The college search...

In My Humble Opinion
1

Hey dopers! I’m currently a high school senior at a competitive prep school in southern california. Ive pretty much picked out all the schools that i am going to apply to, but there is just ONE day to add more schools. I figured that I could communicate with some of the most learned people on the internet if I made a thread on SDMB, so thats why im here…

My stats are as follows:

SAT: 1310 - No time to retake :confused:

SAT II: 620 Writing / 700 Math / 700 U.S. History -
Retaking in 2 weeks because i am more disappointed with these scores than i am with my sat… plus im taking the ACT the following week so if i get more than 30 my SAT is no longer taken into consideration.

GPA: 3.35 Unweighted … DAMN prep school.

Im also an under-represented minority but i dont want to start a huge AA war, so please try to keep the conversation on topic.

Im applying to: Berkeley (first choice), Cornell (second choice), UCLA, UCSD, Emory, Tulane, UMich, Wisconsin - Madison, University of Rochester, and a few back-ups.

My major will be neuroscience. Id like to go to a school with more a few thousand undergrads, but that is not my biggest concern. Any schools you would like to add to my list?

thanks!

2

Let me just tell you that Cornell is a good school, but it is a particularly lonely place for minority students (in general). I don’t know this first-hand, but I have met a variety of folks–white and black–who have relayed stories of racial weirdness from their stint there. Plus, it’s cold. Beautiful, but cold.

Cornell was the only school I applied to who arranged for an alumnus to meet with me. It was exciting, but by then I knew I didn’t want to go there anymore.

I don’t know about undergrad programs, but I know Rutgers has a pretty good cognitive neuroscience program for graduate students. Just keep it in mind…

3

Berkley, Wisconsin-Madison.
I assume you want some freaky atmspherics and liberal mindbending. That’s fine but just be advised those places have a lot of the “didn’t you graduate 20 years ago, what are you still doing here?” people laying around. Just stay focused, those are “big” schools to do the “five year” course in.

4

Berkeley’s cool and most likely will be a lot different from your prep school experience. It certainly was for me and that’s one of the great things about Berkeley. Sure there’s a liberal slant but the campus Republicans are a pretty vocal group and will not stand to be bullied by the liberal majority. And yeah there are several thousand students there and you will become merely a number to the administration, but the amount of students is one of Berkeley’s best features. You’ll find every type of person imaginable there.

However the major you want to do which is probably molecular and cell biology with an emphasis in neuroscience is highly competitive. You’re going to have 500-600 overachievers in most of your introductory science classes. And the department designs these lower division courses as weeder classes. Although it sounds like it I’m not trying to scare you. There’s a lot of students who do well in the molecular biology major, but you should know that it’s a lot of work.

And if you don’t mind, is the prep school you’re going to in LA?

5

Your list looks a little odd to me. With your academic numbers Wisconsin-Madison is a safety school. Why bother with the University of Rochester!? Why not toss in a smaller, liberal-arts type school? Just for kicks? Wesleyan University (in Connecticut) perhaps? Its one of the larger schools of that type.

6

Thanks for the replies everyone.

monstro: The cold is definately going to be a problem. As you can see, many of the schools on my list are in areas where the sun is hardly seen. I hate cold weather, but Ill just stay in when i cant handle it.

Vezer and Nately’s Whore:

I visited Berkeley a few weeks ago and fell in love. There is so much weird crap going on that one cant help but be entertained. One of the largest groups i saw there was the “Berkeley Republicans.” Im liberal anyways, so it wont really matter much… but thats beside the point.

Im pretty dedicated so i know i wont spend much time graduating. Ive been taking classes at a local CC for the last year, and I will have 5-6 more by the time I start the fall semester in 2004. I will most likely start as a nearly done freshman/sophomore and i will be taking 5-6 courses per semester. Im pretty sure that i can handle it. I kid that graduated from my school 3 years ago and was double majoring at Berkeley said that the workload was less than it is at the school im currently at.

The specific major that im apply at for berkeley is neurobiology, so yea ill probably have to take some classes with a few hundred kids. I always end up teaching myself anyways…

The school that im at now is in Orange County, not LA. Ohhh wow ive gotta get out of Orange County…

Hello Again:

Wisconsin - Madison has emerged into a very selective school. Actually it happened rather quickly so if you applied a couple years ago, it was much easier than it is now. Im also out of state so it will be much harder for me to be admitted.

