Why should I choose Cal?

[lala91]

<p>If you are going to switch into chemistry at the college of chem, you will have very small class sizes relative to the rest of campus. I know people in the college currently and they said that you know your professors, you get reserach opport (if you're pro active and ask). You get the nice feel of small class interaction, but still the benefits of a large public university! with awesome sportss!</p>

[Batman17]

<p>I don't hate Cal or anything, but I strongly agree with Sakky. Didn't want to post anything after fifi's glorification of the school because I would then feel bad about being such a downer to a prospective student... but to the OP, if you want to know the lectures of the school, visit and attend a general chem class someday and you'll know what it's like (to be a part of the huge crowd so to speak).</p>

[killthefifi]

<p>

@sakky

I can appreciate your cheerleading for the ol' Blue & Gold, but, come on. Let's cut the BS. Stanford has Berkeley beat on prestige. You know it's true. We all do. I wish it wasn't true, but unfortunately it is true. I believe it's been shown on other threads that Stanford routs Berkeley when it comes to undergrad cross-admits, and in fact wins ~90% of the ug x-admit battles vs. any other school in the entire Pac-10. Put another way, Berkeley's overall yield is only about 40%, which means that a clear majority of ug's who are admitted choose to go elsewhere.

</p>

<p>I wish it wasn’t true as well, but you’re right. It’s a fact, Stanfurd has the prestige that Berkeley doesn’t. The acronym isn’t HYPSMB, it’s HYPSM. Looking at the yield rate of HYPSM, all of those schools hover around 70%. Those 5 most prestigious schools in the nation by far beat any other school, but look at the total numbers of students in their incoming classes. With each school having <2000 students in each undergrad class, their net total is approx. ~9000. ONLY NINE THOUSAND. The last time I checked, about 1.5 million students took the SAT last year, so I’m assuming that about a million are college bound. (Again, it’s a very rough estimate) This tells me that less than one percent of college bound students get into and attend HYPSM. What about the top one percent who the admissions officers just don’t feel too fondly to? What about the students in the 98th percentile? Out of 100 students, only one is smarter than them. Why should they automatically be forced into a crappy undergrad education just because the admissions officers at a few elite institutions decided that they needed another valedictorian, URM, or football player.</p>

<p>If we’re talking about cross admits, it’s very obvious why Stanfurd would win. As an elite member of the most prestigious group of colleges in the nation, who would want to turn them down? Before I got too entrenched in the college process, it was all about advertising on the part of each school, and Stanfurd masters that. Stanfurd is able to pull the cream of the crop like many places can’t, but you’re surrounded by so many amazing people there. What makes Berkeley so great is that not everyone has made a groundbreaking impact. You have the brilliant students, sure, but you also have a lot of just normal, every day kids who figured that “it’s only $60, why not apply to UCB in addition to UCSC or UCM.” At the private NE schools, many people are expected to be smart and typical geniuses. At Stanfurd? Well, the “duck syndrome” exists for a reason. Surrounded by so many smart students, with the CA pressure to act “laid back,” it’s stressful to be a part of both worlds at the same time. At Berkeley, there is no facade, as the students are free to be who they really are.</p>

<p>Also, Berkeley has a pretty bad yield in comparison to only HYPSM and a few others.
I know this data is old, but look at the following link:
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/429673-acceptance-rates-yield-rates-top-usnwr-nat-l-unis-lacs.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/429673-acceptance-rates-yield-rates-top-usnwr-nat-l-unis-lacs.html&lt;/a>
Berkeley is number 16 in the nation for yield as of 2007, and just look at the top 9.
Excluding UNC, all of the top 10 schools are Ivy’s, with Stanfurd & MIT thrown in.
With a yield rate around 41%, I took that to mean that 3 out of every 5 accepted students choose to go elsewhere. In my personal experience, this really holds true. As an out of stater, I personally know four other people who applied to Berkeley. One got rejected, and where are the other three going? Yale, Stanfurd and (probably) Princeton. With upwards of 30k applicants for Harvard & Stanfurd, ~70% qualified, and an incoming class of only 1,800 thousand, where are the other 19,000 qualified, rejected students going to go? A Stanfurd Daily article said, “You’re not smarter than the Berkeley crowd. Remember all that crap they feed you freshman year about how you all really deserve to be here? Wake up, kiddos. Reality: it’s all a load of bulwarky. There’s someone at Berkeley way more qualified than you, but less willing to shell out the big bucks for private school. Or they were less approved of by our admissions department.” As a backup school for the big 5, Cal isn’t so bad. On a side note, they blew Caltech’s yield rate out of the water. Some people try to make it HYPSMC, but with data like that, it’s hard to say that Caltech > Berkeley.</p>

