<p>Is UCLA less competitive than Berkeley for undergrad. Like gpa, work ethic of students etc</p>
<p>I hear that Cal is the most of all.. I'm pretty sure LA will be next of UC's.</p>
<p>No, not necessarily. I think it really depends on the year and major.</p>
<p>No.</p>
<p>One thing to consider is that a lot of people chose Berkeley because of that intensity. They're individual thinkers, and enjoy being held to the highest standard.</p>
<p>UCLA is more laid-back. Do we work just as hard? Yes. But UCLA admissions tends to put more effort into admitting well-rounded students; they'll reject someone who's "one-dimensional," very smart but no ECs. So therefore the students coming into UCLA are used to being very involved in a wide variety of things, and it tends to be more of a social atmosphere than Cal (but that's not to say they're anti-social, because they're not). </p>
<p>But the students here are BY FAR the most dedicated I've ever been around. I think one difference between here and Cal is that students are probably more likely to take one less rigorous class in order to take up a second job, or work as a tour guide, or volunteer, etc. So it's not a lesser work ethic, just a little more EC-oriented one.</p>
<p>Hope that helps...</p>
<p>^i think that makes sense from what i've seen..</p>
<p>Currently, UCLA is growing to become more difficult to get into then Berkeley. However, each campus has its ups and downs</p>
<p>I agree with the above posts. I think the competition stems from the student body and not the school though.
UCLA has the reputation of being less competitive, thus less competitive (but equally smart) people go to UCLA over Berkeley.</p>
<p>Honestly, does it matter? UC Berkeley and UCLA are among the best universities in the nation (and perhaps the world). In recent years, the "prestige gap" between the two has been closing rapidly.</p>
<p>We should focus less on their differences and more on their shared amazing-ness. :)</p>
<p>It really depends on your subject. For example, for aerospace engineering you really have to go to UCLA, Berkeley just doesn't have the major.
For evolutionary biology and paleontology, you really have to go to Berkeley, UCLA just doesn't have the broad fossil collections.</p>
<p>Also, don't fall into the trap that because UCLA has a medical school that it has a better biology program (it varies from discipline to discipline) or that it is easier to get into medical school.</p>
<p>I prefer less competitive so I will probably go UCLA then</p>
<p>good choice...? I don't think "competitive" is a good word. More like Berkeley is more intense. Cal is more prestige-oriented; UCLA doesn't care about that as much bc we know we'll be the ones throwing the best parties when we're millionaires anyway. :D</p>
<p>According to the QS world rankings, UCLA is #30 and Berkeley #36.
But rankings don't really indicate what our experiences will be at the schools.</p>
<p>If I get accepted by Berkeley I'm going to have a really hard time deciding whether to go there or to UCLA. I've heard chemical engineering is ridiculous at Berkeley...does anyone know if it's equally ridiculous at LA?</p>
<p>Since both UCB and UCLA draw from the same pool of applicants with similar stats with some UCB rejects ending up at UCLA and some UCLA rejects ending up at UCB I don't see how one can consider one generally more competetive than the other. The competition from your fellow students should be similar. </p>
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I prefer less competitive so I will probably go UCLA then
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Why not go to UCR then or perhaps the easiest CalState you can find?</p>
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Since both UCB and UCLA draw from the same pool of applicants with similar stats with some UCB rejects ending up at UCLA and some UCLA rejects ending up at UCB I don't see how one can consider one generally more competetive than the other. The competition from your fellow students should be similar.
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</p>
<p>It's all about one's surroundings. If you go to Berkeley and the people that are already there are competetive, the freshman will likely follow there lead. Whereas, if the people at UCLA are more laid back...</p>
<p>I still want to go to a good school though, plus its in a better location</p>
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I still want to go to a good school though, plus its in a better location
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If UCLA's location appeals to you more and it's an important factor for you then it makes sense that this is part of the equation for selecting a particular school. </p>
<p>My point was that there are a lot of assumptions being made that UCLA is somehow significantly (enough for a decision point) less competetive across the board than UCB but it doesn't really make sense since the competition is mostly about the student body and the student bodies between the two are almost identical. There are some other factors such as the rigor of the courses but this will vary with particular majors and I'm sure current UCLA students can comment on what they think of the rigor of certain majors at UCLA, like the engineering majors or bizEcon. You might get more concrete information if you stated what major you're interested in.</p>
<p>Cal is much more difficult and competitive. go to la</p>
<p>I'm a pre biz econ and I can tell you that it's very competitive.
I don't know about laid back...Maybe it depends on the major like "ucsd<em>ucla</em>dad" said</p>
<p>It varies from major to major.</p>
<p>Furthermore, which location is better is highly subjective. For example, one thing I didn't like about UCLA was how the campus is the smallest of all the UCs. I wanted a mid-sized very green campus, and that is what I saw at Cal.</p>
<p>I got to Berkeley, and here is my take on this. Berkeley is not that competitive. I am not that smart, so don't give me that crap. The truth is, I have found Cal to be pretty laid back. My friend who is an upper-class man went to UCLA one summer to do some research and to take some classes, and he told me that UCLA wasn't as laid back as he expected. He said that there was the materialistic aspect (obviously...it's LA) and also because there were more pre-meds there. </p>
<p>I personally party a lot, and have found the frat parties to be quite good at Cal. I agree that on a normal day you won't find as many hot looking girls at Cal as you would find at UCLA, but when the weekend comes along, there are quite a lot of good looking girls that come from Berkeley city college (also, all the hot girls join sororities, so I would recommend going there). I too was stuck between LA and Berkeley last year. I too compared them and thought that they were very similar schools, but the truth is they are not. Going off undergrad rankings , I agree that it may seem like that, but looking at grad school rankings, Cal is always quite higher than UCLA in almost everything. Usually, we are not competing with LA, but with schools like Harvard, Stanford, or other such schools. In addition, this shows you that your GSI's (Graduate Student Instructors) that you have for your classes are the smartest in their field. I guarantee u that if an employer is faced with the choice of choosing between two equal candidates, one from UCLA and one from Cal, he or she would choose the Cal person because Cal graduates are more individual thinkers(I know i am stereotyping here, but I am comparing an average grad from Berkeley and LA). Lastly, if you are pre-med, Cal is not that bad of a place to pursue your medical dreams. I can garuntee you that if you work hard, you can do really well. </p>
<p>I am not trying to start a war here LA people, but these are my observations.
Please excuse me for any grammatical or spelling mistakes(too lazy to read over this). </p>
<p>hope this helps,
GL</p>