would occur at a small school like columbia (4100+ students). Columbia is very liberal art like at the undergrad level</p>
<p>Not so Sefago. Columbia has 7,000 undergrads and 17,000 graduate students. Of those 17,000, a quarter belong to the college of Arts and Sciences or Engineering. Columbia’s faculty is extremely research driven and looks after one of the largest graduate student populations on Earth. I doubt that Columbia is anything like a LAC.</p>
<p>^ nah. You are combining the CAS to the engineering school at the undergrad level. The students in this school might have the same social lives- but their academic curriculum is slightly different. Engineering is going to be taught differently from a LAC subject. Engineers generally dont require or need the attention that people in the arts and sciences do</p>
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<p>Uhh, not really. Suggest you google ‘[college name] common data set’ and you’ll find all kinds of stats for matriculated students.</p>
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<p>How could it ever get old, UCB? </p>
<p>;)</p>
<p>Look fact is that UC Berkeley can never compare to the Ivies for an undergrad education. This is a fact even people at China know. Berkeley is the ideal place for a graduate/PhD education. Not undergrad. As a student who transfered from Cal to UPenn and studied at Duke and Princeton, I can attest to this.</p>
<p>Another fact: UC Berkeley is unbelievably overrated by people on CC (RML, UCBChem, other public school advocates…) basically people who didn’t even attend Ivy League schools. And yet these people insist on comparing Berkeley to the Ivies. Get a grip on yourself and reality.
Berkeley is a good school, but not even close to an Ivy as much as Ivy-like schools such as UChicago, Duke, and MIT are at the undergraduate level.</p>
<p>GoldAngealArea, I thought you are 18 years old ( Born 1992) and you were transfered from Cal to UPenn and studied at Duke and Princeton?</p>
<p>well, as a student who studied at Stanford and MIT and D is studying at Berkeley. I can say Berkeley is as good or better than HSYP as far as quality of education goes.</p>
<p>These are comments from Harvard Students.
I looked at the other negative reviews and don’t think they are , as one reviewer concluded, sabotage from people who didn’t go to harvard. I went there and didn’t like it, and I had much the same reaction these other reviews had. the people there were really cagey and nasty; and maybe this was culture shock, as I am from the midwest, but whatever, it just makes for a bad social life. who would really want to be friends with some of these arrogant people? Also, none of the classes was really good. I majored in government, and everything was huge lectures, with no facutly contact, and not very interesting or conducive to learning. my advisor (not a professor, but a grad student) did not know who I was, since she was at a different house and advised a lot of other people. It was all just so horrible, and I’m glad to be gone from there.<br>
and
I had so many dreams about what I was going to do with my life. Harvard destroyed them. I was a fairly pro-active person, in lots of clubs and stuff, and seeing professors at office hours. But professors just aren’t interested in helping students with anything, I can’t get any really good recommendations now that I’m gone, and I can’t get into a good graduate school. Harvard wasn’t a happy place to go to school, but its even worse after you’ve graduated and completely disabled from going on to the next step</p>
<p>
Probably just as much as new ■■■■■■ on CC that creep up to say it’s overrated.</p>
<p>
Most of Berkeley’s undergrad programs are top notch…e.g. Haas business and engineering.</p>
<p>I’ll be the first to admit that Cal undergrad is not a cozy, mother-hen nuturing type environment. It’s fast paced, dynamic, intense and competitive. Different strokes for different folks.</p>
