<p>Hi all, I am a rising senior at a public high school in a suburb of Kansas City and looking to go to California for college. I've visited 5 UCs, Stanford, and the Claremont Colleges. I'm looking for a place with stellar academics, particularly in the natural and biological sciences, as well as a beautiful setting and campus and access to skiing, good cycling terrain, and a good college community in general. That said, here is how I would rank the ones I've visited:</p>
<p>1) Stanford
2) UC Davis/UCLA tied (for very different reasons)
3) Pomona/Claremont McKenna</p>
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<p>4) UCSB
5) Cal
6) UCSD</p>
<p>The top 5 I'm interested in, the others I didn't like for various reasons. I guess I just want thoughts and input from those who know the universities/colleges better than me and can provide insight! Thanks!</p>
<p>Well Stanford’s great, but even a reach for a straight A student with perfect SATs. That being said, apply, but don’t count on it. UCD and UCLA are my two favorite UCs (I’m partial to Davis. Davis has a great community feel and LA can be a little overwhelming. La Jolla is a great college town and the people I know from UCSD love it. UCSB has a party school reputation, but good academics. I didn’t like Claremont when I visited, but some people love it. I’ve been to Berkeley a lot and I don’t like the urban campus, but again, some students really like it. </p>
<p>I considered applying to all these schools and after visiting and researching only applied to Stanford, UCD, UCLA, and UCSD.</p>
<p>Can you afford all of these schools? The UCs aren’t cheap and rarely give any kind of aid to OOS students.</p>
<p>If you have the grades for colleges you mentioned above, I would also recommend adding Cal Poly SLO to the list. It is considerably cheaper than the UCs – even for OOS students, and it still provides a top-notch quality education. The only caveat is that it’s very hard to change majors at Cal Poly, so make sure that bio is what you really want to do, if you attend.</p>
<p>There’s also a Cal Poly Pomona, if you like that area.</p>
<p>LilyEmery- Totally agree with you! Thanks for the input.</p>
<p>Bruno14-Yes, I/my family can afford it. I do know that we won’t qualify for financial aid at all, hopefully I can get some kind of merit scholarships from UCs and I plan to apply for other, non-affiliated scholarships. Even if none of that happens, we can still afford it.</p>
<p>Hesdjjim- Thanks! I don’t know why, but I haven’t looked into Cal Poly. I will now though 
The only problem I see is that I’m really unsure of what I want to do, I mean I know I have interests but I’m hoping college will help me figure out exactly what major I want. Would cal poly not be the best, then?</p>
<p>If you know you want to be somewhere in the bio / nat sci field, then go ahead and apply to Cal Poly as a biology major. I believe their applications open on October 1st, and they close on November 30, see [url=<a href=“http://www.csumentor.edu%5DCSUMentor%5B/url”>http://www.csumentor.edu]CSUMentor[/url</a>].</p>
<p>If you are not sure what major you want to eventually go into, don’t go to Cal Poly (at least not SLO, Pomona might be different). In fact, there is no shame in going to your local community college and knocking out your first two years worth of classes at a bargain basement price and then transferring. That’s what I did.</p>