<p>If you want to talk about the Pac-10 schools, there are only two real academic competitors - Berkeley and Stanfurd. As the two most prestigious schools in the Pac-10, they win a majority of cross admits against the other 8 members. Now, onto the x-admits between these schools. Stanfurd loses many of its x-admits to who? HYPM. Looking at the yield rates, excluding odd outliers (like Notre Dame and UNC) Berkeley is in a different category, as they compete with UCLA, USC, and UCSD for the x-admits. The kids getting into Stanfurd are the ones getting into the ivy league, who needs Berkeley when you have offers from the top schools in the nation? Stanfurd, competing in the so-called HYP league, also does pretty poorly. If they’re supposed to be an alternative to HYP, their yield does a poor job of reflecting that, since they’re the lowest of the four. For the 99% of us (literally) who don’t have top 5 offers for undergrad, Berkeley is a great alternative.</p>

<p>

@sakky

The fact that Stanford is younger than Berkeley actually speaks to one of Berkeley's weaknesses. Berkeley had a colossal head start...and lost it. For example, in the early 1950's Berkeley's contemporaneous faculty counted 6 Nobel Laureates to Stanford's zero. What's the score today? Berkeley 7, Stanford 16. To paraphrase the Joker from Dark Knight: 'What happened, did Berkeley's cojones drop off?' William & Mary at least can say that they were occupied and burned by the Army of the Potomac during the Civil War, hence explaining their fall from grace. What's Berkeley's excuse?

</p>

<p>For an MIT student, you should know very well what happened. What does Stanfurd brag about in their viewbook? Silicon Valley and the Dot-Com boom! It just happened to be that Google was invented there, and many other daily technologies have their roots at Stanfurd. They have the money and they try their hardest to recruit the talent so they can invent those technologies,
Check the following link for a list of people who Stanfurd claims to be graduates (note how I said claimed, not necessarily graduates):
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/stanford-university/676629-dont-make-same-mistake-i-did.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/stanford-university/676629-dont-make-same-mistake-i-did.html&lt;/a>
Berkeley was leading the way with BSD (sorry I said all of UNIX, I didn’t want to alienate the non-tech-savvy people on the forum), but Stanfurd had the valley. Although Berkeley developed many significant technologies, the Dot-Com saga happened in the valley, and it was so much easier to recruit from The Farm than it was from Berkeley. Since Palo Alto is such a boring town, what else can the students do with their free time but start companies? An avenue of VC firms lies less than a mile from campus & Google is only a few miles away; their location paid off now, so lets see what happens in the future.</p>

<p>

@sakky

Actually, I'm quite sure that Oxbridge have Berkeley beat, at least when it comes to prestige.

Fine, fair enough. Okay, so Oxbridge beats Berkeley, anyone else? Berkeley is (for a fact) the number one public school in the nation, something that shouldn’t be taken lightly.</p>

<p>

@sakky]</p> <p>[quote]</p> <p>and the only school with 35/36 of their programs in the top 10.</p> <p>[/quote]</p> <p>Sure...for graduate school. But we're not talking about graduate school here.</p> <p>[/quote

I was going along the lines of the trickle down effect from grad to undergrad. Since there are no rankings for specific undergrad departments, the grad departments are the closest thing available. Yes, yes, I know that a good grad program doesn’t automatically translate into a good undergrad, (as evidenced by your great posts on the “is it hard to graduate from berkeley?” thread) but it gives a sense about the reputation of the school. With strong programs, there’s going to be strong professors. Although many professors might be doing research, there’s bound to be a few top ones teaching.</p>

<p> [quote=sakky] Which was one of the major - in fact arguably the major - reason for the subsequent victory by Ronald Reagan in the 1966 California gubernatorial election and the concomitant rise of modern conservatism within the American body politic. Whatever one might think about the politics of Reagan, I think we can all agree that its rise was not what the founders of the Free Speech Movement desired.

My point wasn’t that Cal is a hotbed of California liberalism, but rather Cal students are some of the least apathetic out of the top privates. Not to focus on Stanfurd or anything, but if you check the thread on “intellectualism at Stanfurd,” you can see what I’m taking about. I read an article somewhere about how a Stanfurd student wanted to start quite an odd group, but then the administration shut it down because it was deemed a “threat to the public” all because it was just a little odd.
Quoting green-aw-lives, “ It is not gated off from the world, there are no walls to separate the ghettos from the prestige of Sather Gate.
You WILL meet people from different backgrounds as you, and you will be expected to work together in harmony.
There WILL be people who will shove their agendas in your face, challenging you to think and rethink what concepts such as "politics", "race", "gender", and "equality" mean.”</p>

<p>

@sakky

The obvious counterpoint is that there are also countless students competing with you for those research opportunities, especially the good ones. That's why many Berkeley undergrads end up with research opportunities that are little more than scutwork, where they don't really get to learn anything.

