UC Berkeley, Macalester, and Bryn Mawr for a Comparative Literature major!

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hello all!</p>

<p>Currently, I'm having a really hard time deciding between UC Berkeley, Macalester, and Bryn Mawr. I would also consider Reed College, one of my top choices, but I'm waitlisted there :(. I was born and raised in NorCal, so Berkeley would be a mere 1-2 hours away from home.</p>

<p>As of now, I'm almost certain about being a comparative literature major. However, I realize that I'm only 17 and I am probably going to have a severe shift in interests as I enter college... so while picking which school to go to, I want to make sure that they have an extremely strong literature program, while also being relative strong in other departments so that switching wouldn't be a problem. I also have my heart set on going to a TOP graduate school program (Berkeley, Yale, Brown, etc.), so I would definitely prefer to go to whichever school will increase my chances best. I've heard that Berkeley's graduate school rarely accepts students from its undergraduate college because of its poor quality, but I'm not exactly sure. </p>

<p>In terms of finances, Berkeley is the cheapest option for me, despite giving me absolutely no financial aid (although I'm currently a semi-finalist for several scholarships). Macalester is about $1,000 more, while Bryn Mawr is about $10,000 more. </p>

<p>After academics, the thing that matters to me most is the environment. I prefer non-competitive, intellectual environments, which I'm not sure Berkeley can provide (with its large classes, TAs, and whatnot). I visited Macalester last weekend, but to be honest, I didn't really like it. What I DID like, however, was how I was able to meet so many people from so many different backgrounds. As for the other two, I'm visiting both Bryn Mawr and Berkeley this following weekend, so I don't exactly know how much I'll like them yet.</p>

<p>Please give me input on the academic strength, environment, and other information about these schools! If you have any more questions, I'll be more than willing to answer.</p>

<p>Thanks so much; I really appreciate any help!</p>

2

<p>

Can you and your family comfortably afford the price difference without you taking on student loans?</p>

<p>

Berkeley’s undergraduate is NOT poor quality. Far from it, actually. I’m not sure about English and Comparative Literature, but some Berkeley departments do have policies discouraging Berkeley undergrads from going on to Berkeley grad programs. This is due to the university department wanting the student to have a variety of experiences with different perspectives…some call it “academic inbreeding”. </p>

<p>Bryn Mawr will likely provide more care and feeding. If you like a smaller, more nuturing environment, go for the liberal arts college. If you like a larger, more dynamic environment, go to Berkeley. If finances are a concern, go to Berkeley or Macalester.</p>

3

<p>@UCBCHemEGrad -
Thanks for your response!</p>

<p>If I were to go to a school more expensive than Cal/Macalester, I would definitely have to take out loans. However, I’m willing to write hundreds of scholarship essays to minimize Bryn Mawr’s cost if I feel at home there.</p>

<p>Also, thanks for clarifying about Berkeley’s grad program! Do you think Berkeley’s use of TAs is detrimental to the education the students receive, or are they typically well-informed? Do you think courses taken at Berkeley vs. a liberal arts college would be dramatically different? As for the students, do you feel like they’re really as cut-throat as they’re made out to be? I’m under the impression that only Haas students are.</p>

4

<p>

Again my experience is with chemical engineering and not so much with English. Yes, TAs do teach the small intro college writing courses. However, you can usually waive out of those classes with AP credit. In the larger classes, all the courses are taught by professors with TAs (or Graduate Student Instructors GSIs) leading the breakout discussion and recitation sections. This is how teaching happens in all large research universities, public and private. </p>

<p>The good thing is Berkeley’s English graduate program is top notch! So, when you do have to learn from a GSI at Berkeley, he or she will be one of the top young apprentices of their respective discipline.</p>

<p>

The respective lectures will be smaller at the liberal arts college. But courses where there is much discussion and interaction needed with the material, like poetry or something, will be quite small at Berkeley too. </p>

<p>

Meh…that’s sort of overblown. Yes, there are hard working, driven students…Comparative literature will be less competitive vs. molecular cell biology and Haas students. My roomate was an English major…he was always so relaxed and enjoyed his time at Berkeley with his girlfriend. ;)</p>

5

<p>Only you and your family can determine which of these are affordable, but here is a calculator that will help you organize the numbers as well as some non-financial information: <a href=“Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid”>Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid;

<p>I don’t know Macalester, but back when I was at BMC, I spent the summer in a program that included students from Berkeley, Stanford, Vassar, and a bunch of other places. The Berkeley students were just as smart as the rest, and possibly a bit more street-wise. Berkeley is a fine educational institution. If you decide to go there, you will not be making a “bad” choice.</p>

<p>Wishing you all the best!</p>

6

<p>My oldest daughter is a freshman at Berkeley. From what I can tell, she’s enjoying her classes large and small and does not find the atmosphere “cut-throat” at all. Her MV Calc class had 500 students, but she has also taken seminars with 20 students. If you want to meet lots of people from lots of different backgrounds, Berkeley won’t disappoint you.</p>

