UC Berkeley vs. Caltech

<p>Hello, I'm trying to decide between attending Cal or Caltech, so I'd really like to know the pros and cons for each. Also, I'm interested in majoring in biology and as of now I would like to attend med school after my undergraduate years. However, the problem is that I'm not 100% sure I'd love to become a doctor, and if not, I might want to go into research. Also, I'm worried about gpa and not being able to handle Caltech's rigorous curriculum and all its core physics/math classes. Please give me some insight!</p>

<p>Read “Why Caltech is Different” <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/california-institute-technology/577759-why-caltech-different-open-letter.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/california-institute-technology/577759-why-caltech-different-open-letter.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I myself was deciding between Cal (with Regents scholarship) and Caltech.</p>

<p>Pro vs cons of going to Caltech vs. Cal</p>

<p>Pros (of Caltech):
Small size: You get to know pretty much everyone in your house and your grade. No 200-300 people lecture classes.
Houses: These are easily one of the best things about Caltech. It a built in family/support system and they’re really fun. At the dinners at the house I stayed at during PFW, you got to throw food at people!
Core: You get to learn a lot of science and math!
Tunnels: The tunnel system is really cool and has a lot of history! I got to see where Feynman lived for a month in the tunnel!
Pranks: You get to build random stuff/cause consternation @ MIT with financial and moral support from the administration!
Weather: SoCal is nearly always sunny!
Nerdy people: Caltech only has simultaneously really smart, funny, and scienc-y people. I really like being able to make a math joke and everyone around me understands instead of quizzically staring at me.
Interhouse: Approximately monthly awesome dance parties!
Research: Tons of research to do on campus especially with SURFs. If you want to do research, you easily can with almost any prof you want.</p>

<p>Cons:
Small size: This is sort of a fear of mine and I can’t speak from experience at Caltech but I come from a school that is ~half the size of Caltech 450 vs. 1000 at Caltech. You can be bored with people. Sometimes I want to go out and meet some new people but not really as possible at Caltech although mitigated somewhat because everyone will be more like you. At Cal, you could meet 2 new people everyday and never run out.
Core: Core is intimidating and scary especially as you want to be a bio major. This could be a big sticking point if you are really only interested in bio/pre-med and not science in general. 5 quarters of phyiscs and 5 quarters of math is a big deal compared to probably 2 semesters of each at Cal. Possible but painful.
Not pre-med friendly: Caltech is not really set up to be school for getting people into med school. Great for grad school/PhD’s but not med schools. Core/hard classes punish your GPA and not a lot of people doing pre-med things (like volunteering at hospitals although this is made up by the great research opportunities). </p>

<p>I think it boils down to whether you want to be a part of a small, quirky school and do lots of math and science or a big, more diverse school where not everyone will be doing math and science?</p>

<p>I myself decided that even though Caltech is is not as good as Cal for EECS, I would have a lot more fun being there hanging around my own people. </p>

<p>Also, definitely check out the Caltech class of 2015 Facebook group. We had someone ask a question about doing pre-med at Caltech and if you post your question there, you’ll get some responses from actual Techers!</p>

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<p>In terms of GPA and (hard) materials that may be not much useful for bio/premed students, the first two terms are P/F and not graded and thus they should not be as stressful as you may worry. The classes that may be challenging but not really a required learning for bio majors are, IMO, Ph/Ma 1c (E&M, Vector calculus) and Ph/Ma 2a (Quantum Mech, ODE), because I think Statistics and Application (Ma2b) and Thermodynamics/Stat Phys (Ph2b) are very important for bio/premed majors. </p>

