<p>hello. my dad went to uc berkeley. does that factor in at all in the admission process? he claims it doesnt because berkeley is a public school--but i know that UVA (#2 public university) does consider family legacy.</p>
<p>also....is the SAT 2 math iic required?????? ive taken one history and one literature. i dont intend on applying to any math/science branches of the school. im hardcore humanities. im asking for confirmation, clarification, anddd just to relieve my mind, i suppose. ive been under the impression that all the UC schools did require the sat 2 math iic. </p>
<p>i guess every man for himself then. and THANK YOU! im going to blow my sat subject test day tomorrow now that i know the math iic isnt required.</p>
<p>A poor school spirit? How do we quantify and measure school spirit? Of course, you can make a relativist argument and point out USC's "Fight On" or Oregon's enthusiastic fans? Every game I attend at California Memorial Stadium, when students shout "Hey Alumni, GO!" thousands of alumni respond "BEARS!" back and we go back and forth. Chills run down my spine every time I do this because of the immensity of the Cal alumni network. It's always a pleasure to see Cal alums bring their children back on campus. I myself don't have the answer that I posed, but I do have anecdotes. A friend of mine graduated from Cal in 2000. He was wearing a Cal shirt while traveling in Spain. As he was about to board a train, someone shouted "GO BEARS" and did the fist pump. </p>
<p>The CAA (California Alumni Association) has continued to make great strides in forging a stronger network for its students, allowing seniors to become CAA members during their last year for free to access a professional alumni equivalent of Facebook (sans News Feed, relationship status, etc.). Of course, USC's alumni network continues to be the model for all, but that does not mean Cal young alums are shut out from opportunities. Cal alums open their offices to externships and internships for students. For example, Betty Yee has opened up her office to Cal students interested in fiscal public policy and politics in general.</p>
<p>We can quantify alumni support in money, but we also see that alumni support and school spirit go beyond greenbacks.</p>
<p>2.18 billion? that's a huge amount of money, alright. but, compared that amount to what UVa, Michigan, USC have...let alone Stanford, Yale and Harvard... that's a pretty small amount. Harvard has like 26 billion? </p>
<p>I like Berkeley (in fact I am applying there next year), so don't get me wrong by saying those things. but let's be objective here and accept that those things are Berkeley's downsides. If Berkeley's alumni are as eager to help Berkeley back as those alumni with oozing school spirit as Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton peeps... it would have probably tappled Stanford, Princeton and Yale in all ranking games, grad or undergrad level.</p>
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If Berkeley's alumni are as eager to help Berkeley back as those alumni with oozing school spirit as Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton peeps... it would have probably tappled Stanford, Princeton and Yale in all ranking games, grad or undergrad level.
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<p>Keep in mind that there's been a historical mindset at publics to not spend as much time milking the alumni cash cow. However, if you look at endowment growth in the past decade or so, the publics are learning.</p>
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Yeah, it's hard to find alumni in the world with school spirit for Cal.
