<p>I am a transfer student and I have been accepted to both schools (UCI and UCSD) as an electrical engineer. I plan to work with the government to design radars someday. I am planning to pursue a masters degree in electrical engineering and possibly a double or minor in computer science. Does it matter which campus I go to to get a B.S since I'm headed for grad school? Which campus can provide me with more opportunities and internships that relate to my career interest? Which campus would be easier for an electrical engineer? Should I base my decision off my preference of campus environment? In terms of environment, I kind of like UCI more since everything is close and compact instead of spread apart like UCSD's campus.</p>
<p>Where art thou, jas0n? <— should be able to answer your question sometime soon.</p>
<p>junshik, I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw your post. I sporadically check college confidential, so sorry for the delay =P.</p>
<p>Oxyjin: </p>
<p>To begin, radar design takes preparation in the areas of stochastic (random) processes, detection theory, communication theory, and, of course, programming to put it altogether. On a side note, my specialization is right up that alley :P.</p>
<p>The campus you attend should not matter for your B.S. at all, but I highly recommend you try to find internships in the defense industry. Luckily, both UCSD and UCI are adjacent to many companies that deal with radar technology, so you’re set there. This also means that all the defense companies hire equally from both UCSD and UCI heavily since defense is prevalent in Southern California. </p>
<p>In terms of which campus will come out easier, I am going to say the expected (mean) difficulty UCI might be easier. However, as you know there is always variance. I would highly suggest you choose a campus based off of your campus environment preference. </p>
<p>Now, on to more technical details. Undergraduate course selections in terms of radar communications is not particularly advantageous at both schools. However, the graduate level is completely different. You won’t really understand graduate level courses until you begin to apply, but I can point you to the professors that your field is interested in:</p>
<p>UCI: </p>
<p>The King of radar communications at UCI is Prof. Swindlehurst
<a href=“http://www.eng.uci.edu/users/lee-swindlehurst[/url]”>http://www.eng.uci.edu/users/lee-swindlehurst</a></p>
<p>He’s by far one of my all time favorite professors whom I would’ve chosen if I had gone to UCI for graduate school. He has a lot of industry experience and research experience in advanced radar/GPS for defense systems particularly. He will DEFINITELY give you plenty of opportunities for student projects.</p>
<p>The two people big in random processes are
[Animashree</a> Anandkumar<a href=“new%20professor%20who%20wasn’t%20there%20when%20I%20was”>/url</a>
[url=<a href=“http://odysseas.calit2.uci.edu/wiki/doku.php/public:markopoulou_home]Athina”>http://odysseas.calit2.uci.edu/wiki/doku.php/public:markopoulou_home]Athina</a> Markopoulou - Networking Group](<a href=“http://newport.eecs.uci.edu/anandkumar/]Animashree”>http://newport.eecs.uci.edu/anandkumar/)</p>
<p>The downfall here is both professors aren’t particularly interested in radar-like systems. But they are experienced enough to provide you with relevant opportunities for radar systems.</p>
<p>UCSD:
[The</a> Department of Electrical Engineering](<a href=“http://www.ece.ucsd.edu/~whodgkiss/]The”>http://www.ece.ucsd.edu/~whodgkiss/)</p>
<p>Hodgkiss may be a very interesting person to get to know because he works at Scripps Institution of Oceanography which may be an opportunity to get some experience. But yes, he’s more into the application for ocean acoustics.</p>
<p>There are definitely more at UCSD, but I couldn’t find any by quickly browsing the faculty list. There will definitely be someone in the signal processing area that has experience with radar communications . Keep in mind radar communications is a very classic topic that people don’t quite do research in anymore. However, there are always professors who are willing to advise you on an undergrad and graduate project in radar systems to land that job in industry. On a side note, Prof. Kung Yao at UCLA is especially known for radar communications in case you’re looking into graduate schools now. He isn’t extremely active in research since he’s old, but he can always get a project up and running. He’s a very nice person!</p>