<p>So, it just boils down to the two terms (1c and 2a) that are challenging for bio majors. If Cal requires two terms of Phys and Math that are graded competitively, then really the difference in course requirements between the two schools may not be that big for premeds. Being premed at other schools where the classes are graded from the first term/semester (like Cornell where you can easily do badly in the first semester or year unless you are careful), caltech and MIT are really at an advantage because they give you time to ease into college life. If caltech is different, it may be the student body that are truly into their learning (as opposed to Cal’s many students who are not that into academics) and the ample research opportunity with generous funding. Kids do go to Harvard med and other prestigious medschools from caltech premed course. I think if you will make to a top med school from Cal, you will have to stay focused and work really hard on academics and ECs and research; and with such a focus and effort, you can as easily be successful at caltech as premed making as good or better medschool. Just my opinion.</p>

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<p>As a Berkeley student, I agree with this. It is a huge atmosphere difference - a lot of people make it to Berkeley and are happy with that accomplishment, and don’t do much to exploit its resources. The resources at Berkeley are insanely terrific, but it’s up to the individual to take advantage of them. I think more is expected of the typical Caltech student, but there are of course the crazy insane people at Cal who you know are getting into MIT for grad school in hot fields like EECS from the start.</p>

<p>Premed is certainly not pleasant at Cal, from what I hear. It is very ultra-competitive, and you get placed in giant intro courses. I would wager Caltech is probably a notch harder on grading, but Cal’s premed grading is quite utterly brutal; lots of people already know the material, and the professor ensures that there’s quite a distribution of scores by writing an appropriate exam. A huge negative to Cal for premed is that giant lecture classes mean that one thing you could boost yourself with outside of acing classes, namely letters of recommendation, can be jeopardized. Even the upper level biology courses can be large, I think. Caltech might make up in a small way for crushing your GPA by giving you the chance to do quality research and put good padding on your application. I am, however, unaware whether or not this is useful, given med school applications are quite GPA-centric, it seems.</p>

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<p>I am going to say the same thought crossed my mind, but I have a point of skepticism. Caltech, as you said, requires classes that really are not required for biology majors, such as QM, etc. Are these all Pass/Fail, or is there a way you can take them as such? Even so, the GPA for med school that is taken most seriously may be in the standard premed requirements. Which could nullify the benefit of Caltech giving a Pass-or-Fail record. (Is it not true that sometimes medical schools will have to ask schools to release the records, if they are to consider the candidate?). Overall, it seems the standard at Caltech is to take 5 classes every quarter; correct me if I’m wrong. It seems like a fairly good student who wants to maximize his/her GPA would be jeopardized by having considerably more pressured a schedule (as opposed to at Cal, where you can be very careful about taking only as many classes as you really can manage, and putting all efforts into doing well at the premed requirements).</p>

<p>The OP mentions being worried about handling the science/math classes. This has me wonder if he/she is going to be one of those I mentioned, who struggles with those enough to hurt the rest of the coursework. After all, premed requirements are introductory courses, which are likely taken alongside the core curriculum.</p>

<p>Sure, Pass-or-Fail is good, but at Cal for instance, you can just avoid the course altogether, and it does probably take a significant enough drain to pass a class at Caltech in QM, even if the pass rate is very high <em>after</em> one puts in the effort.</p>

<p>Bottom line is, I think you should go to Caltech if you want what it offers, and what it offers is by far not the friendliest med-school track. It is a school for people who love math/science and stuff like that, and a school that is very successful getting a lot of people into PhD programs (although, it can also be hard on you to be alongside such a strong class - you have to be sure to stand out with your research interests).</p>

<p>Only the first two terms first year at Caltech are pass/fail. The rest of core is taken for a grade, including quantum mechanics.</p>

<p>I also agree that Caltech isn’t friendly for pre-med students. A pre-med student from Caltech would have a harder time getting into med school than a student from a school that was more “pre-med friendly.” Some other schools with more focused advising on pre-med are known for getting so many of its students into med schools. Caltech is WONDERFUL if you’re into science and math. You’ll have so many opportunities there to do research in those fields. It’s not impossible to do pre-med at Caltech (I’ve known several who have but they had a more difficult time getting into med school than friends from elsewhere) so if you work hard, you’ll be fine.</p>