True, true. Berkeley is a vicious institution, and by that I mean if one isn’t on top of the game, they’re going to be crushed. If you’re considering top privates over Berkeley, you’re no doubt the type of student who would be able to get those top research positions. The ones who are getting the crummy jobs possibly shouldn’t be the ones going into research anyways. Besides, I know Berkeley has countless undergrad research opportunities for Computer Science majors, ones that will help you learn. If you’re the type of student who would make a substantial impact on the research, then I find it hard to believe that you would be stuck with the bad job. If you’re the type of student merely interested, but not useful, why should you have an important part?</p>

<p>

@sakky

Actually, yeah, sometimes they do indeed fly people out from MIT rather than hire from Berkeley. This seems to be true of the most selective and elite jobs in Silicon Valley, i.e. the jobs in venture-capital/private-equity. I can think of some people from MIT who were hired directly into VC positions in Silicon Valley. That's a rare feat indeed for somebody coming directly out of Berkeley.

You’re right! For the super-elite positions, I can see why they would go to the big name schools.
But what about the tons of other jobs out there, the realistic ones for many of us? In my case, I’m looking for a typical Software Engineer job. With a dozen new VC-funded companies a week in the valley, my competition for new jobs is only made of Stanfurd grads. Berkeley isn’t the school to go to in order to get a 4-500k+ job right out of college, but it is a great place to go for a 70k+ job.</p>

<p>

@sakky

So, should getting a job upon graduation be the least of your worries? I suppose if you're fine with ending up working at Starbucks upon graduation, as that one English major did, then maybe it is true that you need not worry.

If you want to look at one of the “easiest” majors, English, and the “worst” jobs out of all the graduates of that major, I would be surprised if Berkeley didn’t have a couple of cashiers and Baristas. With a student body representative of the entire state of California, Berkeley includes low-preforming students as well. Using that link, let’s take a peek at the EECS grad’s job titles:
Associate Engineer, Product Engineer, Engineer, Hardware Engineer, Design Engineer, ASIC Design Engineer, Computer Programmer, Researcher and the list goes on and on.
For a cream-puff major, it’s obvious that the less talented & academically focused students are going to have a less rigorous job, but for the students who study and take advantage of what’s there, (i.e. the engineers), it’s not difficult to get that job you’ve worked for.</p>

<p>

@sakky

But we also have to be fair. Berkeley's undergrad program, unfortunately, is not as good as its graduate program and, more importantly, is not as good as that of some of the other schools. I wish it was.

</p>

<p>Me too, Sakky, me too. It’s not the best, and I’ll freely admit it has its share of flaws.
What school doesn’t? For a typical public school, Berkeley doesn’t do too bad for its education. Sure, it doesn’t have some of the things that the top private have, but it makes up for it on other ways. The unique feel of the school is enough to make it standout from the many similar traits of HYPM, and it’s a strong competitor for Stanfurd.</p>

<p>

@sakky

See above. Berkeley is hardly "right next" to San Francisco. In contrast, Harvard and MIT truly are right next to Boston, and indeed, certain parts of Harvard and MIT are actually in Boston.</p>

<p>Secondly, SF is not the 2nd largest city in California. It's the 4th. First is Los Angeles, then San Diego, then San Jose.

Good point. H&M beat Berkeley in the proximity to a city, but look at Y, P & S. Yale is an hour away from the big cities, Princeton is the same way, and Berkeley is half the distance to SF than Stanfurd is. Sure, SF is the 4th largest city (I should research more), but UCSD, in San Diego, has a terrible social life. UCLA & USC? All they have is the social life. And Stanfurd right next to San Jose? Well, look at the demographics of San Jose - it’s suburban. Berkeley offers a combination of big cities and academics that no school on the west coast can match.</p>

<p>

@sakky

Or, if you don't trust me, then go ahead and ask, say, some of the current undergraduate engineering students exactly how much Berkeley can hate them.

