UCLA from a disgruntled UCB student's perspective

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
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<p>So I was looking at posts from people who go to UCLA and I'll admit I'm getting a bit annoying and envious at how they are spending their money and their services.</p>

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<li><p>New football jerseys. This is seriously bugging me. We have people sitting in front of Sproul Hall every day and strikes and protests in hopes that we will not have to have that 81% fee hike. Then, in the same month of October, we find out that UCLA completely redesigned their football jerseys for a huge amount of money (only to be pulverized by USC 0-50 haha). Now I'm not saying other things (Such as that regents salary raise) aren't contributing to the fee hike, but something like this is money that could have gone into opening up more classes or whatever. Plus I feel like it's almost insulting to those students who really have trouble paying for University.</p></li>
<li><p>300mbps unregulated internet with no bandwidth limit at UCLA. How come Berkeley's only goes up to a little over 100+ mbps? (I heard we limit server streaming, but why?) I thought we had the fastest internet in the world? (According to some websites....)</p></li>
<li><p>Today Berkeley served salmon in the dining commons (apparently). I saw comments made by UCLA students that say things like "wait... salmon at cal is a big deal?" Well, most of the food in Berkeley is California grown and natural. Our salmon is farmed and sustainable to the environment. That being said if salmon isn't a "big deal" at UCLA, where is this money to pay for all this coming from? </p></li>
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<p>Don't get me wrong, I love Berkeley and I'm a Golden Bear at heart, but how is it that UCLA manages to get all the quirks as far as food and the other little luxuries go? I know I'm slightly envious of them, but even though I'm not one of those brave students who occupies overnight, I feel like it's kind of unfair that Berkeley students protest their hearts out to prevent that fee hike. Sure many of the comments on the youtube videos are like "Oh these kids should be in school" or whatever, but maybe because of the fee hike college may be too expensive for many students who can't afford the costs. It's not like we have a booming economy where everyone is swimming in money. Anyways these are my opinions and whether you agree with them or not I invite you to share yours.</p>

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<p>My younger cousin is a freshman at UCLA right now and I can tell you their internet is definitely not unregulated. It’s faster than Airbears for sure but she’s gotten warnings for netflix streaming.</p>

<p>As for the uniforms, that’s usually funded by the athletic department (or what’s left of it at UCLA) and private donors. Actually, I’m not even sure that UCLA football takes in that much revenue and their basketball team is underperforming right now… Either way, those all whites were a travesty and hopefully they never wear those again. As a lifelong USC fan though, I hope they continue getting blown out, haha.</p>

<p>I’d say the only perk UCLA has that I’d love Berkeley to have is a berkeley.edu address for life. Then again, with calmail still down, that’s kinda worthless as well…</p>

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<p>Wait, UCLA gets perma emails too?!</p>

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<p>Wow I just reread my first post and noticed some terrible grammar errors. Sorry I spent the whole day studying I’m kind of tired haha. I think Berkeley gives you the option of having a @cal.edu email instead or something once you graduate (and all the calmail is imported into that account). I wonder why we aren’t allowed to keep the email since your cal id is preserved as yours forever.</p>

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<p>your email is just a name…
and don’t get too hung up about athletics. people tend to group it together, but as silent hill says, the school/class sizes and athletics are different areas.</p>

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<p>I’m planning to be super-rich and invest in our football program just like Phil Knight got all Nike uniforms for Oregon Ducks wearing different uniform for each game.</p>

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<p>Bottom line: We are all dumb for picking Cal over UCLA. At least I definitely feel like it was the wrong decision…</p>

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<p>The football team is supposed to be an investment. It’s supposed to pump up alumni and solicit more donations from them. People constantly whine about how tax payers dollars shouldn’t be used this way and that way. But usually it’s not tax dollars, people just assume it is. </p>

<p>A good example of this is the CEO of the UCLA medical center. He makes about twice as much money as the CEO of any other medical center (and he’s the highest paid person in the university of california), and so people are ****ed off about that. But he’s a really quality guy (Stanford offered to double his salary from what i hear) And so they gave him a huge bonus, but it isn’t being funded through tax payer money, but is being subsidized through the hospital itself. Also, that hospital brings in 10s of millions of dollars into the campus, so it’s good to have a quality CEO, who’s brought costs down, and increased quality.</p>

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<p>idk anything about unregulated internet. Perhaps it’s faster, but we also have more students here i believe, so that isn’t too surprising (and the internet’s often down when too many people try to use it (like finals week!)</p>

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<p>UCLA is opening up an asian-themed dining hall (or they already did) which will serve stuff like sushi and authentic asian food. If memory serves, we have like the best dorm food in the country, so that isn’t too surprising. I don’t stay in the dorms, but i did have the dorm food once a few times and thought that it was pretty good.</p>

