I know you guys may have seen a lot of this kind of question but I think my situation is a bit different and I have specific worries.
So I was accepted into UCLA and offered an opportunity at Regents (didn’t get it though). I was also made an MAE scholar, meaning that sophomore year I will be guaranteed a research opportunity with $1000.
I was waitlisted at Berkeley and just recently got off the waitlist.
My top three criteria are:
Education: Berkeley’s high rank is very appealing to me, and people keep telling me I’d get a better education at Berk. I have heard, however that 1) it’s equally tough at each of them and 2) the professors at either college are about the same in quality and that they don’t really teach their undergrad classes that well.
Competition: I had pretty good grades in high school and am probably at the top of my class, but I am afraid I wouldn’t be up to par with Berkeley engineering students. I never did any research, internships or enrichment programs in high school, so I have very little experience in engineering, coding, building, etc. However, I did do Science Olympiad (got a few medals at regionals and states), and I was top of the class in AP Physics and Calculus. So I am very interested in science and engineering, but I fear I won’t be ready to face Berk engineering students.
Environment: I visited both campuses, and I liked UCLA’s environment much better. It seemed much happier and more inviting. I’m pretty sheltered and am worried I wouldn’t be able to survive at Berk. However, when I visited Berk’s campus, I might have just been forcing myself not to like it because I thought I wouldn’t get off the waitlist. I was also sick that day haha.
So what do you guys think? Should I go to Berk or UCLA?
Congrats! My bf faced the decision of going to either UCLA/UCSD or Cal for mechE (though in his case, all his friends and family live in the Bay Area, so it made the choice easier). UCLA and Cal are both going to have challenging engineering programs. I’m not certain there will be an appreciable difference in course difficulty, or in the fact that there will be high achievers in all of your classes (there will be more in your Berkeley classes, as the standards are higher to get in). If you fear you won’t be on par with Berkeley kids, you’re going to have the same fear at UCLA. This is normal.
I’m a Cal alum and cannot speak in depth about UCLA, but here are some things to consider: the semester system can be awesome. You will be taking a lot more tests on UCLA’s quarter system, and they come up on you faster. The drawback is that you go into much more depth/difficulty in your Berkeley classes, but if you are paying attention and doing the work, you won’t fall behind. If you were not paying attention and not doing the work, catchup is virtually impossible at the end of the semester depending on the difficulty of the course.
Berkeley has the #3 mechanical engineering program in the country! Have you looked into all the research they are doing?
To address your concerns about UCLA being inviting and Berkeley cold and unforgiving… I definitely did find Berkeley to be a place that is very individualistic, where everyone was responsible for doing well with little hand holding. But the awesome thing is that the College of Engineering has a TON of resources. Much more so than Letters and Sciences, they are there to help you succeed. The dean let one of my friends redo a whole semester where he bombed his classes.
If you are a quirky/weird intellectual, you will fit right in to the overall scene at Berkeley. This is a geeky place, which will either put you at ease or give you anxiety. I agree that the city of Berkeley is not awesome and full of homeless people and ghetto high school students, but it has some hecka good restaurants, and you are super close to awesome hiking all throughout the east bay and a zipcar away from the beauty of the north bay. Plus, its close to mass transit (BART), which takes you 10 minutes to downtown Oakland or Rockridge, and 20 minutes to everything in downtown SF. It’s really awesome to be able to use public transit to get places, which is a pain in the rear end in LA. I also personally prefer the character and differing landscapes of SF and its surrounding areas to LA. How about you?
Ultimately both are strong schools with a lot to offer. Visit both, discuss your fears and aspirations with students at both schools, spend time on both campuses and let your instincts guide you as to where you’ll feel better.
Oh and to address your concern about not doing coding, my boyfriend hadn’t done a lick of coding and was practically computer illiterate before he started taking CS classes, and he excelled in all of them. Don’t worry you will be starting at beginner level and learning everything you need to know.