<p>I often encounter threads where people are discouring aspirants to go to Berkeley? What's wrong with Berkeley or these people? I think Berkeley a great school.</p>
<p>Like who? </p>
<p>(blah blah too short a message)</p>
<p>It's everywhere in this message board. Example:
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=237068%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=237068</a>
And there are a lot that I do not have time to add the link. </p>
<p>I mean, I got curios why they have such bad comments about Berkeley. For the information of others here, the things we have read here about Berkeley is totally different from what we have heard from Berkeley’s alumni. In fact, they're the ones who encourage us to apply to Berkeley. From where I come from, we hold a Berkeley qualification with high regard and it's just so sad that some people in this message board are underestimating Berkeley like it's just an ordinary public school.</p>
<p>Oh, there are always some people who will look down their noses at the public universities. Don't give it any thought. Berkeley is one of only 3 public universities in the top 25 listing of US News. It's a great school and if it fits you then apply there and ignore everybody else.</p>
<p>People are negative when people try and overrank Cal. Cal is a top 20 school, but Cal students seem to try and push its graduate strength onto the undergrad program. While this is important, its only one part of the equation. Cal misses on way too many fronts relative to higher ranked schools (recruiting, selectivity, grad placement, endowment/ undergrad student, size, alumni giving, etc), areas where its much smaller competitors excel. </p>
<p>The only time Cal gets ripped apart is when Cal students overrank it. Call it a top 20 school and no one will complain.</p>
<p>^ Would you say the same is true, for, say, NYU (#34), Vanderbilt (#18), Notre Dame (#20), etc?</p>
<p>I would say the same for NYU (people think too highly of it), but Vandy and ND excel at the 'undergrad' factors.</p>
<p>Slipper called it right. The negative reactions are just that ... reactions to the "other" type of posts. In addition, almost divergent post is viewed a mortal "attack" and is quickly followed by full blown lamentations and cries of injustice.</p>
<p>As an example, repeating a few chosen contents of the following article would not please the adoring crowd and be wiewed as unwarranted needling:
[quote]
Tue, Sep. 05, 2006 - Students surged into a large auditorium at the University of California-Berkeley campus this week, filling all seats and sitting in aisles for a chance to hear the speaker.</p>
<p>This was no celebrity-studded special event, just the second day of class for Introduction to Economics, one of many overcrowded classes at UC this year. The lecture is officially closed, limited to 720 students. But an additional 150 came anyway, hopeful that their names might be plucked off the waiting list and added to the roster.</p>
<p>Discovering that the waiting list was full, many asked to be placed on the waiting list for the waiting list. To understand the morning's lecture -- the laws of supply and demand -- the students simply needed to look around the room: too many kids and too few spaces.</p>
<p>Growing demand is forcing UC officials to think creatively about ways to accommodate everyone. From auditoriums to dorm rooms to dining halls, campuses are squeezing an unexpectedly large number of students into existing space.</p>
<p>While there are enough beds for freshmen at Berkeley, classes are packed, with 100 more freshmen expected this year than last. A limit on lab space and teaching assistants is putting stress on entry-level classes.</p>
<p><code>You are now a number,'' quipped Daily Californian columnist Sonja Sharp.</code>It has eight digits and you will not survive one day without it. Memorize it, because I hate waiting in line behind you.''</p>
<p>In vast lecture halls, ``it's easier to doze off, not focus,'' said Andrew Mok of Cupertino. But he's already learned to sit in the front of the room and write down his questions, so he can visit his professor's office later.
``It's quite a production. We make it entertaining and exciting. Things blow up,'' he says of his 500-student lectures, repeated three times daily. Each student uses a small computer-based wireless keypad to respond to Kubinec's frequent in-class quizzes; answers are tabulated and projected on three large overhead screens. He speaks into a microphone, with stereo speakers. Each lecture is podcast and Webcast.</p>
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<p>I have to disagree. I have seen plenty of unwarranted UCB bashing. A good example of this is the squirrel thread. It was of course meant as a joke but a troll still felt the need to attack the school. I just ignore it but it does get annoying sometimes. Also Xiggi your post would not be seen as an attack.</p>
<p>There are a lot of Stanford fans around here. FYI.</p>
<p>^aye this is true. Many ppl on this site, I feel, are reflexively opposed to any school other than HYPSM. Quite a bit of Tufts-bashing happens also (though this seems to have subsided recently), merely because the school is near Harvard and isn't Harvard. WUStL is also a popular target of CCers, who apparently believe that this school is bad just because it decided a few years back that it was going to raise some money and increase the qualifications for admission. Such is the inversion of reality that occurs on CC.</p>
<p>They're anti-Berkeley because they didn't get in...</p>
<p>Fact, is Berkeley is one of the few schools in the country with a WORLD-WIDE name recognition. It's right up there with Harvard & MIT. And that really bugs the people who pay twice as much for an LAC no one has heard of outside a regional part of the US</p>
<p>Berkeley is and always has been a bastion of left wing, liberal America bashing.</p>
<p>As are most of the high-ranking, selective schools. Smart people tend to be liberal. ;)</p>
<p>
[quote]
Many ppl on this site, I feel, are reflexively opposed to any school other than HYPSM.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't know about that. There is a LOT of Harvard bashing here on CC. </p>
<p>
[quote]
They're anti-Berkeley because they didn't get in...
