<p>Hey everyone,
So I'm a senior in HS and have been Accepted at UCLA, UC Berk, UNC, Tufts and Williams and Mary for next year.
I plan on majoring in something business related...
Assuming tuition doesn't matter, I think I have narrowed my decision down to UC Berkeley or Tufts.
I know they are very different schools but I am attracted at Berkeley for the great location, prestige, more possibilities in terms of business, etc. However, California is very far as I live in Switzerland, I hear Berkeley is extremely competitive and Haas is very hard to get into, and the dorms don't seem too great. Also, the school seems very big to me.
Tufts does not have a business program and is not as prestigious or well-known but it is smaller, has a better location for me as it is closer to home and I have family in Boston. Also, the community at tufts seems to be more enjoyable, international and to be more cooperative instead of cut-throat. If I were to go there, I would probably double major in IR and Econ with an entrepreneurial minor.
Finally a last factor is that, were I to transfer, Berkeley seems to be a better place to transfer from.
WHERE AM I GOING TO GO... I am completely torn between the two schools. </p>
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<p>To some extent, that depends on where you live. For undergraduate education, where I live (in the Northeastern USA) many informed people would consider Tufts a very prestigious choice. The two schools have very similar admission rates and average SAT scores. </p>
<p>Tufts has smaller average class sizes. International Relations is one of its most popular majors. </p>
<p>Berkeley. It would be a bigger change of environment for you. You’re obviously a smart student and I wouldn’t worry about academic rigor. About 50% get into Haas - so you have a decent chance. Berkeley economics is a nice back up if you don’t. </p>
<p>Have a look at the economics course enrollment sizes at Berkeley.
<a href=“http://schedule.berkeley.edu/srchsprg.html”>http://schedule.berkeley.edu/srchsprg.html</a></p>
<p>Examples:
Econ 1P Lecture (690 students)
Econ 2P Lecture (105 students)
Econ 100A Lecture (438 students)
Econ 100B Lecture (403 students)
Econ 101A Lecture (98 students)</p>
<p>The courses marked DIS (“discussion”) are much smaller (~25-30 students) but usually have shorter meeting times, and typically (if not always) are taught by grad students. These are the instructors who will be answering most of your questions and grading your work, not the famous/distinguished professors who make Berkeley so prestigious. Try finding the named discussion course instructors in the following faculty list:
<a href=“https://www.econ.berkeley.edu/faculty/list”>https://www.econ.berkeley.edu/faculty/list</a>
(the discussion class instructors are not on that list … because they aren’t faculty members)</p>
<p>Here’s the Tufts Spring 2014 course listing for Econ:
<a href=“Home | Department of Economics”>Home | Department of Economics;
Three courses (all of them lower division) have maximum enrollments greater than 100 students.
It appears that most of the instructors listed for the courses, even small lower division courses, are professors or lecturers who already hold PhDs (typically from top universities). Some of the “Recitation” classes, with instructors listed as “Staff”, may be taught by grad students. </p>
<p>I don’t understand why tk has always been cynical with Berkeley. </p>
<p>OP, Berkeley is not as bad as what tk has pictured out. BERKELEY is superior to Tufts. It is more prestigious as a whole. More employers and academic people trust it than Tufts. If you like BERKELEY, by all means go there. The Bay Area is an amazing place to live in.
