UCLA vs. UC Davis Transfer

Transfer Students UC Transfers
1

WARNING: Lengthy description. I sincerely appreciate any insights you have. I want to give my full story so you can better understand.

I am a Cognitive Science major. I was honored to have been accepted to both UCLA and UC Davis. For Davis, I’m a regents scholar and also got into the honors program there. For UCLA, I did not get regents but am fairly confident I can get into the Honors program as I meet the GPA requirement.

ACADEMICS:
Academics wise, UCLA definitely is a lot better. My interests align significantly closer with UCLA versus UC Davis, which takes a more computational approach to the major (which is the specialty I would be going into). I’m not very interested in CS classes; more so psychology which is what UCLA emphasizes. By approximation, I’ll have to take about 15 classes for UCLA and 20 for UC Davis when I transfer for my major (this not including UCLA). In terms of the actual material, I know that I’ll enjoy LA more.

LOCATION:
Comfort wise, I love Davis. It’s a small town and it’s relaxed and low key. It’s also an hour away from home, which means I’d be able to come home every weekend (a massive plus). It feels much more welcoming to me.
Versus UCLA is more “vibrant,” different, and big. I’ve never lived in SoCal before, so the culture is very different there. Not to say this is a bad thing, but it’d be a transition for sure. I wouldn’t be able to come home every weekend. This CAN be a good thing because it’ll really force me to make friends and get out of my comfort zone. I like that, but it also scares me (I’m more on the neurotic side). My biggest fear is that I’ll feel trapped at LA.

COST:
This one is no contest. Davis is significantly cheaper, by thousands of dollars. While I am fortunate enough to be told that financial cost won’t be a huge burden in my decision, it still is a factor I have to consider. Simultaneously, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to even graduate in 2 years with Davis. It’ll definitely be tough for both schools, but even tougher for Davis I feel just because there’s more courses.

RANKING:
Cognitive Science, in general, is a new field. At UC Davis, it’s very very new. In terms of rankings, UCLA ranks high while I haven’t found reports on Davis (but this is because most people don’t even know what CogSci is). The department is much more developed at UCLA. Generally speaking, both are obviously world renowned institutions.

I also want to mention that UCLA has been my dream school for years. When I made the decision to go to CC before university, I did it with the specific intention of getting into UCLA. It was my #1 goal and I reached it. If you asked me four months ago where I’d go between LA and Davis, I’d choose UCLA. But now that it’s real, I’m scared. Scared I’m making a mistake. UCLA is a risk for me and Davis is the much safer option.

I think what this ultimately boils down to is should I take the risk, go out of my comfort zone, and go off to college for my dream school 6 hours away or stay closer to home and take it safer?

(If any of you read all of this, thank you so much. I really would love to hear any comments you have!!!)

2

If you need an extra summer session, semester, or year at Davis, will your scholarship be extended to help you cover those classes?

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@happymomof1 no, the scholarship only lasts for two years for when I was transfer as a junior

4

Are you using CogSci as a feeder into masters in Psych? If planning on graduate school, the decision could lean to Davis since it is cheaper and you would have a second chance to get away for grad school.

OTOH, 2 years goes really fast, I don’t think Socal is the risk you think it is. You like the academic plan better at UCLA, that is huge. It could be good to do something different, you have the rest of your life to choose where you live and settle.

5

@CADREAMIN my plan was to actually go into Stanford’s M.S. program for Symbolic Systems for grad school. I like the idea of going to Southern California for undergrad then coming back up to NorCal for Stanford

6

@CADREAMIN you seem to be basing a lot of your decision-process on grad school at Stanford. Now you might certainly get in, don’t get me wrong, but it is one heck of a selective university and the odds are not in your favor. So making the decision to go to So Cal mainly because it compliments your later Sanford location is not implementing the best criteria. Also, Symbolic Systems is heavily CS-geared and you say you don’t especially want to go to Davis because you don’t really care for CS. Hmmm, I think you need to think this through a bit. Keep in mind, Stanford will want to see CS. Your pro and con list heavily favors Davis. I would not use the location of Stanford as your determining factor.

7

Not gonna lie I just skimmed through your post really quick. But I had a similar decision, and I chose LA cuz I wantedd to stay in SoCal and I get to room w/ my best friend. Also, this may be a personal bias, but UCLA was always just my dream school. I couldn’t be happier with my decision. Honestly, the $7500 total that you get is pretty good, but it’s not THAT much in the long run, esp. for someone like me who didn’t receive any financial aid. It’s one of those things where it’s hard to articulate why, but something about UCLA just attracted me so much, and I couldn’t think of picking any UC over it. Also, department rankings for undergrad don’t matter for grad school, from what I’ve heard.

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@ohm888 I think you flagged the wrong person, I am not the OP. Just fyi. My grad school ship has sailed. :slight_smile:

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@CADREAMIN oops! @nick1234567892

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I’ve made the decision to officially declare at UCLA! It just made more sense for me and what I want out of my program. Perhaps Stanford’s SymSys program isn’t the best path after all. I need to do more research on it, and I understand it’s more computational based than regular CogSci. There are definitely CS based courses even within UCLA’s curriculum, and I’ll definitely be sure to the ones that best align with Stanford’s SymSys program.

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@nick1234567892 Check out Berkeley’s School of Information. I’m not sure how it aligns with CogSci but it seems to have a broad range of options, possibly similar to Stanford’s Symbolic Systems.

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@Ohm888 Thank you, I will definitely look into that! To be honest, I’m not sure what I want to do after university quite yet. I’m just going to go into it open to all new experiences and trust in the process.