Hi CsHead! So I have pretty much the same questions to ask you that I asked Tots..Would you say there are a lot of research/internship opportunities? And how are the science classes and professors? How hard is to do well while maintaining a social life? Is there a lot of access to tutoring or other similar services if needed? And why do you say that you would choose SB over SD? Thanks so much!!
Just stumbled upon this thread too by chance. I'm a UCSD alumni who just graduated last spring of 2012 and attending medical school this fall.
In terms of research opportunity, there are a ton. You can go through the school programs such as the Academic Enrichment Program (
http://aep.ucsd.edu), Faculty Mentor Program (
http://hmp3.ucsd.edu), Amgen Scholars Program, McNair Program (both found here
http://students.ucsd.edu/academics/research), and if all that fails, you can always ask professors to do research with them. There's the Salk Institute, The Scripps Research Institute, and several other buildings that exclusively house research (Leichtag, Cellular & Molecular Medicine, VA Hospital, Sanford Consortium, etc.), so there's no shortage of research opportunities available. Almost every science major I know has worked or volunteered in a lab during their stay or after they graduated from UCSD. You can even go abroad with a doctor to do public health research like I did at UCSD. San Diego is known for being a biotech giant.
Doing well while maintaining a social life is up to your time management skills that you currently have and that you'll develop. You'll soon learn that when you live in a dorm environment, your suite-mates/roommates/friends all have similar goals of doing well in college, so you work together during midterms/finals or for projects. You're surrounded by intellectuals, which allows you to have quality discussions and access to help when you need it from your peers. It becomes easier to be motivated to study when everyone else is studying and invites you to study with them and it's also easier to go out and have fun when everyone else wants to too. From what I hear about UCSB, I say that the party scene at UCSD isn't as forced in your face, but I really can't say much since I've never attended UCSB. It'll also be WAY easier for you to maintain a social life because you'll be in John Muir College, which has the lightest general education requirements.
For tutoring services, you have
http://oasis.ucsd.edu which is the main, free tutoring service that gives you extra help in every general education requirement and even some upper division ones (organic chemistry and bio to be more specific). For every lecture, there's a separate smaller class (up to 25 or in rare cases 30 students) for discussion led by a Teaching Assistant. Consider this as extra help as you can go to as many or as few (or even none sometimes) as you need to understand the course material. I think other schools have this as well. If you can't do either of the two above to help, then you can always go to your professors office hours or email him/her or the TAs for extra help, which you can also do at other schools. And even though the lectures might sometimes be big, there are a few all star professors that are very excellent at teaching the prerequisite classes for medical schools that have written me strong letters of recommendations. When you get a letter of recommendation from a professor that teaches 300 students each quarter and they can say you're in the top 5% of all his/her students, it usually looks more impressive than a letter from a professor who only teaches 10 students a quarter and says the same thing.
In the end, you want to go where you're the most happy. San Diego has definitely treated me well in terms of how much culture it has, the rigor and intrigue of the academics, the social opportunities from living in the residential halls (I lived with the same 12 suite-mates pretty much all 4 years), and the extracurricular opportunities at UCSD. I also got accepted to UCSB, UCI, and UCSD and choose UCSD over the rest.
Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any more questions!!