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, I don't know if you would include me in this group of people who are anti-Berkeley, as I don't consider myself to be. But I would say that there are some people here who actually went to Berkeley, did very well there, yet will talk about Berkeley's faults. That doesn't make these people "anti-Berkeley" in my opinion, just honest about what Berkeley can and cannot offer. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Fact, is Berkeley is one of the few schools in the country with a WORLD-WIDE name recognition. It's right up there with Harvard & MIT. And that really bugs the people who pay twice as much for an LAC no one has heard of outside a regional part of the US
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You're presuming that people go to a school just for worldwide name recognition. There are other reasons for choosing a school, you know. My brother, for example, could have gone to Berkeley, but instead opted for Caltech. Berkeley probably has a better brand-name than Caltech does. But Caltech was clearly the better choice for him, because his personality fit the Caltech mold, and also Caltech gave him a full merit ride + stipend. </p>
<p>The issue that I have with Berkeley is that it is mostly a graduate school. Undergraduates really do get the short end of the stick. That doesn't make the undergrad program bad, as it's still pretty good, but just nowhere near as good as the graduate programs are.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Berkeley is and always has been a bastion of left wing, liberal America bashing.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Wow... what a deep and incisive comment. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>"That doesn't make the undergrad program bad, as it's still pretty good, but just nowhere near as good as the graduate programs are."</p>
<p>Oh, I agree with you. Cal's undergraduate programs are not ideal for the shyer, less mature, less outgoing student who could easily get lost in the crowd. However, if you have the right personality, Cal offers stunning opportunities even to undergrads. </p>
<p>As to name recognition, I mention it only because it's been surprising to me (a Cal grad, as you may guess) just how impressed people are by the school internationally. I went to Berkeley for many reasons, but mostly because it was a cool campus in my home state. It never occured to me that, decades later, clients from Africa, Asia and Europe would whistle with awe when they heard I graduated from there. Ironically, the name makes much more of an impression than my partner's Ivy League degree (Cornell).</p>
<p>And as for Caltech - well, Berekely may have an OVERALL better brand-name but those in the know, the ones who count, certainly appreciate the powerhouse that Caltech is.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Slipper called it right. The negative reactions are just that ... reactions to the "other" type of posts. In addition, almost divergent post is viewed a mortal "attack" and is quickly followed by full blown lamentations and cries of injustice.</p>
<p>As an example, repeating a few chosen contents of the following article would not please the adoring crowd and be wiewed as unwarranted needling:
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That's nice, except other universities have problems with classes too. Cornell used to have an intro psych class that was I believe around 1,400 people. So why did you only attack Berkeley? Was it a negative reaction to an "overly positive post?" I certainly haven't seen any on this thread. I've seen "I thought Berkeley is a great school and alumni encouraged me to apply there" and I've seen "Berkeley is a top 20 school but shouldn't be overranked beyond that"...which I don't see as fanatical praise. So the only reason I could come up with is that you are, for some reason, inherently biased against Berkeley now and feel the need to bash it every once in a while.</p>
<p>Back to the topic, I think what happened is that due to rankings/prestige that stems from the graduate program (i.e. THES and ShaoTong rankings) there is a minority on CC who believes Berkeley to be one of top universities in the nation, undergrad and grad, because they don't bother to differentiate the two. When the reality is, the graduate program at Berkeley is quite a bit better than the undergraduate program, which is around top 20 or so. This led to some posts in the past that overpraised Berkeley which created this backlash of posters (shiboing boing, xiggi) who want to point out the negatives of Berkeley too, to "balance" some of the overly positive posts, but honestly I think they go too far and it leaves a bad taste in the reader's mouth.</p>
<p>I agree with Katliamom. Berkeley’s “name brand” is really powerful nationally and globally, especially in Asia/Europe region. Granted, those reputation is largely due to its fabulous graduate school especially PhD programs. However, as many posters pointed out, one cannot really separate them. For example, you cannot say Harvard undergrad is totally separate from Harvard graduate programs: They are all Harvard students; they share same facilities, professors, labs, graduate ceremony etc etc.. Another example is MIT, where grad and undergrad students are doing wonderful research together. Guess where MIT got its “world-class” name from: u r right, its graduate program!</p>
<p>If a school has an excellent graduate program, its undergrad shouldn’t be too shabby. In the same vein, there are many excellent undergraduate focus schools (for example LACish types), but it will be hard for them to be globally recognized as “world-class” without excellent graduate programs and research output.</p>
<p>I, too, have noticed that there are quite a number of Berkeley bashers in the message board. And, like the thread starter, I am "curious" why they're reacting that way. My guess is, maybe they're not smart enough to get into Berkeley so they resort to bashing spree. </p>
<p>
[quote]
**This led to some posts in the past that overpraised Berkeley **which created this backlash of posters (shiboing boing, xiggi) who want to point out the negatives of Berkeley too, to "balance" some of the overly positive posts, but honestly I think they go too far and it leaves a bad taste in the reader's mouth.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I've been a member of this message board for over 2 months now and have been checking out some posts here from time to time whenever I have free time... but I have not encountered a message where Berkeley was "over praised". </p>
<p>Those "over praised" comments were actual observations about Berkeley and if they appear "over praised" then that's because these are clueless about Berkeley's reputation.</p>