<p>My daughter was just admitted to UCB (we live in New York). Does anybody have any current info on quality of teaching at the school? Has there been a serious decline with all the budget cuts?</p>
<p>As the flagship (together with UCLA) of the California University system, I do not believe that there has been any decline in the quality of the faculty and the classes. The university draws the very best people in all the fields that are important to its mission.</p>
<p>My sense is that the California funding issues are not unique to California. They are just more visible because of the size of the state and because of the very vocal students/electorate. The effect of the cuts is most severe on the State University system (not the UCs) and the Community Colleges. UCBerkeley and UCLA have an “extra” pool of funds.</p>
<p>Longer term I would expect that tuition costs will rise, and the the mission of the State Universities and CCs will become more focused. I seriously doubt that (despite all the talk in the media) that UC Berkeley and UCLA will lose their appeal and academic competitiveness.</p>
<p>Congratulations on your D’s acceptance to UC Berkeley.</p>
<p>Flagship or not the UCs are under tremendous financial pressure and at Berkeley with the exception of the Haas business school all other departments are struggling with cut-backs. Keep in mind that Berkeley is primarily a research institute. While there might be really good teachers and instructors, the classes are large and depend on GSIs for instruction. That being said, your daughter no doubt must be very qualified to get in OOS (only 10% get in). If she is independent and can cope with uneven teaching quality the overall Berkeley experience ( Bay Area, great research school, really smart peer kids) will be well worth while. If teaching is the main priority, my suspicion is that your daughter will be better off at private schools given that you will be paying OO fees. It also matters what major she plans to be in. In any case if you can afford it, visit the school - in the end the kid is going to have to feel comfortable with the school environment.</p>
<p>BTW a great resource to judge teaching quality is to check out the Berkeley web-casts.
[UC</a> Berkeley Webcasts | Video and Podcasts: Spring 2010 Courses](<a href=“Webcast and Legacy Course Capture | Research, Teaching, and Learning”>Webcast and Legacy Course Capture | Research, Teaching, and Learning)
Unlike other schools ( MIT, Yale), Berkeley does not try and put only their best teachers online. Their web-casts are also an indication that some freshman classes are really large.</p>
<p>Thank you so much. You are all very generous. We were very happy when the notification that she was accepted to UCB. But like all these sorts of things, once the dust settles, you start thinking about the many facets that go into making the decision. In the finally analysis, it’s at best an educated guess as to which institution is most suitable to any given person. In a time of uncertainty such as this one, it’s even more difficult because the past doesn’t predict the future. We are still waiting to hear from USC (cinema studies). If she gets accepted there, she will probably go there. Film production is really her passion and UCB has more of a critical film studies program for undergraduate.</p>