Should I consider Irvine?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - GENERAL
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Ok, so this is prob a pointless and useless thread in many ways, just for my personal satisaction so I apologise in advance for that and hope you will comment only if you have a real point to make.
I’m an overseas US citizen, who grew up in Norcal, then left after elementary school- I’m coming back now for college. I’m a BME major, but might switch to another engineering or biochem-related major. Thinking of premed or working in biopharma companies.
I got accepted to both Davis and Irvine. I can’t visit either. I SIR’ed at Davis, ignoring Irvine for a variety of trivial reasons which I now regret. I’m quite happy with Davis and prob won’t change, but I would still like to know which one would have been the better fit for me.
Reasons why I ignored Irvine:
-supposedly lesser prestige academically and ranking-wise
-Irvine is boring (somebody called it a suburbian nightmare on CC)
-UCI is a commuter school

  • Larger population of Asians was a little off-putting
    -I hated the mascot.

Reasons why I’m reconsidering:

  • From what I can see, Davis and Irvine seem to be mostly equal, academically- in fact, Bio seems to be big at Irvine- at Davis too, but I get the feeling that they focus more on agri/vet stuff instead of human body/medicine stuff, and that is a bit off-putting. Also, Irvine seems to be ranked higher every year, and seems to be growing at a really fast pace, while Davis remains static. I just get the feeling that Irvine is better known than Davis now. Also, Obama came to speak at Irvine- that never seems to happen at Davis!
  • I’ve also heard Irvine is better for internships.
  • Music is imp to me, and Irvine seems to have a way better music scene than Davis. They also have good dance teams, something I’d like to try out in college.
  • I didn’t realise I would be giving up LA, SD, and Disneyland, and the beach!! I love the beach too.
  • I did grow up in Norcal, and perhaps it would be a better experience to go to Socal and see things differently. However, I don’t really have a “home” in Norcal anymore, but I do know some people. One of my friends is in the year above at UCD. Then again, I left when I was quite young, and haven;t really “experienced” Norcal. There are also some personal reasons why it would be better for me to stay in Norcal. I don’t have to, but its better if I do.
  • People at Irvine seem to be more geographically diverse (they get more applications than Davis) while people in Davis seem to be mostly Norcal people.
  • For the "commuter"school tag- Do people at Irvine go HOME for the weekends, or stay close by, outside the campus? Because at Davis, many people move off campus after the first year too. So why does UCI have this tag?
  • I’ve lived in cities most of my life, and don;t really know whether I would or would not like rural life. I LOVE the idea of a college town tho, but I’m a little scared that it may get really boring.
  • For some reason, Davis’ “Aggie” rep, cows on campus thing kind of irks me. But so does the anteater, so oh well.
    I’m not the kind of person who loves clubbing/partying or getting drunk or sports or greek life. I do want a full college experience though, with a vibrant campus life, and I want things to do. I’m the adventurous, outdoorsy, going for long drives type. Coupled with this is the fact that I will def have no car, for the first 2 years at least (prob throughout college), and will most likely be the stereotypical broke college student. I also love Davis’ biking culture,and the huge, green campus. I do, however, like UCI’s architecture.
    How often do students at Davis go to SF, Berkeley and Tahoe, and how convenient/inconvenient is it? Do they ever go to Socal on long weekends? I mean, if I do get bored, are their ways to get out of it?
    How is the music dept and symphony orchestra at Davis? Can somene tell me more about the dance teams at Davis?
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Also, does the fact that Davis is close to UCSF, Berkeley, Stanford, make a difference? For research positions, etc?
Also, do Davis students ever go to any beaches in Norcal?

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I also generally dislike quiet towns, where nothing ever happens.

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We have a medical school, so why wouldn’t we have human body/medicine stuff? What you “focus” on depends on your major and the electives you choose. Obviously if you major in an agricultural major or in animal biology, you’ll focus on those things. If you major in NPB (neurobiology, physiology, and behavior), you’ll have more human body type stuff. It just depends on what you want to do.