<p>On the other hand, Bryn Mawr (which we just visited with my 2012 daughter) has an impressive track record for sending graduates to PhD programs. </p>

<p>Good luck with your decision!</p>

7

<p>“I’ve heard that Berkeley’s graduate school rarely accepts students from its undergraduate college because of its poor quality, but I’m not exactly sure.”</p>

<p>LOL! You were misinformed. Though it’s true that many Berkeley comp lit undergrads go to graduate school elsewhere - not because they couldn’t get in, but because they wanted to continue their studies at a different university with a different set of professors. This is actually encouraged in academia - it promotes the exchange of ideas across universities and helps keep departments from experiencing a kind of intellectual stagnation. It’s also why brand new PhD grads leave the schools where they got their doctorates to pursue their careers elsewhere. </p>

<p>In terms of TAs - you will probably have the most TAs in the language classes you will be required to take as a comp lit student. In the English department, there are some big lecture hall type classes, where TAs lead the discussion sections, but it’s easier to avoid them altogether in the comp lit department. </p>

<p>It sounds like you didn;t like Macalester - so it could be between Bryn Mawr and Berkeley. And these are polar opposites - one is a small private all-womens LAC, the other a huge public known for its diversity. It’s really a choice between two extremes, and it could be hard to make. But either one will give you a fine education, it’s more a matter of fit. Bryn Mawr has a long tradition of quality, is set in an interesting part of the country, and should offer you the kind of intellectual atmosphere you want. Berkeley has all that too, but it may just demand from you a bit more assertiveness and maturity.</p>

8

<p>Berkeley is the best and cheapest option.</p>

9

<p>

</p>

<p>Is there a specific size cap for these smaller courses? How does the school determine which courses require more discussion/interaction, and do you know which courses are typically under this label?</p>

<p>Also, how small is small?</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Do you know exactly how I could avoid being taught by TAs/lecture hall type classes?</p>

<p>Again, thanks for everyone’s help!</p>

10

<p>You will not find a Comp Lit class at Berkeley with five hundred (500) students. Even Berkeley’s Comp Lit lower-division classes (i.e., classes geared towards freshmen and sophomores) run to about thirty (30) students. Once you get to upper division (junior/senior), even in required courses like Comp Lit 100, you will rarely find more than twenty (20) students in a class and none of your upper-division coursework will be taught by graduate students.</p>

<p>As for languages, you’d be best prepared for the major if you enter Berkeley with at least one at an advanced level. For example, Berkeley foreign language departments will generally consider four (4) years of a high school language class to be equivalent to 1 1/2 - 2 years (3-4 semesters) Berkeley-level coursework. The French department, for example, will let you sit for French 102 (and you may be weeded out and asked to take French 4, depending on your level of French) as your first course if you have a five (5) on the AP Literature test (this likely has changed now that they’ve stopped offering the test) and the Spanish department places you in Spanish 25 (the highest level lower division course and a prerequisite to upper-division literature courses) with a score of five (5) on the AP Spanish Literature exam.</p>

<p>For general requirements, avoiding TAs at the lower division level is going to be a challenge; avoiding lecture halls is much simpler. As far as Comp Lit prep goes, look for classes in departments like Comp Lit, Philosophy, the various language departments, or Rhetoric and you should be able to find lower division courses with fairly small enrollments. </p>

<p>I concentrated in French and Spanish and, with the exception of my Comp Lit 100 (limit was 30 and the professor was one of the really popular, trendy to say you’ve studied with kind of people) I rarely saw a class bigger than twenty (20) students. My section of Comp Lit 190 (Senior Seminar) had eight (8) students and French 126 (Senior Seminar) had four (4) students.</p>

<p>Again, things will be very different when you decide to fulfill some L&S requirement like American Cultures, quantitative reasoning, or something else where yes, you may very well run into a lecture hall of five hundred (500) people. You won’t find that it in Comp Lit.</p>

<p>To address your concern about post-BA placement, as one of the posters mentioned above Berkeley encourages its students to look elsewhere (I was encouraged to look at Yale, University of Toronto, and Oxford). You can get into the Comp Lit program at Berkeley but if you can get in there chances are, you can get in anywhere else as well so why spend your entire academic career amongst the same people?</p>

11

<p>@UCBAlum,
Thanks for your response! It was exactly what I was looking for. I visited Berkeley on CalDay, and the departmental advisor said the exact same thing about class sizes. Made me love Berkeley a LOT more.</p>

<p>

Is it inadvisable for me to start completely new languages, then?</p>

<p>

From your own experience and the people you know in the department, do you think it’s really feasible to go on to those universities (and other similar schools) after graduating from Berkeley? In other words, do the majority of the students aiming for graduate school tend to succeed in their graduate school applications?</p>

<p>Thanks for all your help! I’m pretty sure (and happy) about Cal now, although I’m waiting for a response to my appeal for financial aid from Bryn Mawr.</p>