Engineering students get screwed over everywhere, it’s a difficult major! It’s up to the incoming freshman to research the best avenue for their education. Look at me, I’m a prospective Berkeley freshman and no one from my school ever goes to the west coast, let alone Berkeley, and I’m taking the time to throughly research every aspect of the school. To go off of a little of what mathboy said, If a student isn’t able to understand what they’re getting into, they shouldn’t be going into the major in the first place. The “engineering-trap” is not just Berkeley’s fault. Yes, they could do some things to help students, but the students shouldn’t have chosen to go into a major over their heads. MIT and Caltech let freshman hide their grades because, quite honestly, if someone gets into those schools they can handle the basic concepts. For many Berkeley engineering students, they can’t get past the weeder classes, and thus have trouble. The University of California is doing its duty of serving the students of California by offering them admission to the school, it’s up to the student to see if that’s the best route for them.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Well, one major difference between the ug programs at Harvard and Berkeley with respect to future PhD admissions is that the Harvard PhD programs are absolutely overrun with former Harvard undergrads, to the point where I have become increasingly convinced that Harvard may be the most incestuous school in the world (and I used to think that honor belonged to MIT). This is far less true at Berkeley. There really aren't all that many former undergrads in Berkeley's PhD programs, which is even more surprising when you consider the sheer size of the undergrad program.

[/quote]

Hahaha! You really crack me up. :]
Well, why would you want to go to the same school for undergrad and grad? You’ve already experienced that school, you know what the spirit is like. Why not go extend all you’ve learned at the school at another place? I’ve heard that it’s harder to go from the same undergrad program into the grad program. At Harvard & MIT, the students are at the top of their fields for undergrad, why not just stay at the top for grad? On my lengthy diatribe about Stanford’s problems, my final one, which can be extended to the other top four schools, was as follows:
“Stanford is ideal, and that’s one of the biggest problems in itself. Stanford is a truly wonderful place to go, but once you’re out, you don’t truly ever want to leave it. That’s one of the reasons why the alumni association is so strong. That’s the reason why Condoleezza Rice is going back to being a typical Poly Sci professor after being Secretary of State. One person said that leaving Stanford was like waking up from a beautiful dream. They cherished their time there, but then they were thrown in the real world, left almost defenseless after being protected for so long.”
Who would ever want to leave the comfortable cocoon of academia at some of the top schools in the world? I know I wouldn’t.</p>

<p>

@sakky

Of course this all presupposes that the student even cares about grad school and research in the first place, yet the truth is, most Berkeley students don't. They're not interested in an academic lifestyle.

They’re not. UC Berkeley serves the entire state of California, not just the athletes, or the URM’s, or the overachievers. They pull some of the brilliant valedictorians of the state. They pull some of the disadvantaged students in the state. They pull kids who spend their saturday nights partying, and kids who spend the same time curled up with a differential equations textbook. Not everyone is brilliant, which is why our party scene is livelier than the top 5 schools. Not everyone spends their life partying, as shown by the killer grading curves in many classes. Cal is not purely focused on academia, we have HYPSM for that, nor are they focused on social life, as UCLA & USC have that covered. Cal offers a synergy of student life and academics which is hard to find at many other schools.</p>

<p>On a side note, I kinda went a little overboard with this post. I figured this was the thread where I could chug that kool-aid and leave with more than enough reasons to choose Cal, with the 50k/year price tag, and forgo a full ride at a prestigious other public school. Thanks for bringing me back to reality. =]</p>

[sakurax]

<p>Omg. This is fricken intense. @__@;;</p>

<p>..but I did learn a lot...lol.</p>

[Fasttrack]

<p>0.0 ... ok ... wow
But to whoever started this ... its your decision and your choice. Undoubtedly Cal is strong academically, and I don't know which other colleges you're comparing Cal with. There are always opportunity costs of picking this college over another, and vice versa. Is Cal the "best" college? No. There are both advantages and disadvantages of going to Cal. For some people, those disadvantages may outnumber the advantages, for others it might be different. It all depends on opinions and perspective. This thread started as a calmly and then went into a full-blown war of people criticizing and disproving other people's opinions, and I don't think that's necessary ... we all are friends here :D</p>

[sakky]

<p>
[quote]
It's true that most students don't do their homework before coming into tough majors. I hope to encourage at least some to do so, however. You and I both know that no matter how many reality checks are provided here, quite a few engineers are going to come to Berkeley just because its rankings beat out practically every school's. Quite a few will remain cocky after their high school achievements. Hopefully some minority actually hears what I have to say, does its homework, and is better informed.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>The problem is that I don't even think high school seniors could reasonably come to an well-informed decision regarding where to study engineering, even if they wanted to. This is not like the sciences, the humanities, or math in which high school course analogues actually exist. With the possible exception of CS - which is arguably not even a true engineering discipline - engineering is not offered in the vast majority of high schools, not even in a simplified format that is palatable to high school students. </p>