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<p>Money. Lots of Money. It comes through stuff like fees, but i think a large part of it is subsidized by the people who use it, and not the general campus. We’re opening up a new food court, and it’s being subsidized by all the people who spend money at our foodcourt (Ackerman Uniion) So i wouldn’t be surprised if that asian-themed dining hall was subsidized through the dorms themselves.</p>

<p>I love UCLA. But if there’s anything i’ve learned about it in my 1 and 1/3rd of a year here, it’s that UCLA is a money-grubbing institution. Some of the stuff is worth it though imo, like the Ashe center. We have the best student medical center (you can make an appointment in 20min and see your primary care provider! and it only costs like $20 per visit after you get insurance)</p>

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<p>yes, some of our donations for a given year (forgot which one) were used to give us permanent email addresses. I assumed that all the UCs had them. (Your post is a bit ambiguous, but i assume your ‘too’ means ‘in addition to all the other stuff they have’ as opposed to ‘as well as us’)</p>

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<p>Cal and UCLA are not really in the same universe when it comes to faculty and departmental/academic quality. So much of our “extra” fees goes into compensating a more talented professor corps.</p>

<p>As far as going to UCLA over Cal, some people do it, but they give up an edge in graduate admissions, career prospects generally, the prestige factor, etc.</p>

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<p>Bottom line: from an academic point of view, the only good thing about UCLA is Terence Tao.</p>

<p>If you prefer guaranteed mediocrity and a certain level of comfort over a chance at actually being successful, go to UCLA.</p>

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<p>LOL^ i posted this in another thread, but it would seem to be apt here as well</p>

<p>[Haters</a> gonna hate](<a href=“http://i.imgur.com/7NNmu.jpg"]Haters”>http://i.imgur.com/7NNmu.jpg)</p>

<p>UCLA has many top-tier distinguished faculty. Terrance Tao is a huge name, but there are many other distinguished professors on staff as well. Our philosophy department, of which i’m a major, is very distinguished. Historically much more than Berkeley’s.</p>

<p>I don’t think berkeley actually has that much of an edge on graduate admissions, or job prospects. (in fact the job prospect statement seems false due to the NYtimes MBA article) </p>

<p>Maybe Berkeley does better for business because of UCLA’s lack of an undergrad business school, but UCLA clearly has the advantage in terms of medical schools. Our medical school has the best heart transplant program in the country. And we have very high quality doctors on staff.</p>

<p>but hate all you like :)</p>

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<p>they give up an edge in graduate admissions</p>

<p>3.7 > 3.2
i doubt a grad admin seeing a 3.7 from la and 3.2 from cal will be like hmm well cal is harder, so they get a .5 gpa boost! I’m just saying.</p>

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<p>beyphy, as much as UCLA is a good school, Berkeley is simply just better. The salary indexes of both schools would even tell you that. So, please accept it when such topic emerges again in the future.</p>

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<p>Salary index (starting AND mid career . . . average AND top graduates). . . . student body strength . . . . research . . . </p>

<p>Community college transfer philosophy major? I’m sorry, I really can’t bring myself to take your opinion seriously. Does your people even know what empirical evidence is?</p>

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<p>Maybe, but i surely know what an ad hominem is :p</p>

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<p>Well, if you want to compare pay levels of graduates:
<a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm[/url]”>https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm&lt;/a&gt;
[UCLA</a> Career Center](<a href=“http://career.ucla.edu/Students/FirstDestinationSurvey.aspx]UCLA”>http://career.ucla.edu/Students/FirstDestinationSurvey.aspx)</p>

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<p>I’ll just verify all the statements:
UCLA has some of the best dorm food in the nation. Athletics generate cash and as far as I know have their own form of funding, so no one really cares. The dorm internet is INCREDIBLY fast. Like, download an album in a minute (though people get in trouble for downloading torrents and junk).</p>

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<p>Berkeley’s mid career salary is #11 in the nation - far higher than any other public school. It’s #3 in the country in terms of having grads at the helm of recently-IPO’d companies (Stanford #1, not unexpected given their startup culture). And in the most competitive grad school admissions - Johns Hopkins Med, Yale Law, Harvard Business, etc - Cal usually enrolls about 2-4X as many students as UCLA.</p>

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<p>^ we know cal is inherently better. the question is: why aren’t we treated like it compared to ucla?</p>

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<p>Crow, that’s a pretty good question. I’d have to say it’s mostly political, and the awful climate of Berkeley. It’s anti-progressive and anti-economic development. And the administration spends more resources on left wing political causes than UCLA does, while foregoing better resources and facilities for students. </p>

<p>If Berkeley wasn’t so damn intent on being about “counterculture” then it would be a much, much better place.</p>