I love San Diego, but I also lived in Isla Vista (the college community right next to UCSB) for 3 years while attending SBCC (I’m an OC native).
I believe UCSB actually beat out UCSD in terms of general school rankings this past year, but UCSB is generally regarded as a party school whereas UCSD is not. Some people are wary of that party school reputation, others are not. That being said, UCSB is great school. I actually hate the architecture of the campus and think it’s utterly hideous but you literally. cannot. beat. the. location. It is ON THE OCEAN with its own lagoon for Christs sake (though the lagoon can occasionally have its own interesting smell).
I don’t know firsthand about the differences between internship opportunities between the two places. If you’re considering communications, then I would say UCSB. UCSB has the 3rd ranked comm department in the nation if I’m not mistaken (it’s actually the major I was accepted as). If you were set on engineering, again, UCSB. UCSB doesn’t have a business major and I don’t think that UCSD does either. UCSB does, however, have a FANTASTIC and extremely, extremely difficult accounting major.
Warning though, I have seen so so so so so many people sucked into the party atmosphere of Isla Vista. IV has a way of taking certain people in, chewing them up, and spitting them out if you’re not careful. Parties are ample, the downtown scene is great, and I’ve seen a lot of people get lost in the party that school is put on the back burner. A girl I went to high school with asked me what it was like up there when she was a senior making her decision on where to go and I gave her this same warning. She assured me up and down, left and right that she had no intention of partying whatsoever (she wasn’t a party type in high school to begin with). Well, almost two years later I see her snapchat stories and she parties quite a bit. Which is not necessarily a bad thing, as long as you know how to prioritize.
Again, I love San Diego and I’m not trying to convince you one way or another, just giving some insight into what UCSB is like. I’m not even going to UCSB myself (though I got in), I’m going to UCLA in the fall. My guess is that being able to transfer into UCSD’s engineering program is slim to none. For myself, I would’ve gone to UCSD over UCSB but ONLY because I already lived in Santa Barbara for 3 years and felt like it was time for a new experience. Had I not lived there, and had I not gotten into UCLA, I probably would’ve picked UCSB over UCSD.
Had you gotten into both engineering programs, I probably would’ve said go to UCSD but if you’re not passionate about biochem and truly want to study engineering then UCSB is a great choice. Long ass post, so I hope this helped.