<p>A better way would be to allow college students to try out engineering and allow them to walk away with a clean slate if they find out that it isn't for them. Unfortunately, Berkeley requires that you apply directly to the engineering school before you ever really had the chance to have even taken a single engineering course in your entire life, and with only limited opportunities to switch out of engineering later (witness the 'engineering major trap'). Put another way, Berkeley is requiring you to marry somebody before you've even had the chance to date them, which inevitably leads to numerous sad and messy divorces. </p>

<p>To this day, I don't understand why the CoE needs to be so impacted. It's hard for me to believe that the problem is a lack of engineering resources. After all, MCB is the largest major on campus, and consumes extensive undergraduate lab resources, yet remains an unimpacted major. Students are free to switch in and out of MCB whenever they want; if you want to major in MCB, or if you want to leave the MCB major, nobody is going to stop you. Why can't the engineering majors do the same? But even assuming that the problem is a matter of a lack of resources, then why doesn't Berkeley provide more resources to the CoE? After all, it's not like the impaction of CoE is a surprise to anybody. CoE has been persistently impacted for decades. If a program is consistently impacted year after year, wouldn't the logical response be to provide additional resources to that program? Seems to me that Berkeley just doesn't want to solve the problem of impaction. </p>

<p>
[quote]
As I said, English majors can look to obtain teaching credentials,

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Right, and this is where I think Berkeley could aid its students immensely, and at little incremental cost. After all, Berkeley already has an Ed school, and a top-ranked one at that. Can't Berkeley develop some harmonized programs that blend a bachelor's degree with a state teaching certificate? Let's face it, the vast majority of school teachers went to colleges that were far lower ranked than is Berkeley. I think that every Berkeley student should be fully qualified for a state teaching position upon graduation if they want to do so.</p>

[sakky]

<p>
[quote]
Well, why would you want to go to the same school for undergrad and grad? You’ve already experienced that school, you know what the spirit is like. Why not go extend all you’ve learned at the school at another place?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Allow me to point out that there are a surprising number of 'lifers' at Harvard and MIT: that is, those students who went there for undergrad, stayed for their PhD's, placed as assistant profs there, were promoted to tenure, and therefore spent literally their entire adult lives at the same university. </p>

<p>To my knowledge, nobody has done that at Berkeley.</p>

[lemon_lime_rush]

<p>Wow, that was great. Some posts about the budget cuts were getting me worried, but that post just got me even more psyched than I already was.</p>

[mathboy98]

<p>
[quote]
The problem is that I don't even think high school seniors could reasonably come to an well-informed decision regarding where to study engineering, even if they wanted to. This is not like the sciences, the humanities, or math in which high school course analogues actually exist.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Frankly, by this logic, neither could they in math, because I would argue that high school math is more similar to the kind of "mathematics" that an engineer uses than it is to theoretical math. For instance, I refer to courses like EE 20, 120, 40, etc, which I have some knowledge about. I think the most accurate statement would be that you can't get a picture of college education from your high school education realistically. You have to do your homework, as I said, and that, I agree, isn't exactly a simple thing. </p>

<p>But hey, I know what kinds of math I'll encounter years before I'll encounter it. I have a pretty good idea about what I'll get into in grad school because I actively talk to people who've been there. I encourage students to ask around, and also visit the websites of your major. Get an idea what your major entails. Look at past exams. I certainly did these things before coming to Berkeley, and while I'm in the minority, nothing is to say that I won't encourage people to be informed. </p>

<p>
[quote]
Let's face it, the vast majority of school teachers went to colleges that were far lower ranked than is Berkeley. I think that every Berkeley student should be fully qualified for a state teaching position upon graduation if they want to do so.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Totally agreed. My friend is looking to get some sort of graduate degree in education, and she'd probably be a wonderful teacher, and is a very intelligent English major...I don't think she needs any extra years when people who go through the entire process to obtain a teaching credential probably end up less qualified than she will be upon graduation.</p>

[mathboy98]

<p>
[quote]
A better way would be to allow college students to try out engineering and allow them to walk away with a clean slate if they find out that it isn't for them. Unfortunately, Berkeley requires that you apply directly to the engineering school before you ever really had the chance to have even taken a single engineering course in your entire life, and with only limited opportunities to switch out of engineering later

[/quote]
</p>

<p>This is why I encourage people to come in very well informed. I obviously have always agreed with you that flexibility to change out is especially important to engineers. If well-informed, at least I'd be confident a student could maintain the grades necessary to switch out if he/she grows tired of the major, because at least this individual will know what the courses are like, and not be totally taken by surprise.</p>