<p>Cal is sort of a unique case. Sure, its undergraduate population is large and easier to gain admission than smaller, more selective privates. That may or may not detract from a university that offers top graduate academic programs and faculty. Most people on here who never attended the school seem to think it detracts…I don’t. Cal’s academic offerings are among the best in the world…adding a public institution charter makes it more special.</p>
<p>“Look fact is that UC Berkeley can never compare to the Ivies for an undergrad education. This is a fact even people at China know. Berkeley is the ideal place for a graduate/PhD education. Not undergrad. As a student who transfered from Cal to UPenn and studied at Duke and Princeton, I can attest to this.”</p>
<p>GoldAngealArea, I recommend you change your personal profile. 18 year olds do not usually have sufficient wisdom to compare universities, let alone claim that they have attended 4 different universities.</p>
<p>“Another fact: UC Berkeley is unbelievably overrated by people on CC (RML, UCBChem, other public school advocates…) basically people who didn’t even attend Ivy League schools. And yet these people insist on comparing Berkeley to the Ivies. Get a grip on yourself and reality.”</p>
<p>I am one of those “public school advocate”, and I actually have a graduate degree from an Ivy League. My grip on reality is pretty firm.</p>
<p>The new NRC study is out, so it is appropriate to include Berkeley’s position among Ph.D. programs again.</p>
<p>The 1995 NRC Ph.D. Quality publication had Berkeley #1 by a narrow margin over Stanford and Harvard. These three were well separated from all other research Universities.</p>
<p>In this 2010 NRC publication, using compeletely different rating criteria, again Berkeley, Stanford, and Harvard stand separated as the premier grouping. I arrived at this by counting the number of Ph.D. programs that fell within the new NRC ranges that include postions 1, 2, or 3, and in both rating methodoligies R and S. I then gave triple weight to #1 positions, and double weight to #2 positions, and tallied up the weighted score. </p>
<p>Notice Berkeley appears twice. #1, or #4, depending on whether you consider UCSF to be Berkeley’s de facto medical sciences apparatus. Recall that the University of California once consisted of just Berkeley. UCSF was established as the UC medical school and for demographic reasons was situated in San Francisco (more people there) instead of Berkeley. Berkeley has no medical school “in” Berkeley because it’s medical school is “in” San Francisco.</p>
<p>Note: Important Note: This new NRC study puts much, much more weight on Ph.D. programs in the Agricultural Sciences than the study published in 1995. This helped Wisconsin, Penn St. and UC Davis’ poslitions considerably in comparision to the 1995 study…</p>
<p>Here is how the new rankings look by using my “# of Departments ranked in the Top 3” methodology:</p>
<hr>
<p>Position, School, R1/R2/R3/S1/S2/S3/Weighted Total</p>
<p>1 UCB + UCSF 16 / 14 / 8 / 9 / 9 / 8 / 137
2 Harvard 16 / 8 / 4 / 13 / 9 / 4 / 129
3 Stanford 11 / 10 / 2 / 15 / 9 / 4 / 122
4 UCB (alone) 14 / 12 / 8 / 8 / 7 / 7 / 119
5 Princeton 10 / 7 / 3 / 16 / 2 / 1 / 100
6 MIT 10 / 6 / 3 / 6 / 5 / 5 / 78
7 Yale 7 / 4 / 4 / 9 / 3 / 3 / 69
8 Wisconsin 6 / 4 / 5 / 4 / 3 / 4 / 53
9 Caltech 4 / 4 / 2 / 8 / 2 / 2 / 52
10 Columbia 6 / 4 / 0 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 42
11 UCLA 3 / 5 / 3 / 4 / 4 / 0 / 42
12 Penn St. 3 / 3 / 1 / 5 / 2 / 5 / 40
13 Chicago 4 / 4 / 3 / 3 / 1 / 4 / 38
14 Michigan 3 / 3 / 6 / 1 / 4 / 5 / 37
15 Hopkins 2 / 5 / 2 / 4 / 3 / 1 / 37
16 Illinois 2 / 6 / 3 / 3 / 0 / 2 / 32
17 Penn 3 / 5 / 0 / 3 / 0 / 4 / 32
18 Cornell 1 / 7 / 3 / 1 / 2 / 4 / 31
19 UCSB 3 / 2 / 1 / 3 / 2 / 1 / 28
20 Duke 3 / 1 / 1 / 3 / 2 / 2 / 27
21 UC Davis 3 / 2 / 1 / 2 / 1 / 1 / 23
22 Washington 2 / 1 / 3 / 0 / 4 / 2 / 21
23 Texas 5 / 1 / 0 / 0 / 1 / 1 / 20
24 UCSD 2 / 0 / 2 / 2 / 3 / 0 / 20
25 UCSF (alone) 2 / 2 / 0 / 1 / 2 / 1 / 18
26 Minnesota 2 / 2 / 2 / 0 / 2 / 1 / 17
27 Rutgers 2 / 2 / 0 / 1 / 0 / 0 / 13