Where have you heard this? It’s not true, for what it’s worth; they’re pretty much equivalent as far as internships, unless you’re specifically looking for things close to that campus. In which case, obviously Davis is more connected if you want to go to the Bay Area, and obviously Irvine is more connected if you want to stay in SoCal. But just because you go to one school doesn’t mean you can’t intern or work elsewhere in the state.

All of those things can wait until either after college or until you’re on break to visit them. If you need your beach and Disney fix so often that you can’t wait a couple months between visiting, then yeah Davis wasn’t a very good choice. If you’re a broke college student though, how would you expect to afford going to Disneyland often enough where being close to it would matter?

Yes, a lot of people were from the Bay Area. But I had several SoCal friends (mostly LA) while I was there. Similarly, I don’t personally know anyone from the Bay Area who went to Irvine. Unless we’re talking about Berkeley or LA, I’d assume that people attending a given UC are more likely to be in the general geographic area of that campus.

Yes, this is true. But people move into Davis itself, and many apartment complexes are populated mostly by students. At both of the complexes I lived in after freshman year, I could take a 2-3 minute walk and casually wander into a friend’s apartment without any notice if I felt like it. That’s why it doesn’t get the commuter label: People actually live in the town instead of only going in for class.

I don’t know how Irvine is to know how much of a commuter school it actually is.

Davis is suburban, not rural. So this is a nonissue unless you meant “suburban life”. The university having research farmland isn’t the same as the community being rural.

As I’ve said many times before when this comes up: Davis being boring says more about you than about the town. Which is to say, Davis is only as boring as you let it be. If you expect the fun to come to you with no effort, yes you’ll be bored. If you go and explore the area and make arrangements with your friends, you won’t be.

In case you’re not aware of the history of our athletic name, it’s because UCD was originally founded as the agricultural school for Berkeley. We still have our agricultural roots, but we’ve expanded far beyond them since then to where the agricultural stuff really isn’t noticeable unless you’re in the more agricultural areas of campus. South campus by Tercero is where you find the animal facilities, if that’s your concern.

If you don’t like cows, stay away from Tercero. The Dairy is right across the street from there. If you live in any other area, you’ll only see (and smell, and hear) the cows if you actively go in that area.

Well one nice thing about Davis (depending on your view) is that the architecture around campus is such a hodgepodge of different styles that you’re bound to like the look of at least a few buildings. It’s not exactly renowned for having a consistent architectural style though, if that’s what you’re looking for. Frankly as someone who only notices architecture when she doesn’t like it, I didn’t pay much attention to the architecture at Davis at all. Except the Death Star, which everyone agrees is just bizarre.

Me personally? Never, I never had a car and neither did any of my friends. We also found plenty to do in the surrounding area to not need to go to any of those places. None of those are particularly hard to get to if you or at least one of your friends has a car. You could swing SF and/or Berkeley with either the Berkeley-Davis shuttle and transferring to BART, or by taking Amtrak if you really wanted to. For Tahoe you’d pretty much need access to a car, or someone with a car. I don’t know of other ways to get there, but I’ve never been super outdoorsy and never looked into it.

I’ve only ever heard of people actually from SoCal going back to SoCal for long weekends. Why would we when it’s a hassle to get down there? You do realize you’re talking about at least a 7-8 hour drive to get any major destination in SoCal, right, and that airfare gets expensive very quickly for just a weekend? Why is this important for Davis? If going to SoCal is a concern for people, I’d imagine they would have picked a school down there.

If you want to get out of Davis without a car, Sacramento is close and accessible by bus (though not particularly conveniently, if you can avoid it). There’s also the Berkeley-Davis shuttle and Amtrak, both of which can connect to BART. If none of those are appealing, you can only get as far as your bike can take you.

If you’re getting a research position, why wouldn’t you get it at Davis? I don’t see how being close to any of those makes any kind of difference. And yes, you can find research at Davis very easily if you take the time to look and ask around.

I never did, but I don’t particularly like the beach. In a campus of over 20,000 students, I’m sure at least some do.