[sakky]

<p>
[quote]
At Stanfurd? Well, the “duck syndrome” exists for a reason. Surrounded by so many smart students, with the CA pressure to act “laid back,” it’s stressful to be a part of both worlds at the same time.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Well, I don't know about that. I think most Berkeley students would happily trade their stress for the (supposed) stress at Stanford. While a Stanford student might feel pressure to do well relative to your peers, at least they know that they're going to graduate, even with just mediocre grades. Stanford is (in)famous for grade inflation and it's practically impossible to actually flunk out. At Berkeley, flunking out is a real danger that I've seen inflicted upon people on more than a few occasions. </p>

<p>
[quote]
Stanfurd, competing in the so-called HYP league, also does pretty poorly. If they’re supposed to be an alternative to HYP, their yield does a poor job of reflecting that, since they’re the lowest of the four.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>That's not true. According to the latest IPEDS data, Stanford is actually #2 among HYPS, yielding 71% of its admittees, which is far better than Princeton's 59% and is slightly better than Yale's 61% (but is unsurprisingly beaten by Harvard's 79%). </p>

<p>College</a> Navigator - Princeton University</p>

<p>College</a> Navigator - Stanford University</p>

<p>College</a> Navigator - Yale University</p>

<p>College</a> Navigator - Harvard University </p>

<p>Now, I can agree that Stanford's yield used to be the worst among the four, as shown by Hawkette's old data. But that only speaks to the great strides made by Stanford recently. </p>

<p>
[quote]
For the 99% of us (literally) who don’t have top 5 offers for undergrad, Berkeley is a great alternative

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Well, I don't know that Berkeley should be so willing to submit to being what is effectively a safety school, that is, a second-choice place for those students who couldn't get into HYPSM. After all, Berkeley doesn't play that game for graduate school. Many people gladly turn down HYPSM for Berkeley for grad school. Why can't the undergrad program do the same? </p>

<p>
[quote]
For an MIT student, you should know very well what happened.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As I'm not an MIT student, I guess I wouldn't know. </p>

<p>
[quote]
Berkeley was leading the way with BSD (sorry I said all of UNIX, I didn’t want to alienate the non-tech-savvy people on the forum), but Stanfurd had the valley

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Speaking of BSD, Bill Joy, the Berkeley graduate student who developed BSD, later became founded SUN Microsystems with three other guys. Pop quiz: where did the three other co-founders came from? Why was the company called SUN? {Big hint: the 'N' stands for Network. Given that, what do you think the S and U stand for?)</p>

<p>
[quote]
True, true. Berkeley is a vicious institution, and by that I mean if one isn’t on top of the game, they’re going to be crushed. If you’re considering top privates over Berkeley, you’re no doubt the type of student who would be able to get those top research positions. The ones who are getting the crummy jobs possibly shouldn’t be the ones going into research anyways. Besides, I know Berkeley has countless undergrad research opportunities for Computer Science majors, ones that will help you learn. If you’re the type of student who would make a substantial impact on the research, then I find it hard to believe that you would be stuck with the bad job. If you’re the type of student merely interested, but not useful, why should you have an important part?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>The obvious counterargument is that you could choose to go to another school (i.e. MIT) where you are highly likely to be given important roles even if you're only interested but not useful. Put another way, why fight for opportunities if you don't have to? </p>

<p>
[quote]
my competition for new jobs is only made of Stanfurd grads. Berkeley isn’t the school to go to in order to get a 4-500k+ job right out of college, but it is a great place to go for a 70k+ job.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>To be fair, Stanford and MIT people aren't getting 400-500k jobs right out of college either. VC doesn't pay that well.</p>

<p>But 100-150k, in rare cases, even 250k (including bonus) right out of school, that could be done. Obviously not now during the crash, but when the economy is functioning normally. </p>

<p>
[quote]
If you want to look at one of the “easiest” majors, English, and the “worst” jobs out of all the graduates of that major, I would be surprised if Berkeley didn’t have a couple of cashiers and Baristas. With a student body representative of the entire state of California, Berkeley includes low-preforming students as well. Using that link, let’s take a peek at the EECS grad’s job titles:
Associate Engineer, Product Engineer, Engineer, Hardware Engineer, Design Engineer, ASIC Design Engineer, Computer Programmer, Researcher and the list goes on and on.
For a cream-puff major, it’s obvious that the less talented & academically focused students are going to have a less rigorous job, but for the students who study and take advantage of what’s there, (i.e. the engineers), it’s not difficult to get that job you’ve worked for.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>More Berkeley students graduate from the English major than from any engineering major. And of course there are plenty of other majors that are even larger than English that are also clearly easier than engineering is (i.e. poli-sci). </p>

<p>The point is, many Berkeley students will have to worry about future employment. As you said, not every Berkeley student is in EECS. </p>

<p>
[quote]
Engineering students get screwed over everywhere, it’s a difficult major!

