<p>The Cog Sci department, unlike many other departments, has a nice centralized listing for research assistantships. So I emailed a couple of researchers--I say researchers because the guy I'm working with is a lecturer and a researcher, but not a professor--about my interest, met up, and got offered a position.</p>
<p>If you're interested in more details about getting an RA, check out the graduate school forum here on College Confidential. They've got a lot of good advice about approaching professors, etc.</p>
<p>I was wondering if you could share a little bit about your Muir college experience. I just got accepted into the college and am anxious to know what to expect should I choose to go there. What seperates it from the other colleges, what is the social life like, and academics? Thank you!</p>
<p>Are you allowed to change majors as a transfer? You write that you came in as a math major and then moved to cognitive science, how did that effect you?</p>
<p>@sweetnezz998: Personally, I like Muir college a lot. In keeping with the vision of the college's namesake, the college feels a little more woodsy than other colleges. It's got a lot of tall concrete buildings: Muir felt that concrete was low waste, and building up helped reduce our footprint. However, I happen to spend so much time at Muir because my major keeps me nearby. As a transfer, whether off campus or in the new transfer housing, college doesn't have much effect on where you spend your time, or your social life. Though some orgs are chartered towards a particular college, anyone can join. At the transfer level your social life is very little about your college, and much more about your major and organizations.</p>
<p>@Art is Melodic: You're totally allowed to change majors after you transfer. How it effects you will depend on the major you're going to, and the coursework you've completed. It's really easy to change, though: I just went online, clicked a few buttons, and that was it. No approval necessary. In my case it worked out fine, because many of the lower division requirements were the same. But if you're going into a major with much different prereqs, it would mean an extra year of work. If you switch after Fall quarter, you might also miss out on getting started on those year-long series, if your major has them.</p>
<p>wow cognitive science?? thats my declared major! but theres so many different parts how were you able to decide. </p>
<p>my admission is still pending..:( but hopefully i get in. it was ucsd, cal, and ucla that offered cognitive science. how do you think ucsd compares to the other two?? im hoping i at least get into one of the schools. cognitive sounds very interesting, care to elaborate??</p>
<p>so what kind of scientist are you planning to be with cognitive science??</p>
<p>So, the general consensus seems to be that UCSD is the premier Cog Sci institution. I don't know how to objectively judge that, except that I've heard it from people in different departments, it's the only UCSD department I've heard boasted as the best, I heard it before I was considering transferring here, and Google--without personal history effects--turns it up as the first university department in a search for Cognitive Science.</p>
<p>I posted a bit of an explanation of the major on 02-07, but I can flesh that out towards your questions a bit. As for how to decide your focus, Cogs 1 is a sampler course to help you figure that out. Every lecture is from a different researcher within the department, or within a related department. So, you can get a feel from there if you've got more interest in comp sci, ling, neuro, etc. Between your college's upper division elective requirements and the major's, you've got a good opportunity to actually take courses in these other majors.</p>
<p>I'd like to be a researching professor, and my performance so far suggests I'll be able to get a job doing that somewhere. I'm not entirely sure which areas I'm going to focus on. My research assistantships look to be on the computational/theoretical neursoscience side. I can definitely see focusing on a mathematical/theoretical/computational approach. I've also been taking linguistics courses, and this next quarter I'm taking a graduate course in semantics: how we use words to convey meaning. I'm starting to become interested in brain plasticity, or the ability of the brain to rewire itself in response to external stimuli, in the process of learning. Finally, I find some theory of mind stuff interesting. I figure I'll just explore this stuff freely during my undergraduate time, and narrow my focus more when I get to graduate school.</p>