I was accepted to all four of these schools with fabulous financial aid packages. I will be studying Political Science and plan to pursue internships, so I know that GW is best in that respect. I also adore DC. However, it’s hard to turn down the prestige of USC, and Occidental’s both social and academic environments are very appealing to me. I visited Boston U, and didn’t love it as much as I expected, but am I missing something? Boston just didn’t seem to have any life. Also, I will NOT have a car. Obviously I can get around Boston and DC relatively easily at BU & GW, but will I have any chance of regularly seeing downtown LA if I attend one of the Cali schools?
Hi! I’m a first year at Oxy so maybe I can offer some help. Regarding getting into LA, Oxy runs its Bengal bus service to take students into various parts of LA. You could also take public transit or bike around northeast LA (one time I biked 10 miles to the museum district). That said, overall public transit in LA is worse than D.C. and Boston.
Oxy has an excellent political science and DWA program. It’s one of two schools with a UN Residency program, and has a semester where students participate in political campaign work. I didn’t apply to the other three schools, so I can’t provide a useful comparison, but you’ll definitely find a smaller community and more attention from professors at Oxy than GW, BU, and USC.
Downtown LA is very easy to get to from USC if you just take the metro. However, LA is a place where the cultural amenities are not concentrated and are rather dispersed throughout the county.