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Not at Stanford. Stanford is the model of a school that can offer an elite engineering education that is also relatively laid back. Like I said, it's practically impossible to actually flunk out of Stanford, even from an engineering major. Granted, you might get mediocre grades. Many of their engineering students do. But you won't actually flunk out. </p>

<p>
[quote]
The “engineering-trap” is not just Berkeley’s fault. Yes, they could do some things to help students, but the students shouldn’t have chosen to go into a major over their heads. MIT and Caltech let freshman hide their grades because, quite honestly, if someone gets into those schools they can handle the basic concepts. For many Berkeley engineering students, they can’t get past the weeder classes, and thus have trouble. The University of California is doing its duty of serving the students of California by offering them admission to the school, it’s up to the student to see if that’s the best route for them.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I've heard this argument before, and I still have significant problems with it. Like I said before, how exactly are students supposed to know whether to choose engineering or not, when odds are, they've never even had the chance to have ever taken an engineering course in their life before? Schools like HYPSM allow you to freely switch in and out of engineering. You can try engineering and if you find out that you don't like it, you are free to switch to something else. </p>

<p>Furthermore, Berkeley engineering students are not bad students. On the contrary - on average, they're the most highly qualified students of any college at Berkeley. Many of the engineering students who can't survive the weeders would have performed perfectly fine if they had just chosen a different major right from the start. Why should their transcripts be ruined just because they made a bad initial choice of major? If somebody isn't going to major in engineering anyway, who cares what his grades were in the engineering weeders? Let him walk away with a clean slate.</p>

[sakky]

<p>
[quote]
Frankly, by this logic, neither could they in math, because I would argue that high school math is more similar to the kind of "mathematics" that an engineer uses than it is to theoretical math. For instance, I refer to courses like EE 20, 120, 40, etc, which I have some knowledge about. I think the most accurate statement would be that you can't get a picture of college education from your high school education realistically. You have to do your homework, as I said, and that, I agree, isn't exactly a simple thing.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>But the math major doesn't lock you in. You come to Berkeley, try math, don't like it, you can freely switch to some other major.</p>

<p>The main problem with engineering is that she wants you to marry her before you even get the chance to date her, or for that matter, even date any other girl. That is, you can't come to Berkeley, try on a bunch of majors to see which one you like and ones you don't, and then decide that you want engineering. No, you have to choose engineering before you even arrive, with only limited opportunities to switch later. </p>

<p>Let me put it to you another way. Instead of Berkeley, let's say that you could go to a school where you could date the various majors for a few years - including engineering - and then decide which one you wanted to marry, like at, say, a certain school in Palo Alto. Which school would you prefer?</p>

[sakky]

<p>To summarize, in case anybody get the wrong idea, I'm not saying that Berkeley is a bad school. Indeed, Berkeley has numerous positive things to offer. The location is splendid. The cultural offerings are vast. The research apparatus and concomitant faculty are stellar. The student body is eclectic and dynamic. I would certainly attend Berkeley over almost any other school in the world. </p>

<p>But that's not to say that Berkeley doesn't have its problems, for it certain does. It behooves potential students to investigate what those problems are and honestly assess whether they might impede the fulfillment of their goals. Berkeley is not for everybody, and it is better to realize that now rather than later.</p>

[mathboy98]

<p>
[quote]
Why should their transcripts be ruined just because they made a bad initial choice of major? If somebody isn't going to major in engineering anyway, who cares what his grades were in the engineering weeders? Let him walk away with a clean slate.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>There is what I'd call a way for students to not get screwed in this regard, if they're smart about what they do. What you do is to take courses and drop them if you find the material going over your head. Don't wait until you're completely screwed. Take it easy first semester if you're scared, do a humanities class you can get a high letter grade in, and sample the engineering work. Continue through the first year. If you hate engineering, switch. I switched out of EECS in the blink of an eye, having had good grades already. I wasn't cocky, and came in with a keen eye towards having good math and science skills.</p>

<p>I swear to you that if you're very careful and maintain your GPA, you can transfer schools. I agree Berkeley should make it easy to transfer schools, but I'd say to the students here who even bother to read some of these posts that they can come to Berkeley, benefit from the brilliance of the institution, and walk out in peace if they play the cards correctly.</p>