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Internships: I heard about that because Irvine is a city, with more tech companies in general, while Davis probably has none.
Aggie rep: Actually, I was planning to live in Tercero for the first year (for other reasons, not cows) I thought the cows had been moved, or something?
At any rate, thank you for your comment. As of now, I think I’m going to be quite happy at Davis.
“At both of the complexes I lived in after freshman year, I could take a 2-3 minute walk and casually wander into a friend’s apartment without any notice if I felt like it.”
This is something I absolutely love about Davis!! Can’t wait to experience it.
I know I can get research positions at Davis, I was simply asking if it is POSSIBLE to get positions elsewhere if I tried.
Also, do people ever take summer classes at Berkeley?
“We also found plenty to do in the surrounding area to not need to go to any of those places.” Just curious, what kind of things did you guys do?

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Regarding internships, that’s true if you’re looking specifically in the town/city the campus is in. But remember that you can (and most do!) go outside of the town for internships. Most people who interned at Davis went to the Bay Area for their internships, and some went to other places near Sacramento. I mean, I went to Davis and wound up getting a position in San Jose.

I heard about the cows moving a few times while I was at Davis, and whenever I’d check after hearing that I’d still see them there. I actually wasn’t near the Dairy much at all my last year (just graduated), so they very well could have actually been moved fairly recently.

To whether you could get positions at other campuses, I’m not sure. I don’t personally know anyone that tried.

Yeah, I’ve heard of people taking summer classes at other UCs, including Berkeley.

Me and my core friend group were a happy little band of nerdy introverts, so a lot of our stuff involved things like movies and gaming. To that end, there are quite a few gaming groups around town that hold open meetings if you’re into that. Davis Urban Gaming Group (I believe it’s now called Davis Nerf Club) is a popular one. There’s also DRAGON if you’re into card, board, and roleplaying games. And an active Smash Bros club if you’re into that. Basically, if you’re into gaming of any kind you’ll be able to find a group to game with.

I also happened to know a few guys that lived in the same apartment within my complex and were active in various gaming clubs. A lot of times we’d go over there just to hang out and game, and there’d be people from various clubs showing up too.

Movies-wise, there’s an on-campus cinema held in the bigger lecture halls that tends to show at least one newer movie each quarter. It’s only a few bucks for entry (don’t remember the exact price off the top of my head).

If you’re into sports but don’t play competitively, intramural sports are very active and welcoming to players of all skill levels.

One of my favorite “hidden gems”, so to speak, is Birdstrike Theatre. They’re the campus improv group, and their shows are always hilarious but not always very well-advertised. Usually they do shows every other Friday, and it was $1 to get in but I don’t know if it will stay that way. On top of that, they usually do a big show each quarter that lasts a bit longer and has a bigger cast.

Kind of out of left field for me personally, I wound up on a kayaking trip in Sacramento my second weekend at Davis. It quickly became a water fight when it turned out people brought water guns. I never wound up doing that again, but it was a ton of fun.

There’s pretty much a club or group for anything you can think of, if you look around. Of course I can’t vouch for how active all of them are, but even if they’re inactive it’s fairly easy to either start a group up or try to revive it.

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“Kind of out of left field for me personally, I wound up on a kayaking trip in Sacramento my second weekend at Davis. It quickly became a water fight when it turned out people brought water guns. I never wound up doing that again, but it was a ton of fun.”
You know, I’m going thru some trouble financially right now, and my parents are telling me to seriously consider CC, and I’m trying to convince myself it’s a great idea, but then I read stuff like this, and it hurts me that I’m going to miss all this fun :frowning:
I shalt not forgive you for mentioning it:P But thanks anyway!

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How active strong is the symphony orchestra/ acapella groups, dance teams?? I’m a musical sort of person. How is the music scene?

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I’m not involved in music or dance, so I don’t know.

I do know that the Band-Uh (our marching band) is active, but last I heard they’re restricting new members (first come first serve, I think) because they’ve been running out of instruments.