<p>Well, honestly, I had never imagined I'd get into Penn so deciding between these two schools is incredibly hard. A couple of pointers/preferences that I have:
1.) Name (Penn vs Berkeley): Berkeley wins somewhat, it has an element named after it: Berkelium (how nerdily awesome is that? ). But then again PEN'15 sounds cool too :p
2.) I want to major in Computer Science (and in Economics if I can manage that at Penn)
3.) Jerome Fisher Program in M&T has been my dream program but I didn't apply for it (long story) so now the only other option that I have is to transfer into it after freshman year and I know how competitive it is. But in all honesty I don't mind doing a dual degree outside the M&T program too. I am more concerned about learning than I am about having a degree from Wharton. I have no idea how I can do this (i.e a dual degree) at Berkeley.
4.) Location: I am leaning towards Penn in this case because of two key reason, Philadelphia is a pretty historical city (I love soaking up American history) and its close proximity to NYC also helps. As surprising as this may be for many people I am not all gung-ho about the sunny weather of California (I've been living in Dubai for 15 years now and I prefer cooler weather over sunny weather).
5.) I'd like to party every weekend and just have a fun time generally.
6.) I want to meet people outside my area of interest (i.e Comp Science). So, basically, I don't want to limit my group of friends to like-minded engineers.
7.) I'd like to work for a top-notch tech firm like Google, Microsoft and their like.
8.) I'd like to engage in research related to Artificial Intelligence and I'm open to other fields in Comp Science too. So the real question is: how do the research opportunities and resources offered by Penn compare to those offered by UCB (From what I've heard due to the budget crisis Berkeley's resources might be limited).
9.) A REALLY IMPORTANT FACTOR FOR ME IS CLASS SIZE. A couple of students studying in EECS Berkeley have told me that the class sizes are large and so in most cases your professor barely knows you (I know that this won't happen magically at Penn but it will certainly be easier at Penn as about 70% of the classes have less than 20 kids)</p>
<p>So yea, what do you guys have to say? I would like advice on any of the above points (and anything else that you guys think might be important) and if possible try and give me a Penn SEAS vs Berkeley EECS picture.
Thanks,
mynameisv</p>