<p>It seems that many people regard UCLA and Berkeley as the top UC's, but not UCSD. do you guys think UCSD often gets overshadowed by these other schools and that UCSD deserves to be to ranked as high as them?</p>
<p>I personally don’t care what other people rank the schools as; I passed on both Cal and UCLA to attend UCSD. I just get annoyed when people cite published rankings as proof that school A is better than school B. The variables they use to determine placement usually have no direct impact on student experience. Whether a lecture hall has 300 people or 500 people doesn’t matter: it’s huge either way.</p>
<p>UC San Diego passed Berkeley in applicants for the first time this year. Kills my chances, but shows that UCSD is becoming more recognized as an amazing school.</p>
<p>How about engineering electrical/mechanical, as good as UCLA or Berkeley?</p>
<p>Hard to say at the undergraduate level for any specific department. These rankings are typically for graduate departments, and this doesn’t always translate directly to quality of the undergraduate programs/students.</p>
<p>UCSD has a top econometrics faculty/department, but you would never know with all the undergraduates here complaining that the major requires too much math.</p>
<p>For graduate schools, however, UCSD Jacobs is typically on par with UCLA Samueli, but still behind Cal COE. These relative rankings are for schools of engineering, though, and not for specific focuses. If you’re interested in, let’s say, current-induced magnetic reversals in nanostructures and superlattices, then these rankings go out the window only because a handful of professors are doing research on this topic.</p>
<p>Because each discipline is so nuanced with a myriad of avenues of research, rankings are inherently limited. If you wish to go far in your field, your professor/advisor’s reputation is what’ll get you there, not your school’s.</p>
<p>If you’re thinking only about the undergraduate level, then disregard this ENTIRE post: UCSD is comparable to UCLA and Cal.</p>
<p>Yes. </p>
<p>(10 char)</p>
<p>Here is how I perceive the top UCs. Berkeley is top notch in every undergraduate aspect. UCLA is good in nearly every undergraduate aspect. </p>
<p>UCSD is good in most undergraduate majors but it has gaping holes in others. In particular, UCSD is strong in engineering and the sciences (read: a bit better than UCLA) but the school is weaker in terms of humanities and business/economics. Many students would choose to attend a midtier UC over UCSD for some of those areas.</p>
<p>^And what makes you confident in that perception?</p>
<ol>
<li>From what I’ve heard, ucsd has an excellent Econ department. </li>
<li>Ucsd doesn’t have a business major for undergrads, so I’ll assume by “weaker” you mean nonexistent…</li>
</ol>
<p>I would be skeptical of anyone attempting to rank undergraduate departments (even US News).</p>
<p>Honestly, the only reason people regard UCLA and Berkley in high esteem is b/c its well known through its athletics. Academically, UCSD is just as good as those two universities, if not better since it has more research/internship opportunities for undergraduate students.</p>
<p>And if athletics do matter to you, several of my friends who are in the athletics and also work with the athletic department said that we (as a school) are getting close to a deal with a conference that would make us D1</p>
<p>Sentiment, when someone asks you for advice, respect them enough not to talk out of your ass.</p>
<p>UCSD has excellent social science departments. The Econ Department( world renowned for its econometrics scholars), its psychology program( considered the one of, if the THE best, place to study cognitive science in the world), and it’s poli sci department( also top 10 nationally, and many say better than UCLA).</p>
<p>Also, I know little about the English departments but UCSD has a great theater program(it’s part of the humanities), and one of the best Philosophy departments in the nation( strong emphasis on phil of science, phil of mind, and poli phil), tied with the University of Chicago on Brian Leiter’s rankings.</p>
<p>Advice to anyone no matter how smart you think you are, don’t open your mouth unless you know the answer, or it’s a question. Anything else is worthless!</p>
<p>There is no comparison in non-science graduate programs between Berkeley and UCSD. For undergraduate programs, they are all the same, from Harvard to Riverside, i.e. the name of the school is what counts ultimately.</p>
<p>^Thank you! Someone understands. If you care so much where you go to undergrad, you must be an engineer (otherwise, it really only matters where you go to graduate/professional school) therefore rankings of undergraduate departments are useless. That said, our departments are on par with the big football schools in terms of faculty research and all that. So if you’re looking for a research program, you should pay attention to that more. UCSD I think is better for undergrad because of the opportunities available in terms of research and internships, etc. available to us, and the fact that professors care about us (at least in social sciences and humanities, I have no experience elsewhere so cannot say). I’m glad the people who go here (mostly) have some common sense to see how blessed they are.</p>
<p>Yes, I plan to be an engineer (EE and Mech E)</p>
<p>I apologize for hijacking this thread, but how good is UCSD’s math program?</p>
<p>If you thrive in a competitive environment of Asian beasties, go Cal Bears for EE!!! Half kidding, haha, the EE people at Cal are pretty nice : )</p>
<p>UCSD Jacobs School requires its students to work with a company for a senior project, so even if you consider yourself horrible at interviewing and job hunting, you’re guaranteed professional experience before graduating. That’s a huge leg up.</p>
<p>I can’t speak for UCLA and Cal on that.</p>
<p>Btw, graduate rankings do matter. Good graduate programs = good professors = good graduate students. If you want to learn from the best, I think it’s safe to say graduate department rankings are a fair criteria to consider. Not just learn from the best, but also get letter of recs from the best, etc (matters most if you are interested in graduate school).</p>
<p>Anyway, based on my feel of current graduates, the key to success is the amount of professional experience you have upon graduation. I know several engineer graduates from all three of these schools, and it seems like professional experience really goes a long way, and I can point to success stories from all three schools.</p>
<p>disclaimer: I’m not from an engineering dept…G’luck!</p>
<p>Good graduate programs = professors who rake in tons of research grants = lots of busy motivated grad students doing the gruntwork</p>
<p>end result?</p>
<p>–> professors more interested in grant-writing than teaching and grad students more interested in research than teaching. great grad programs don’t always work out well for undergrads.</p>
<p>In lieu of that, your undergraduate education is bolstered by these opportunities to do research under these professors. They may be horrible lecturers, but they can teach you plenty about how to do quality research.</p>
<p>For study on bio-related sciences, UCSD is better.</p>