<p>Right now, I'm curious about both San Francisco state and San Jose state. I've always been hesitant to start my education at anything other than a community college (because I'm * very * worried about money related issues), but I would spend a bit of extra cash to go to a state school for the college experience.</p>
<p>Though I'm obviously invested in the education, the number one thing I'm looking for is a good opportunity to make friends. When I say that I want the college experience, I don't care about parties or fraternities (in fact, I would probably avoid all that stuff). I'm really just speaking about the opportunity to meet nice people and make lasting friendships. All throughout high school I attended independent studies, so I'm very used to learning things on my own. If I took one or two classes at my regular high school and they were poor quality, I would just do what I always did and study by myself. When I * do * go to college, what I'm looking for is an environment where I can actually meet people and make friends for the first time in my life. </p>
<p>I've never been to San Jose (I think), but I've visited San Francisco several times. I like that the city is extremely liberal and open minded towards the LGBT community and people of different races/backgrounds, but for some reason, the cloudy/chilly weather always makes me feel a bit down. I'm not sure I like the idea of living somewhere where it's cold and cloudy most days. I get cold easily, and I love the sunlight. 90% of the time I've visited San Francisco, it's always been very overcast. However, I've heard some bad things about San Jose - mainly that there's an uneven male-to-female ratio in the city, and there is a very large number of the techy, scientific, usually Asian entrepreneurial silicon-valley community living there (my uncle is a part of that community, as he lives near San Jose, and I've never been attracted to it - I'd take an artsy city any day over an entrepreneurial tech-based city, thank you very much). I also heard that San Jose can be a little boring, because the downtown district is far smaller than San Francisco and it's pretty much "endless suburbs". Though I've never been a fan of concrete jungles, I feel like a total suburb could become a bit bland. I know most of these things are probably just rumors though. </p>
<p>So, in your own experience, how do these schools rank up against each other in terms of </p>
<ul>
<li>things to do around the city/nightlife/community activities </li>
<li>scenery and weather</li>
<li>the number of young people living there</li>
<li>how open-minded/diverse people are<br></li>
</ul>
<p>Thanks for any tips. Like I said above, the education is an important part of what I'm looking for (even though I know none of these schools are "bad"), but the social opportunities are what matter most to me. </p>