Why do you say there are more opportunities for internships/jobs if one goes to UCB?There are so many opportunities for these at UCLA (and UCSD for that matter) that I doubt the opportunities 'due to attending UCB' are significantly greater.
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Location, and speaking for engineering. Simply, their coursework gives them the advantage and they learn more programs/skills, some which match what the industry desires in certain positions.</p>
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Regarding coursework difficulty of one versus the other, have you compared the specific courses in a particular engineering program at one versus the other to compare the difficulty of the material?
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You can look at the course descriptions at UCB and some of their problem sets posted. They are much more difficult than textbook problems given at UCLA, where 50% of the students have the solutions manual.</p>
<p>My statement was clearly an assumption because I've never taken a class at UCB. However, MOST of the professors I've had in the UCLA Engineering department (CS/EE) have terrible communication/teaching skills, and I'm assuming they're at UCLA mostly for the research. Again, I could be terribly mistaken...but about 80% of the engineering professors I've had are pretty bad and don't seem to care about the students (...except the students who are conducting research under them)</p>
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Why do you say there are more opportunities for internships/jobs if one goes to UCB? There are so many opportunites for these at UCLA (and UCSD for that matter) that I doubt the opportunities 'due to attending UCB' are significantly greater.
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Of course there are opportunities at UCLA - how else would we get jobs or internships? However, most companies in the Silicon Valley ARE getting their engineers/interns from Berkeley. Sure, there may be a couple of exceptional students from UCLA who work for companies such as Google...but they take a lot more students from Berkeley. If we're considering two students with the same exact stats on the paper and the same extracurriculars, I'm about 99% sure that Google will take the student from Berkeley.</p>
<p>As Boelter said - location is extremely important. A lot of local companies/branches take students from UCLA...but Los Angeles is no Silicon Valley.</p>
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Regarding coursework difficulty of one versus the other, have you compared the specific courses in a particular engineering program at one versus the other to compare the difficulty of the material?
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I've only been able to compare by word of mouth. I've had a couple of students from my high school go to both UCB and UCLA. To be honest, the engineering coursework at UCLA is pretty easy - but I think that's what makes UCLA so balanced. It allows engineering students to also get some experience from student groups, club sports, and other social activities. However, I haven't heard the same experiences come from UCB. Most of the stories I've heard from friends involve working their butts off and studying every day of the semester. The experiences at both schools are definitely different, but the academic competitiveness at Berkeley is definitely a lot more challenging at UCLA.</p>
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For competetiveness, again, the pool of students between the two is almost identical and that's where the competition is. An example is my D - she turned down UCB for UCLA and she would have presented the same level of 'competition' to the fellow students at one college versus the other and the same would be true for many other students.
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This isn't necessarily true. If the professors at Berkeley have a stricter curve (say - 10% A, 30% B, 50% C, 10% fail), then there will be more competition. However, I have no idea what the grade distributions are like. You're also failing to consider the large amount of out-of-state students at UCB (UCB has the most). The competitive OOS students apply to Berkeley for it's exceptional engineering program...the same cannot be said for UCLA.</p>
<p>how would the student to teacher ratio in UCLA and UCB engineering compare..and which engineering are you doing MadeInChina.
secondly as you say that the professors dont really concentrate on communications in UCLA wouldn't that make it more difficult than UCB? I mean there cant a huge difference between whats taught in UCLA and UCB because after all both are UCs</p>
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You're also failing to consider the large amount of out-of-state students at UCB (UCB has the most).
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I was basing my statement on the average stats of the incoming students to the campuses. The last time I checked, they were very very close.</p>
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If the professors at Berkeley have a stricter curve (say - 10% A, 30% B, 50% C, 10% fail)
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Hmmm, my CS kid who went to UCSD (who also turned down UCB) had some classes like that.</p>
<p>Regarding location - sure, the bay area is a haven for engineers but the companies, especially the bigger ones, don't limit their hiring to bay area campuses. UCB, Stanford, SJSU, and Santa Clara U all provide their students with the advantage of a large number of local internships and job opportunities but they also hire from other campuses. At least in CS, I don't think there's much of an issue in virtually everyone finding jobs and frequently receivig multiple job offers. Neither of my kids have had any problems getting internships or reasonable job offers. For many of the companies one finds college hires from universities around the country.</p>
<p>I think people read too much into the differences in subjective rankings between the top few UCs and other schools. I also don't think you should sell yourself short - you'd likely perform about the same whether at UCLA or UCB.</p>
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which engineering are you doing MadeInChina
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Computer Science and Engineering</p>
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secondly as you say that the professors dont really concentrate on communications in UCLA wouldn't that make it more difficult than UCB?
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Nope - the coursework at UCLA is still relatively easy. Students will just have to depend more on the TAs or textbook.</p>
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I mean there cant a huge difference between whats taught in UCLA and UCB because after all both are UCs
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Again, I don't have any personal experience at Berkeley, but I do know UCLA courses are more on the theoretical side. Anyone have comments on Berkeley engineering teaching style?</p>
<p>I agree with bruinboy and ucsd<em>ucla</em>dad here. The student makeup of UCLA and Berkeley is very, very similar; come on now, you aren't comparing Harvard with some no name school in the boonies. And unless you've been a student at both schools, how can you tell which school is more competitive anyway? It's pretty subjective, and with a few exceptions (specific programs or what not), any perceived difference is probably minimal and not worth harping over.</p>
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come on now, you aren't comparing Harvard with some no name school in the boonies.
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But I am comparing UCB engineering with UCLA engineering...close enough.</p>
<p>Edit: Okay...UCLA engineering isn't that bad. just a joke. but still, i'm only focusing on the engineering schools at UCB and UCLA...and there is a considerable difference. the projects that i've done in my CS classes at UCLA are nothing compared to the ones my friends do at CMU or Berkeley..</p>
<p>I did say with few exceptions, as the op was talking about the competitiveness of undergrads and not specifically engineering. There are lots of people NOT going into engineering, but just the general letters and sciences.</p>
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I did say with few exceptions, as the op was talking about the competitiveness of undergrads and not specifically engineering. There are lots of people NOT going into engineering, but just the general letters and sciences.
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</p>
<p>true. kinda steered the thread to an engineering debate lol</p>
<p>zuser,
Those numbers tell us little about how many people each school actually admits.
For example, while UCLA has 4700 slots for freshmen, it accepted roughly ~12000 applicants.</p>
<p>LA admits around 13k, berkeley admits about 10k, because berkeley has a better turnout for the accepted students, so they need to accept less to not overfill their class</p>
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^That's weird for UCLA, lol, What if all those 12k students want to go to UCLA ?XD what's UCLA gona do?
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UCLA knows that they're not all going to come. Obviously some of those students will end up at the Ivies, some at UCB, and so on, so they have to make their decisions accordingly. There have been years where they got over-enrollment though, but they just accept less the next year to compensate.</p>
<p>Eh, not entirely true. The average GPA at Berkeley is actually higher than LA’s (3.3 vs. 3.1 or 2), so if you think “competitive” means that it’s harder to get good grades, LA is actually more competitive than Cal. And engineering really is not as bad as everyone makes it out to be. Being in one of the best programs in the nation does not mean that it’s “competitive.”</p>
<p>Tons of people double major at Cal. In my primary major, the double majoring rate is about 40%. Most of my friends are double majoring. My boyfriend is doubling in EECS and Engineering Physics and has already completed his minor in Math. So don’t think you can’t do it. People are generally very involved in ECs and practically everyone I know (maybe it’s a result of my major) does an internship the summer after junior year.</p>