<p>I am in agreement that things can be improved about the current situation, but I don't think students should forget trying to come here altogether -- suck it up, and do your homework, and you'll be fine. I saw a thread in MIT about someone worrying that it'd be too tough; guys, Berkeley and MIT are tough schools, but don't let it freak you out + miss out on amazing schools. In fact, missing out on Berkeley is sort of a terribly sad thing to do, because as has been stated several time, the faculty + researchers here are on par with the biggest names like MIT, and you can have some great academic experiences here if you're only ready for them. </p>

<p>SUre, if you just want to barely scrape by with an engineering degree or something, don't go to MIT, Stanford, or Berkeley. Stanford may have semi-inflated grades, but its engineering is no cakewalk, I'll assure you. You'll fry your head and probably lose the motivation to work if you're not cut out for it, even if they won't flunk you out so easily. It ain't like high school when you can pretend to be studying something you totally don't understand and get by!</p>

[ajr2009]

<p>I heard that it takes 6yrs in average to graduate from Cal. Is it true? UCLA takes 4yrs+1 quarter in average.</p>

[effward]

<p>

@sakky

The obvious counterargument is that you could choose to go to another school (i.e. MIT)

</p>

<p>Am I missing something? Where do I sign up to "choose to go to MIT"? Last time I checked, MIT chooses you.</p>

[SDTB]

<p>

@sakky

Well, I don't know that Berkeley should be so willing to submit to being what is effectively a safety school, that is, a second-choice place for those students who couldn't get into HYPSM. After all, Berkeley doesn't play that game for graduate school. Many people gladly turn down HYPSM for Berkeley for grad school. Why can't the undergrad program do the same?

</p>

<p>This quote seems to be a theme in your posts. Could it be that it's a philosophical difference between the approaches to education of a large public institution and small/medium sized private institutions? Large schools are inherently going to have less control over the quality of their students by admitting a large student body. It's a sacrifice the school is willing to make. Public education is an important factor in all of this.</p>

<p>The undergraduate program can't do the same because the school is philosophically a public education institution. In order to compete with more selective programs, Berkeley will probably also have to become more selective, which is a marketing technique for creating an image of being "hard to get" - "people always want what they can't have". Marketing is key. Establishing a specific brand name is just as important in academics as in business, which is a sad thing, but it's reality. </p>

<p>Beyond marketing, becoming more selective will enable Berkeley to control the quality of their undergraduate admissions much more - so there will be fewer "bad apples". The few "bad apples" can hurt the reputation as well. I think it's a size issue more than anything else. Right now, Berkeley performs quality control by having weeder classes. Selective private institutions perform quality control through admissions. In the end, the top academic students from these institutions tend to do well career-wise (of course the selective private institutions still have an edge due to the marketing factor). It's a different approach.</p>

<p>For the graduate program, Berkeley is just as selective as the most selective institutions because the size of each department is comparable to the most selective institutions (except Caltech/etc...); they have just as much control over the quality of admits. In the field of advanced academic studies, Berkeley has branded themselves as such and that's probably why they are comparable in reputation to other brand name institutions.</p>

<p>Personally, in general, I love the benefits of a public education.</p>

[blackfire]

<p>So many things go into choosing a school --- I'd say that the best bet is to ask a number of current students at Cal, and actually visit the place. That way, you can find out differences in others' opinions about the university and make an informed decision from there. In my opinion, Sakky makes some really good points -- Cal is by no means a bad university, but there are flaws that can be fixed (like the 'engineering trap', which can be mitigated by following Stanford's philosophy of engineering). Fixing these flaws would help the university, but as of now I don't think that those changes will occur anytime soon. From my own personal experience, I find most the humanities classes I've taken to be less competitive than the science/math classes (by a good margin). The main problem, at least for me, is Berkeley's philosophy that if you're going to choose to be an engineering major in your senior of HS, then you can't change your major easily and its no cakewalk to change your majors after having realized that its not for you. But to get it straight, I think opinions of current Cal students (from a humanities and technical major perspective) would help you quite a bit.</p>

[unlimitedx]

<p>The undergraduate population at Berkeley is simply too large to do any quality control. Admissions would need to be tighten immensely in order to bring up the caliber of the students.</p>

[SDTB]

<p>

@effward

Am I missing something? Where do I sign up to "choose to go to MIT"? Last time I checked, MIT chooses you.

</p>

<p>If you are good, you choose MIT. If you are not so good, MIT chooses you.</p>