Having a Tufts degree in Switzerland doesn’t mean anything special. On the other hand, having a Berkeley degree in Switzerland would wow people there as BERKELEY is prestigious and well respected world-wide. And, that’s what matters more for international students like you. </p>
<p>Thank you all for your answers, another thing I should make clear is that I will probably stay in the USA for work
(my father is american).</p>
<p>^^ I’m not cynical about Berkeley. Berkeley has many excellent graduate programs. At the undergraduate level, too, it is one of America’s best public universities. However, I also think that at the undergraduate level, quite a few alternatives are even better for many students (especially those who are not California residents). The reasons why I think that shouldn’t be too mysterious. I try to offer evidence for my opinions and cite sources, as I’ve done above. </p>
<p>The OP will have to decide which school is better for his own needs. I agree that Berkeley is indeed “more prestigious as a whole”. However, the kinds of professors who make Berkeley famous and prestigious do not necessarily engage very closely with undergraduates. That is likely to be all the more true in a high-demand major like economics. If this is not an issue for the OP, then there is a lot to like about Berkeley. There is a lot to like about Tufts, too, especially for a prospective IR major. </p>
<p>How can you make a blanket statement that Berkeley profs don’t closely engage with undergrads? </p>
<p>Public policy and international relations courses will be a lot smaller than economics courses. Class size is determined by the subject matter being taught. </p>
<p>^ The statements I’m making are more specific and guarded than statements like, “BERKELEY is superior to Tufts”. I’m not making a blanket statement that Berkeley professors never closely engage with undergrads. I’m saying that the kinds of professors who make Berkeley famous and prestigious do not necessarily engage very closely with undergraduates. Well, o.k. … you could make a similar statement about many selective colleges. But more specifically, since the OP is interested in economics, I cited the economics course listings (which are available with enrollment sizes and instructor names for both colleges). It appears that many of the faculty members shown in the Berkeley undergraduate course listings are teaching very large lecture classes. Nearly all of them, even. Tufts appears to make many more economics professors available to undergrads in smaller classes. </p>
<p>Maybe the OP does not care about that. Or, maybe the situation is different for IR classes. As I said above, large classes are more likely to be an issue in high-demand subjects. Berkeley does not seem to have an undergraduate IR major, so it’s a little hard for me to tell exactly what the OP might want to look at. Here are a few examples of Berkeley offerings that may be of interest (from the Spring 2014 listings):</p>
<p>INTERNATIONAL AND AREA STUDIES 45 P Lecture (221 students)
INTERNATIONAL AND AREA STUDIES 106 P 001 LEC (165 students)
POLITICAL SCIENCE 2 P 001 LEC Intro to Comparative Politics (248 students)
POLITICAL SCIENCE 123I P 001 LEC Special Topics in International Relations (52 students, taught by an Assistant Professor)
POLITICAL SCIENCE 124C P 001 LEC Ethics and Justice in Int Affairs (157 students)
POLITICAL SCIENCE 126A P 001 LEC International Political Economy (53 students, taught by a Professor)
POLITICAL SCIENCE 128 P 001 LEC Chinese Foreign Policy (43 students, taught by a Professor)</p>
<p>Here is a listing of Political Science / IR courses offered at Tufts in Spring, 2014:
<a href=“Page Not Found - ASE - TUFTS UNIVERSITY”>Page Not Found - ASE - TUFTS UNIVERSITY;
(enrollment numbers are not shown, but quite a few are described as “seminars”; nearly all are taught by Professors)</p>
<p>^ Uh huh…Tufts being private doesn’t reveal as much info publicly.</p>
<p>Plenty of assistant profs and part-time lecturers listed here at Tufts:
<a href=“Home | Department of Economics”>Home | Department of Economics;
<p>Compare to Berkeley’s econ faculty list:
<a href=“https://www.econ.berkeley.edu/faculty/list”>Faculty profiles | Department of Economics;
<p>Unfortunately, colleges are not consistent in how they expose course, enrollment size, and instructor information. Berkeley reveals a lot, but I’ve never found the same level of information for Michigan. Chicago and Princeton reveal a lot too, but many other private schools don’t. The Tufts economics department reveals a lot, but I’m not finding the same level of detail for its IR courses. </p>
<p>The issue I’m raising in comparing Tufts and Berkeley is not the number of full professors, assistant professors, or lecturers. My interest is in the number of professors (compared to grad students) who teach undergraduate classes small enough to interact closely with individual students (in classroom discussions, or in grading and commenting on assignments). After all, another poster made blanket statements that Berkeley is “superior” and “more prestigious”. What makes it more prestigious? It couldn’t be the caliber of students, because the two schools are equally selective. </p>
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<p>However, the main introductory economics course at Tufts (Ec 5) has capacity 450 in the lecture, with the 25 student recitations presumably led by graduate students. The small lower division economics courses are a specialized version (Ec 8, environmental economics) and two “business” courses.</p>
<p>Tufts’ intermediate micro and macro economics courses are divided into 35-39 student lectures by faculty, but they are much less mathematical than the Berkeley ones. Even the “more math” versions of the Tufts courses (Ec 16 and 18) have only calculus 1 as a prerequisite. The “less math” versions of the Berkeley courses (Economics 100A, 100B, 140) have calculus 2 as a prerequisite, and the “more math” versions (Economics 101A, 101B, 141) have multivariable calculus and linear algebra as a prerequisite.</p>
