I have a friend who is not sure about which would be the best option for him. He is accepted at UC Berkeley, UCLA, NYU, and Georgia Tech - all out of state colleges for him. He plans to Major in Math, particularly Applied Math. Can someone help make the choice? Mainly he wants some insight in comparing the academics at these schools.
Net price at each?
He is not much concerned about the cost. It is about 10-20k difference from lowest to highest cost. He wants to know academics wise and research opportunities/internship opportunities which would be better choice. Also is class size and professor access an issue at UCs?
UCLA has a fairly strong math department. Their faculty includes the man that’s arguably the world’s greatest living mathematician: Terrance Tao.
A recent group of students did very well in the Putnam competition and seem to really like the department:
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/ucla-s-student-math-team-is-3-246022
If I would rank them based on the strength and respectability of the mathematics program, it would go something like this:
Berkeley > NYU > UCLA >Georgia Tech.
Please take note, however, that these are all fantastic schools for maths, so you’ll be fine wherever you’ll end up at. That said, I think that Berkeley offers more opportunities for their maths students and graduates.
How highly advanced in math is he? In other words, what math courses will he be starting in?
If he will be starting in junior level math courses (i.e. has already completed multivariable calculus, linear algebra, and differential equations), then it is likely that the subarea strengths of each department will become more relevant to him while he is still an undergraduate – he will likely be taking graduate level courses and doing graduate level research as an undergraduate.
A look through the faculty rosters and course offerings at each school may hint at the available subarea strengths at each school’s math department.