Hey guys, I’m having a really tough time deciding which school to attend and what’s the smartest route for me to take. I am currently undecided on my major. I would definitely like to have the 4 year college experience, however I don’t want to go to a school solely on experience. I do think about my future and getting the best education is most important to me. My other option is transferring from community college to Berkeley in 2 yrs. Saving money would be nice but it’s not a factor on deciding which school to attend. I live in Los Angeles, Ca and both Universities offer same cost of attendance. Thanks!
All have pros and cons. I live in the Bay Area and this is my breakdown of what the best options would be. I wouldn’t discredit the idea of the college experience. It may seem like a lot of money but if you work hard at getting scholarships the out of state public schools can become the same price as an instate. Also undergraduate research is more accessible at IU and U of Arizona. I have a friend at Arizona who has an internship at General Electric right now as a Freshman, and received over 25K in his first year in financial aid and scholarships. Other pros to a four year college experience, networking, making lifelong friends. Cons, if you can’t put together the money college debt can mess you up for the rest of your life. The CC then UC route can also be really good or really bad. My mom was a UC Berkeley transfer and she had a bad experience because she was poor and had to live really far off campus even though she had a scholarship for full tuition. She didn’t meet any new friends because of it. Also keep in mind that transferring to Berkeley is harder then you think, so don’t be fixiated on it. Be flexible with Davis, SB, SD, LA, and Irvine. These are also top tier universities that are hard to get into. The plus side about the two year transfer is that you can graduate basically debt free from a top tier California university. Just be warned the manotany of two years of community college. I just visited the IU campus and it is legit beautiful. IU and UArizona are both great schools if you are proactive in pursuing scholarships and opportunities. Good luck