I am a current high school senior and was accepted into several universities. I am currently choosing between three of these schools, each for different reasons.
UCLA is the highest ranked of the schools I’m considering. I was offered admission, which is a huge honor considering their markedly low admissions rate this year. I really like the campus and have met several student representatives, all of which impressed me. However, I doubt I would be able to maintain straight A’s considering the school’s rigor. While this doesn’t bother me in itself, I want to apply to a prestigious graduate school (such as Stanford) and pursue a medical career, so I’m worried that if I’m the middle of my class at UCLA I won’t be much of a consideration for these graduate programs.
I received an offer from UC Irvine saying that I am a recipient of their highest scholarship award, the Regents scholarship. I like UCI as well, although I prefer the environment at UCLA. However, I will have priority registration and a yearly award of $2500 dollars at UCI. Although money is not my biggest consideration, I like the idea of being one of a few scholarship recipients.
My local college is CSULB, which I could easily commute to. I was offered the Brotman scholarship, which is a full ride (tuition, room and board, and all) and contingent on my STEM major (Biology). When I spoke to representatives at CSULB, they said there are only 1-4 full ride scholarships awarded every year, which makes it particularly prestigious. I was also admitted to the University Honors Program, where I will have small class sizes and exclusive mentoring opportunities. The program has had students attend graduate schools such as the ones I am interested. However, I heard that there is no defined Pre-Medicine program, which is negative. I am very honored by the opportunity, but I have doubts about whether CSULB is right for me, as I have grown up around it and have never pictured myself attending. Despite this, the Honors Program offered me an appealing new perspective on the familiar school, and I am now seriously considering it.
I’m not sure which of these programs would be more appealing to graduate schools. If I was in the top 50% at UCLA, top 5-10% at UCI, or top 1% at CSULB, which would look better to graduate programs? And how much weight should I put on monetary offers versus the overall prestige of the school? These are only a few factors for my decision (I still have Bruin Day at UCLA and Celebrate UCI to attend) but I would appreciate any advice on the matter.
Thanks for taking the time to read this post, and I look forward to hearing your perspectives!
Our child also got a Regents at UCI last year and was accepted to UCLA without the scholarship. He chose UCLA without any hesitation (passed up other Regents too) and is doing great there grade-wise. I doubt UCI will be appreciably easier, but that’s a bit of a guess. I feel like your decision is whatever UC you choose vs the full-ride at CSULB. That’s kind of a unique opportunity. I think what I’m trying to say is don’t be afraid of UCLA - you’re obviously smart and should do well.
I also agree with @youcee , as my daughter also had somewhat similar situation 3 years ago (Regents in both UCLA and UCI as well as Full ride in LMU, among other choices). She had a difficult time deciding between those … with similar concern as yours. However, she braved out and enrolled in UCLA and I am happy to report to you that she is not regretting a bit, as she is gratuating this quarter with great results.
An older data point - A good friend of mine is a Doctor. He went to UC Santa Cruz and studied Biology. Accepted to Stanford med program. Now, this was years and years ago, but the reality wrt getting into med school is almost any ‘good’ degree from any UC and killer MCAT scores will get you into a great med school.
Medical school admission depends heavily on a high college GPA (probably at least 3.7) along with high MCAT score to make the first cut to admission reading (where essays, premed extracurriculars, etc. are considered).
Most premeds get weeded out early; of those who do apply, most get shut out. So consider choice of college and major that you would not mind graduating from if you do not go to medical school.
My opinion is that if money isn’t an issue, go to a UC rather than CSULB. Try to get away from the prestige of UCLA and being part of select group at UCI. Investigate what honors/regents at UCI really means from a practical standpoint (ex. do you get priority registration for classes in colleges other than Bio Sci?) On the flip side, being a bio major at UCLA is very competitive. Are you ready to be a small fish in a big pond?
@youcee@uclaparent9@SFBayRecruiter@ucbalumnus@lkg4answers Thank you so much for your advice! While I am still weighing this decision, I feel a lot better about my choices now. I admit that I made this forum when I was really unsure about my academic abilities, but thanks to your advice I am feeling much more confident and excited about my future. Thank you all for taking the time to thoughtfully answer my questions! I wish you all the best
I figured I’d update this now that I’ve made my decision. I’d like to thank everyone who commented for taking the time to help me. The college search was admittedly one of the hardest periods of my life, both because of the incredible offers I got and the ones I didn’t.
As the last part of this post demonstrates, I was suffering from pretty low self-esteem when I made it. While UCLA was one of my dream schools, I was also hoping for other top tier universities (e.g. Stanford, Harvard… those types). Even though I knew my chances were slim, I let myself get pretty hopeful after my initial offers came in. So, of course, I was devastated when each of these schools rejected me (save Cornell, where I was waitlisted).
The thing that was the most damaging, strangely, wasn’t that Stanford turned me down - I had prepared for that for some time - but that USC did. I didn’t really want to go to USC, but I wrongly assumed that I would be admitted there because I got into UCLA and Cal Berkeley. Even more, so many people I know who I thought were just as qualified as me were rejected from UCLA. This led me to believe that I had gotten lucky with the top-ranked publics, and that I was bound to be a C-student if I went to UCLA.
After talking to a lot of people at each of these schools, however, I realized that this didn’t have to be the case. While UCLA will likely be more difficult than CSULB, there’s no guarantee that I’ll be top of my class at one and not the other. The saying is true: it’s not where you go, it’s what you make of it.
It was really difficult to pass up the amazing offers I got, but I knew that I had to make the choice that would be best for me in the long run. As you can guess from all the hints in this update: yes, I will be joining UCLA’s class of 2022! I am truly excited to be going to a school that genuinely makes me happy and motivates me to be my best self. While I don’t know what the future holds for me, I have a feeling that it’s something great. Whatever challenges I may encounter, I at least know that I am following my dreams and doing what feels right. Thank you everyone for helping me reach this state. Even though this thread was the whole reason I joined CC, I’ll be sticking around to help other students achieve their dreams. Hopefully I can help someone the same way you all helped me
While UCLA and USC are generally seen as roughly similar in admission selectivity, they do look for different things, so it is not a given that you will have the same results at both. One of the more obvious differences is that UCLA emphasizes GPA more than test scores, while USC emphasizes test scores more than GPA (relative to each other), which can be seen from their frosh profiles (UCLA frosh have higher HS GPA, while USC frosh have higher test scores). So if you were GPA-heavy relative to test scores, your result is not surprising. But test-score-heavy applicants may be more likely to get into USC but have disappointing UC results.
