Pitzer VS UCSC

<p>Hey, this is realllyyyy stressing me out right now. I am stuck deciding between santa cruz and pitzer. I am out of state, so ucsc would be quite expensive. I am currently undecided but visited both schools this past weekend. I really liked them both, for different reasons that is. Pitzer seemed to have a very nice SMALL and warm atmosphere. UCSC on the other hand had a very fun beautiful feel to it. Which one is a better school???</p>

<p>Where do you want to spend four years? Which school has the opportunities that you are looking for?</p>

<p>I was thinking about majoring in psychology (later go off to grad school). I liked the area of santa cruz MUCH more, it was very beautiful and green. However, I feel that I'd receive a better education at Pitzer. I really don't know.</p>

<p>Well, Pitzer was founded to do things like pscyh and philosophy. While Santa Cruz has the ocean, Pitzer is much closer to major metropolitan area (and not that far from the beach). It is easy to be a big fish at Pitzer.</p>

<p>speaking of UCSC and Pitzer, Im a junior in highschool and am looking at both.
(btw, i am also outofstate, NY actually )
im looking for a good liberal arts education but also have a strong interest in art/design. do either of these schools have good (studio) art/ design programs?</p>

<p>pitzer has a nice art program, though there is not much design to it. the whole campus is pretty artsy- a few galleries and a free-art policy.</p>

<p>this is REALLY killing me. idk where to go. I am also out of state, btw. the only thing holding me back from pitzer is the fact that two of my good friends are going.</p>

<p>who cares if your friends are going? you can still make your own path easily.</p>

<p>At Pitzer, you will have between 4 and 15 students in your classes. You can take some classes at the other colleges, but mainly you will be in a very small setting.</p>

<p>If you like seeing the same faces and hearing the same people talk in class everyday, Pitzer would be a good choice. If not, perhaps Santa Cruz makes sense. Santa Cruz would have larger, and some very very large classes. Professors would be less available outside of class. But the range of intellectual and social experiences would be much more diverse, and perhaps more stimulating. This is a tough choice!</p>

<p>Since Pitzer and UCSC will cost pretty much the same for you, here are the questions to focus on:
1. Do you want small classes at Pitzer, where you are one-on-one with top notch professors, or do you want large classes where, if you are lucky, you get face time with a TA?
2. Do you want stimulating in-class discussions at Pitzer, or do you want to just read the book, take notes, and take the test?
3. Do you want to live in dorms for four years at Pitzer, or do you want to live in an apartment at UCSC?
4. Do you want to graduate in four years from Pitzer, or do you want to spend six years a UCSC trying to get all of the classes for your major?
5. Do you want to sit in classes with some of the best students in the world, from Pomona, CMC, Scripps, Harvey Mudd, and Pitzer, or do you want to spend your college years at UCSC, which is a good school, but ranked far below the Claremont colleges.
6. Do you want to spend your time in the well-funded Claremont College system, or in the UC system, which is facing ever more budget cuts.</p>

<p>Note that many of my D's classmates went to UCSC, and she was disappointed to find they did not like most of their classes. Maybe it was because there classes were so large, maybe because UCSC is rigid regarding what you have to take to fullfill a major. My D loves her classes.</p>

<p>following up on the comments made by cyberprof, my daughter's friend is at UCSC and she is at Pitzer. they both have the same major, but the friend will not be able to do coursework in her major until her 3rd year, while my daughter has been taking classes in her area of interest from the very beginning.</p>

<p>That's an excellent point- I'm ending my sophomore year at Pitzer and I've completed 4/5 of my major reqs, including a few upper division classes, just because they're interesting to me and I can.</p>

<p>One more that may be important to you. Pitzer is literally 10 minutes from Ontario airport, so if you want to be able to get home fast and cheap (e.g., for a long weekend) you can do it. I am not sure how close UCSC is to an airport.</p>

<p>Eh, that depends on whether there are direct flights out of Ontario, which can sometimes be a problem.</p>

<p>so, where did you decide to go, and how is it working out?</p>