Hi guys,
I’ve gotten accepted into both UCLA and CSULB and am extremely conflicted on which school to go to. I am currently planning to major in English, but since I have no idea what career path I want to enter, there’s a chance that I might change my major… (I’m not sure what I’d change it to yet, so that makes this an even harder decision.) I also might decide to go to graduate school.
For CSULB, I was blessed to receive the presidential scholarship that provides me a completely full ride, along with “priority registration, small classes, faculty mentors, internship support, summer research assistantships, and opportunities for international educational travel and local civic engagement.” I would also have to do a research project/honors thesis for my senior year. Out of hundreds of applications, only 30 people are chosen for this per year, so it’s a pretty big deal.
On the other hand, my estimated cost of attending UCLA is projected to be about $8.8k per year. After talking to my counselor and considering the fact that the costs are overestimated and include some variables, we took that number down to about $4.3k per year. For an education at UCLA, that is a pretty cheap price. Many of my teachers have also told me that UCLA would offer me more opportunities since it’s located in Los Angeles and is such a big school.
Where do you guys think is the best place to go? These are both extremely good options. Money is an issue for my family, but I do still want to consider opportunities, the social life, and my future with this degree in finding a job/attending grad school. Would it be worth it in the long run to turn down this amazing scholarship for a relatively low price in attending UCLA? Or is it a better decision to accept this free opportunity at LB? I would love to hear anybody’s input, especially if they’ve attended UCLA or have received the Presidential Scholarship for CSULB!
If cost is a huge factor then go with CSULB.
And priority registration is pretty neat since classes are somewhat hard to get at UCLA cause its so big.
Thought you would get more responses when I saw this a few days ago…I think the key to your decision is to really focus on what you want to get out of college. Being an English major is not exactly a vocational choice (usually), and on top of that, you say you’re not sure you won’t change majors, and then you say you are interested in graduate school. Typically you have to get more and more specialized the farther you go, so thinking about graduate school tends to imply that you have an idea of where you want to end up. So this sounds a bit contradictory. On top of that, you didn’t mention which school you actually liked better–assuming you have had the opportunity to visit both.
So I would say really think about where you want to end up–even if it’s something general. Could you make a statement, for example, like any of the following? “I want to work with children” or “I really want to be financially well-off” or “I want to be a professional of some sort” or “I could see myself as a professor.” These could help others give you advice.
I’ll give you a couple of general impressions on your situation. I don’t have any direct experience with CSULB, but I think the UCLA experience will be more academically rigorous. There are many very good departments at UCLA, if you decide to change majors. I think you’ll be around a set of more motivated and higher-achieving students at UCLA. And if your financial math is correct, I think the difference in cost will end up not being a very big deal (you’re making sure to distinguish between grants that don’t have to be paid back and loans that have to be paid back, right?). So at the risk of being unfair to CSULB (out of my ignorance), I think UCLA is the better choice.
I think I was a bit reluctant at first to explain my career path because I’m not sure if I’m set on it, but my current plan is to get my bachelor’s in English at either LB or LA, go to UCI for the 14 month Masters of Arts in Teaching+Single Subject credential program, and teach at a high school/middle school. After a few years, I hope to move on to school administration as an assistant principal of a school or work at the district level. Again, I’m not sure about this, which is why I didn’t explain it in the original post, but for the sake of this question, let’s assume that I’m going toward this path!
I think for teaching in general, LB might be the better choice since it’s cheaper, but since I plan to move up to school administration, would UCLA be a worthwhile investment?
If that’s your career goal, then I think Long Beach will be fine. I don’t think credential programs really care about the “prestige” of your undergrad career. And in terms of school administration, it’s more about your experience than where you went to school. But if you want to rise up, you probably eventually want to consider doing an Ed.D.