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<p>S/he said relatively. Look, let's not kid ourselves. UC Berkeley does not get nearly as much alumni donations as the top private schools does. Of course you will find alumni with school spirit and students with school spirit, but no one said that there are no loyal UC Berkeley alum or students. Of course there are some. But they are, on the average, not as loyal as say, the Harvard alumni. One or two anecdotes about spirited students doesn't really relate to the problem. It's like someone points out that a neighborhood has high poverty and someone else points to a wealthy person in the neighborhood. Well that's great, but how does that help the poverty that exists? It doesn't. Trying to detract from the fact that many Berkeley students don't have a lot of school spirit by pointing to those who are spirited is just avoiding the issue. Instead, let's tackle the problem and figure out how we can build up more spirit within the Berkeley community.</p>
<p>I don't know how much of it is school spirit vs. privates having better managed funds. Harvard doesn't have to worry about a spendthrift UC system/California government trying to tap into resources in times of financial crisis.</p>
<p>But it hardly matters. State funding only accounts for a minority of Berkeley's income nowadays, and if Berkeley can rake in half of what Harvard rakes in it wouldn't need state funding at all. My point is, I don't see a change in funding cuts to the UC system anytime soon, so we should focus on 1. private funding and 2. alumni donations, and also that we spend the money wisely and efficiently.</p>
<p>But I agree that school spirit is loosely related. For example, Columbia probably does a lot worse than Berkeley when it comes to school spirit, but still has a much larger endowment. With such issues multiple causation is always present in some form.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that the state/UC system has a wonderful habit of taking private funding here and there and letting it get funneled into all sorts of wonderful porcine projects that don't benefit Cal.</p>
<p>That, and Cal is much more limited in how it can raise money and use it than most privates.</p>
<p>Oh no. Not another thread that compares publics to privates.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>You can't buy your way into Cal. If you are a billionaire and promise to "donate" $100 million towards a new building on the Princeton campus, yeah, your kid will get accepted.</p></li>
<li><p>School spirit in terms of what? USC might have more die-hard football fans who are willing to spend more money on football: does that money necessarily equate into a greater school spirit? My brother-in-law is a USC alum, and he pays the $20 "donation" (it's more like a fee) because he feels compelled to. </p></li>
<li><p>Do schools with medical schools automatically have more school spirit? Medical schools are BIG in terms of endowment.</p></li>
<li><p>UC schools do not pay former CEOs $40 million to manage their investment funds, like one school in Cambridge, MA.</p></li>
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<p>Of note, of the $26 billion in Harvard's endowment, only $595 million are from alumni donations. Harvard only has a 39% alumni giving rate, while Princeton has 61% but give less money, so which school has more "school spirit."</p>
<p>I will say that Cal does not rank high along the arbitrary term of "school spirit." However, I did not come to this conclusion by looking at how students and alumni speak in monetary terms.</p>
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Keep in mind that the state/UC system has a wonderful habit of taking private funding here and there and letting it get funneled into all sorts of wonderful porcine projects that don't benefit Cal.
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<p>Right, which is why I mentioned that the money needs to be spent wisely and efficiently. There seems to be no shortage of leakages in funding into less-than-useful projects.</p>
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* You can't buy your way into Cal. If you are a billionaire and promise to "donate" $100 million towards a new building on the Princeton campus, yeah, your kid will get accepted.
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<p>What's wrong with having one kid who may not be entirely qualified into the school if generations of students will benefit from it? Look at it as a trade-off: the kid's parents offers the university and its students more resources and opportunities, and the university offers the kid more resources and opportunities by admitting him/her. Oh wait. I know what's wrong. Non-legacy students develop a case of bitter-tosis. These students are a very small minority of the population; get over it.</p>
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School spirit in terms of what? USC might have more die-hard football fans who are willing to spend more money on football: does that money necessarily equate into a greater school spirit? My brother-in-law is a USC alum, and he pays the $20 "donation" (it's more like a fee) because he feels compelled to.
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<p>In terms of school loyalty.</p>
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* Do schools with medical schools automatically have more school spirit? Medical schools are BIG in terms of endowment.
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<p>I don't think anyone claimed that.</p>
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* UC schools do not pay former CEOs $40 million to manage their investment funds, like one school in Cambridge, MA.
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<p>What's the point in attacking other schools? That doesn't help the fact that UCs don't manage their funds as well as they could. At least one school in Cambridge, MA manages its funds well.</p>
<p>I misinterpreted your comment since metonymy with regards to an institution is usually employed as an indirect attack on the institution without outright stating it. Rhetorical devices aside, my point still stands. There is little use in mentioning what other schools are doing. So what if one university is shelling out big bucks for investment funding? That still doesn't change the fact that Berkeley can manage its funds better (note: this does not only refer to investment) and I think you will agree that it doesn't have to take $40 million to achieve.</p>