Yes, I am making college decisions right now and I need your help >_<
Before I start with questions and listing pros and cons, here are things for your convenience to know about my decision-making process:
Pros:
Pros:
I got a tiny taste of what college is like at a CC. I experienced the frustration of not being able to choose classes on the regular time (Special admit student has their own schedule), choosing hard graders, having nerds in class, and drinking caffeine to keep my eyelids up during class.
I won't mention their names but I took a Calc I class (math calc1, not business) which was taught by a professor who came from the UC system (taught lectures at other UC schools, graduated from a Ph.D. program from UCD or UCR I can't remember) His tests where those tests where no one gets above 60% except for that one "nerd" and his friends. I got a B in the end with a class size of 16 (4 gets As, 4 gets Bs, etc.) I took another basic Bio class (~30 students) and got an A easily (interestingly enough the teacher also teaches in UCI and work at UCI's lab, so if I go to UCI I might meet him again. He was nice to me, I might have been a bit annoying to him hehehe)
From my research on SDN, I read many debates on choosing an undergrad program from the UC schools such as UCLA, UCSD, UCI, UCD, and UCB. I understand that the forum doesn't like recurring topics, but most of them are outdated, and I need to-date answers to certain questions:
Before I start with questions and listing pros and cons, here are things for your convenience to know about my decision-making process:
- My goal for asking advice is to get into a top-tier medical school, not necessarily a top-tier pre-med/undergrad program.
- Which means I don't care too much about school weather, parties, safety (as long as I don't get severely injured or robbed), or cost (that's another topic and I've already made up my mind)
- I am interested in physician shadowing opportunities, GPA (specifics, in other forums what I hear a lot is "UCB/UCLA is very competitive", which is not very helpful. Specifics like how the curve works, data, experiences are helpful and needed), school accessible resources (how accessible are professors, how helpful are the professors when it comes to earning GPA and LOR, school advisors, etc),things that medical schools really look into.
Pros:
- The Honors Program. I heard honors students at UCI get to choose classes earlier and get better school resources (their own advisors from the CHP department, etc.). Pretty much a very privileged group within the University.
- Easier GPA curve.
- Nice campus.
- The Honors Program. I also heard students from CHP mention that you need to take extra and rigorous non-medical related courses for the honors program, which is not exactly what med schools care about from my research
- Not as academic as Cal. (discussed later)
Pros:
- I have a hunch that I'm probably going there. (had weird dreams and experiences)
- Better professors, more academically rigorous
- Feeder into UCSF (rumor)
- Also really nice campus
- Rumors about strict GPA curve, (not sure what it actually looks like)
- Rumors about crazy competition, students literally tearing down other students to get dat A
- Housing. I think yall know what I mean
- I like and don't like the student population. There are students there who looks like they don't really care about studying and others who look like absolute superhuman geniuses.
I got a tiny taste of what college is like at a CC. I experienced the frustration of not being able to choose classes on the regular time (Special admit student has their own schedule), choosing hard graders, having nerds in class, and drinking caffeine to keep my eyelids up during class.
I won't mention their names but I took a Calc I class (math calc1, not business) which was taught by a professor who came from the UC system (taught lectures at other UC schools, graduated from a Ph.D. program from UCD or UCR I can't remember) His tests where those tests where no one gets above 60% except for that one "nerd" and his friends. I got a B in the end with a class size of 16 (4 gets As, 4 gets Bs, etc.) I took another basic Bio class (~30 students) and got an A easily (interestingly enough the teacher also teaches in UCI and work at UCI's lab, so if I go to UCI I might meet him again. He was nice to me, I might have been a bit annoying to him hehehe)
From my research on SDN, I read many debates on choosing an undergrad program from the UC schools such as UCLA, UCSD, UCI, UCD, and UCB. I understand that the forum doesn't like recurring topics, but most of them are outdated, and I need to-date answers to certain questions:
- Is Cal a feeder into UCSF?
- If I became top 20 students in UCI pre-med, what are my potential choices for med-schools?
- How exactly terrible is the GPA curve at Cal?
- Would anyone suggest transfer from UCI/CC to Cal?
- How hard is UCB MCB Neurobiology major (prob very hard, anyone from that major?)
- Any potential question raised previously
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