<p>Haha, I was once seriously considering going to another UC instead of Berkeley because of the “competition” and “intense workloads” that I had heard about Berkeley. It’s partially true; there are people who are highly motivated and work smart and hard, and there’s always the curve which you compare yourself against. But I haven’t experienced very much direct competition. Most people are happy to offer friendly help and will ask for help in return as well. When there is competition, it’s usually in the form of people refusing to cheat and give away free answers - I guess you could say there is a sense of fairness in the air.</p>
<p>Regarding the difficulty of the courses, it’s hard for a totally random person (me) to tell another random person (you) how hard school is. I don’t know what your expectations are, how experienced you are in your field of study, yadda yadda. If you want just to graduate, don’t worry. Do your work, have fun, be responsible and you’ll get that piece of paper in four years. But depending on the grad school and department you want to get into, obviously you need to have a good track record (breaking news! Grad schools want smart students). A top student at another school is likely to be a pretty good student at Cal as well (for example, I know a few community college transfers who are some of the smartest students), and Cal has the added benefit of well-known (in academic circles) professors who are going to be the ones signing your letters of rec. That carries serious weight.</p>
<p>So if you are a good student, you will do well wherever you go, so please pick a college that you have visited and like a lot. (BTW schools with “easier” grading often just make it harder to fail, but not too much easier to get great grades.) </p>
<p>Berkeley also has a lot of opportunities being a large school. This means that you have more research projects to pick from, more clubs, more selection for your breadth requirement and electives, you get the idea. But because of Berkeley’s size, you do need to go out and take advantage of what’s offered. No one’s going to sit down (except you, perhaps) and lay out your four years at Berkeley.</p>
<p>But it’s surprisingly not hard to reap the benefits of Berkeley. Want a research position? Write a professor a short email request. Would you like to join a club? Attend the general meetings or check out the club website for member requirements. You just gotta take that first step.</p>
<p>Luck aside, you reap what you sow. Going to another college isn’t going to change that much. Anyway, come to Cal for a year and see how you like it. Most people seem to think they’ll be OK for four years =)</p>