<p>Granted, this may not matter too much if the OP is looking at economics more from a “business” standpoint. But a student looking at possibly doing PhD study in economics would find the Berkeley economics courses to be much more suitable preparation.</p>
<p>(It does seem odd that relatively few economics departments offer math-heavy intermediate economics and econometrics courses, even at very selective universities and LACs, despite the fact that the faculty in economics departments have earned PhDs in economics which requires a strong appreciation and interest in math and its application to economics.)</p>
<p>tk, the problem is, whenever you post about Berkeley it’s always about Berkeley’s negative side. No school is perfect. Harvard has its own negative side, too. And, so is your alma mater school, Uof Chicago, which has a terrible placement at top bulge bracket firms which resulted to having a terrible placement at top grad business schools. For example, Berkeley has about 84 students at HBS, Wharton, Tuck and Columbia. If you’ll add Haas, Stanford GSB and MIT Sloan to that list, that number would perhaps double. Meanwhile, UofChicago has only 17 students at those top MBA programs. That’s quite dismal compared to Berkeley, yet you’re not complimenting Berkeley and instead, defend why U0fChicago has a dismal and pathetic representation at those prestigious business schools. </p>
<p>Berkeley has about 25k undergrad, we all know that. the OP knows that too. But I think he knows too that Berkeley has many more departments and courses than Tufts has. There isn’t a need for you to push it too hard to make it a big issue. There are so many good things that Berkeley offers and you’re not touching them in your posts other than those lines we already have said. Are you saying you won’t learn anything from Berkeley because it has 25k undergrad students, or you’ll learn more at Tufts because it has fewer undergrad students? If a Berkeley education is really suffering that badly due to it having 25k undergrads, then why did Berkeley beat Chicago at grad business school placement? Berkeley did not just beat Chicago in that area, Berkeley smashed Chicago to the ground, in terms of top grad b-school placement. </p>
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<p>That is not true at all. Even Nobel Prize winners teach undergrad at Berkeley. Here’s a proof.
<a href=“http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2006/smoot-photo.html”>http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2006/smoot-photo.html</a></p>
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<p>Well, I didn’t say Berkeley is more prestigious than Tufts because it has smarter students, though I’m inclined to believe that that it true. But rather, Berkeley is more prestigious because it has a more powerful alumni not just in America but in almost all parts of the globe. Berkeley also has better rating by faculty and top academicians, which resulted to a much higher rating at almost all ranking games/league tables.
The OP is an international student, from Switzerland. I have been to Switzerland myself, many, many times, and I know Tufts is unknown in that country whilst Berkeley is prestigious, lots of employers have heard about it there. </p>
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<p>I’m not a huge fan of league tables but I wouldn’t totally discount how they make impact to a lot of students, especially the international students/applicants. That said, I have not seen many rankings (or even one ranking) where Tufts was ranked higher than UC Berkeley. Remember that each league table has its own criteria. So, if no league table has published a ranking where Tufts has beaten Berkeley, then it would be safe to assume that Berkeley is superior to Tufts regardless of the variation of metrics used. </p>
<p>OP, if you haven’t been to UC Berkeley campus, here’s a video of it on youtube: </p>
<p><a href=“University of California, Berkeley Campus Tour - YouTube”>University of California, Berkeley Campus Tour - YouTube;
<p>On Berkeley girls: they’re not bad, lol. <a href=“Chi Omega Lip Dub - UC Berkeley [Get Yourself Back Home] - YouTube”>Chi Omega Lip Dub - UC Berkeley [Get Yourself Back Home] - YouTube;
<p>I’m afraid I’m too weak to resist the smell of the red herring introduced above about Chicago’s business school “placement”. It has nothing to do with this discussion, so excuse me for taking the bait. Skip the next paragraph if you don’t care about Chicago v. Berkeley biz school “placement”. </p>
<p>Berkeley has more than 5x as many undergraduates as Chicago, so Chicago’s placement rate into those business schools (adjusted for college size, for only the enrollment numbers cited above) is slightly higher than Berkeley’s. Not that colleges actually “place” students into graduate programs. Students choose to apply to them. So for this comparison to be meaningful you’d need to know not only how many Chicago v. Berkeley students are enrolled in those programs, but also how many Chicago v. Berkeley students applied to those programs in the first place. It would be helpful to know their average credentials, too (since it may be the case that many top students at one school apply to MBA programs, while more top students at the other school apply to PhD programs). Maybe a smaller percentage of Chicago undergrads even want MBAs. Of those who do, perhaps a higher percentage are applying to Chicago’s own MBA program (#1 ranked by Bloomberg) than to any of the programs listed above.</p>
<p>I don’t know if any good data exists that would support a meaningful comparison between Berkeley and TUFTS for graduate school admissions. A few years back, the Wall Street Journal did a study of “feeder” rates for a collection of elite business, law, and medical schools. The study has been heavily criticized on CC for its methodology (the limited number of target schools chosen, the fact that it was not repeated for more than one applicant cohort). It did adjust for college class size (but apparently not for application numbers). It ranked Berkeley 41st, Tufts 45th. I’m not aware that a better, more up-to-date assessment exists.