28 UMASS 1 / 1 / 0 / 2 / 0 / 2 / 13
29 Northwestern 0 / 1 / 2 / 0 / 3 / 2 / 12
30 Florida 0 / 4 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 8
31 UC Irvine 0 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 2 / 0 / 4</p>
<p>Here is how each of the above schools did (and adding tOhio St. and UNC) breaking out their rank order position in each of the NRC’s 6 “Broad Fields” separately:</p>
<p>Note, this is NON-ZERO ranking. If you want to penalize a school for not being ranked at all in a Broad Area, then another ranking would result.</p>
<pre><code>Ranking Position in Each of the 6 Broad Fields of Research
Broad Field Ag / Bio / Eng / Hum / MathSci / SocBeh /
AVE
</code></pre>
<p>1 UCB + UCSF 6 / 1 / 2 / 3 / 3 / 4 / 3.2
1 Stanford nr / 2 / 2 / 4 / 6 / 2 / 3.2
3 Harvard nr / 4 / 13 / 1 / 1 / 1 / 4.0
3 UCB (alone) 6 / 6 / 2 / 3 / 3 / 4 / 4.0
5 Princeton nr / 13 / 6 / 2 / 1 / 3 / 5.0
6 Yale 13 / 3 / 10 / 5 / nr / nr / 7.8
7 Caltech nr / 18 / 2 / nr / 4 / nr / 8.0
8 MIT nr / 5 / 1 / 21 / 5 / 12 / 8.8
9 UCLA nr / 11 / nr / 10 / nr / 10 / 10.3
10 Hopkins nr / 6 / nr / 21 / 19 / 6 / 10.4
11 Michigan nr / 9 / 11 / 18 / 19 / 7 / 12.8
11 Brown nr / nr / 13 / 12 / 14 / nr / 13.0
11 Penn St. 3 / nr / nr / 18 / 19 / 12 / 13.0
14 Columbia nr / 21 / nr / 6 / 9 / 17 / 13.3
15 UCSB nr / nr / 5 / 26 / 12 / 12 / 13.8
16 Illinois 4 / nr / 11 / nr / 14 / 28 / 14.3
17 Penn nr / 10 / nr / 13 / 25 / 10 / 14.5
18 Wisconsin 1 / nr / 21 / 32 / 14 / 7 / 15.0
19 UC Davis 5 / 18 / nr / 26 / nr / 17 / 16.5
20 Duke nr / 21 / nr / 7 / nr / 23 / 17.0
20 Texas nr / nr / 8 / 26 / nr / 17 / 17.0
20 Washington 8 / 27 / 21 / 21 / 8 / nr / 17.0
23 NYU nr / nr / nr / 9 / 9 / 35 / 17.7
24 UCSD nr / 15 / 9 / nr / 12 / 35 / 17.8
24 Cornell 2 / 30 / 16 / 21 / 19 / 19 / 17.8
26 Chicago nr / 30 / nr / 8 / 25 / 9 / 18.0
27 Minnesota 7 / 35 / nr / 16 / nr / nr / 19.3
28 Rutgers nr / 35 / nr / 16 / nr / 23 / 24.7
29 Ohio St. 11 / 41 / nr / 32 / nr / 19 / 25.8
30 Florida nr / 35 / 16 / nr / nr / 28 / 26.3
30 N. Carolina nr / 15 / nr / 14 / 25 / 25 / 26.3
32 Northwestern nr / 41 / 21 / 32 / 14 / nr / 27.0
33 UMASS 12 / 21 / 21 / nr / nr / 23 / 38.5</p>
<p>Does anyone think Berkeley’s Ph.D. programs are overrated?</p>
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<p>Wow, really! That would potentially destroy your social life. Why don’t you hire a baby-sitter instead? S/he would guide you the whole day for the whole year. </p>
<p>We have a tutorial system at Cambridge and we were asked to meet our tutors for an hour or two (maximum) per week.</p>
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<p>On the same site you linked to me says: ** Based on Office of Undergraduate Admissions data; enrollment estimate as of 7/14/10.*</p>
<p>GoldAngealArea, </p>
<p>I think the quality of Berkeley’s undergrad education is as good as some of the Ivies, inferior to some of the Ivies, and better than some of the Ivies for some programs. By that I mean, since Berkeley operates departmentally, some departments at Berkeley are quite strong even at the undergrad level. For example, the business (Haas) and engineering (COE) undergrad programs at Berkeley are as great as their corresponding postgrad programs, and are comparable, if not slightly better, than some of the Ivies that offer the same programs. For example, I think that very few people would argue that Berkeley eng’g undergrad is superior to Brown or UPenn or Dartmouth eng’g undergrad. I think Berkeley’s CS is superior to Cornell, UPenn, Columbia or Dartmouth undergrad CS. So, the concept of “as a whole” does not fully and fairly apply to large research, departmentally-run schools like Berkeley or UMich or UCLA. But I’d rather have a Berkeley CS undergrad degree than a Dartmouth, UPenn, Columbia, Cornell or Brown CS undergrad degree. I would push it to my parents to send me to Berkeley to major in CS than to any of the Ivies other than HYP. And, I think my parents would push me to go to Berkeley if I decide otherwise even if they have to pay a little more to attend Berkeley CS.</p>