<a href=“http://inpathways.net/ipcnlibrary/ViewBiblio.aspx?aid=1577”>InPathWays - Discover latest hot new trending topic, insights, analysis;
<p>As for the “proof” that top professors teach undergrads at Berkeley, I’m not surprised that one can find examples. Evidently at some point George F. Smoot taught the Physics 7B course (Physics for Scientists and Engineers). This is a lecture class that in the current term (Spring 2014) enrolls over 200 students. According to the Spring 2014 listings, Professor Smoot does not currently teach a single course. For Fall 2014, he is slated to teach one course, a 299 (graduate) course entitled “Research”. So the case of Professor Smoot kinda illustrates my point. Maybe there is an example of an equally distinguished economics or IR professor who sometimes teaches classes of fewer than 50 undergrads at Berkeley?</p>
<p>ucbalumnus makes good points about the mathematical content of economics courses. This (like class sizes) may or may not be important to the OP.</p>
<p>tk, I used your alma mater school, UofChicago, as an example of the many private schools you’re in a habit of protecting or covering (their many weaknesses) whilst you’re degrading what supposedly is a world-class school, UC Berkeley.
UofChicago, like UC Berkeley, is a truly world-class school. But like Berkeley, it has flaws. Many, many flaws. So, whilst you find pleasure in deriding Berkeley for having 25k undergrad students, you should find any criticism about UofChicago for having a pathetic low placement at top grad business schools equally satisfying. </p>
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I guess you need to understand the numbers more before posting a fatuous statement. Adjusting to class size in order to get a better picture of which school has got a better placement to the best MBA programs is absurd and inapplicable in this case. </p>
<p>Let’s take Tuck for example. Tuck’s intake is only about 250. </p>
<p>Berkeley has 480,000 living alumni. That’s, perhaps, the number of people with age that ranges from 22 to 70. </p>
<p>Let’s say 65% of those alumni are in the 22 to 40 age bracket, then we’re talking about 312,000 Berkeley alumni that are eligible to apply to Tuck. </p>
<p>Now, here’s why your logic does not work. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>Tuck (and such top MBA program) does not accept all students coming from one undergrad school. It never happened before. It is, therefore, statistically improbable that it will happen soon. </p></li>
<li><p>Tuck reserves slots for their own grads, and grads from the other Ivies, and other top schools, to maintain a good balance of student body. That is on Tuck’s (or on every top b-school’s) policies. </p></li>
<li><p>There aren’t 312k Berkeley grads who apply to Tuck. In fact, Tuck does not receive more than 6k applicants per year. Yet your logic suggests that in order to get a better picture of which school has got better placement success rate at those top MBA programs, we must based it on 312k Berkeley alumni rather than potential applicants and school name strength.</p></li>
<li><p>Berkeley alumni are diverse. Yes, a lot of them would want to have MBAs. But I am certain that a lot of them would want to be doctors, lawyers, specialist engineers, medical researchers, or careers in international relations, academe, arts, media or movie industry. </p></li>
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Why wouldn’t they want an MBA from a top b-school when many grads from their so-called peer schools want? How is Chicago’s student body any different from say, Columbia’s or Duke’s, in terms of having students/grads who want a career in banking or finance or consulting, when in fact, they say, Chicago’s forte is economics, a program often used as a stepping stone to land a career in banking of grads from other top schools??? Unless a lot of Chicago grads don’t have the basic requirements to apply to top b-schools, in the first place, many of them wouldn’t apply, and, therefore, you wouldn’t see many of them there, like what the numbers show now. </p>
<p>Let’s take a look at Stanford MBA. <a href=“http://poetsandquants.com/2012/05/30/top-feeder-colleges-to-stanford-b-school/2/”>http://poetsandquants.com/2012/05/30/top-feeder-colleges-to-stanford-b-school/2/</a>
Whilst it is estimated that Berkeley has 10, Chicago probably has 2 or hasn’t any, as the list suggest. That is very, very alarming.
At HBS, Chicago didn’t perform as well. There, Berkeley has 23. Chicago hasn’t even made it to the top 20, suggesting there must be fewer than 9 from Chicago, if there’s any at all.
<a href=“http://poetsandquants.com/2011/08/15/top-feeder-colleges-to-harvard-business-school/2/”>http://poetsandquants.com/2011/08/15/top-feeder-colleges-to-harvard-business-school/2/</a></p>