Actually, I forgot to mention the two liberal arts schools that im applying to. Im only applying because they have no fee to apply. The two schools are Carleton and Colgate. Both of those have also become extremely selective… almost as selective as amherst, williams, and davidson.

Actually, do you have any suggestions of a liberal arts school that i could apply to?
thanks,

culov

7

I’ve always been fond of Duke and Clemson. FWIW. If I would have had the ways and means years ago, I would have ended up at one of those two.

8

Well i honestly have no chance at Duke, i am not even going to consider clemson. I think i could get in (75th percentile), but the school is only 1% hispanic… i cant handle that.

9

Perhaps U of Texas @ Austin?

10

Or maybe some other good Texas school: Baylor or Rice?

11

It would be great to go to rice but its a bit too elite. My SAT’s are only 25th percentile there. Baylor is way to religious, conservative, sober… and pretty much boring. Yes, im going to a school to learn, but at a school that isnt too academically challenging, im gonna have a lot of free time on my hands. Ive never really heard much about U Texas @ Austin, but a lot of people i know are applying there as a safety… ill check it out tomorrow because im done with the computer for the night.

thanks for the suggestions,

culov

PS: You love the south dont you? :stuck_out_tongue:

12

Ok i lied… I just looked on the Austin site and it would most likely be a safety for me. I could actually apply to the honors program which is basically just a chance to have classes taught by their top professors. Its a bit harder to be accepted to, but it would be a match for me! Now i gotta go talk to my counsellor tomorrow so i can add one more school to my list… hahahha

thanks again,

culov

13

Well, growing up in Chicago and now living in Florida, yes indeed I do love the south. :slight_smile:

Chicago

Florida

14

Unless you want to go insane you should not take 5 or 6 courses per semester, especially if they’re science and math. You can’t even take 6 full courses per semester; it’s over the maximum unit load.

15

Grinnell (Iowa), Oberlin (ohio), Reed (Portland). All are very much on the liberal side. Grinnell is very much in the middle-of-nowhere side, being about equidistant from Des Moines and Iowa City.

Carleton is a good school but its hella cold up there.

Interesting what you say about Wisconsin. Actually the same thing happened at my alma mater, The College of William & Mary (Virginia). When I applied it was strictly second tier. In the past few years (partly because of the relatively low tuition cost) it has become quite popular and much more selective.

I do recommend it in general for a great undergraduate education, but I don’t think it is particularly strong in the science area you are interested it (it is very strong in Physics and Marine Biology). On the downside it is pretty whitebread. They are working on it but they can’t help the fact that their largest draw area (the DC suburbs) is a white upper-middle class area.

16

If you’re looking at Carleton and UW-Madison, give Lawrence University in Appleton, WI, a shot. It’s a small liberal arts college. I’m an alum and I was awfully fond of it.

17

My wife and I both went to Tulane (we graduated in '95). We both loved everything about it. I was a psychology/neuroscience major in fact. The neuroscience faculty is interdepartmental and all of them were excellent. The professors are all very accesible too. If you want, I can set you up for a chat with my old mentor. He is still the head of the neuroscience program I believe.

New Orleans is a unique city and to go to college in and that should not be discounted. It is warm (understatement) and there is definitely a huge party scene. Tulane students party a lot, but the academic atmosphere is intense enough to limit that to sensible levels.

The only drawbacks that I know of are: The campus is undergoing a ton of new construction for the next couple of years and New Orleans can be a bit on the dangerous side if you aren’t careful.

Other than that, I highly recommend Tulane. It is a very good, medium sized university, in one of the most unique cities in the world.

18

Here are some things you should know about Berkeley. My daughter went there her senior year of high school half time as part of a program, and decided that she didn’t want to stay (thought she was admitted.) It has nothing to do with the environment or the size. First, it is often very hard to get the classes you need, because of underfunding. I suspect it is going to get worse in the next few years. Second, you only have one year in a dorm, and then get kicked out. Housing is expensive. a lot of her friends from high school did go, and the satisfaction level is not very high.

If you want to interact with professors, a smaller school is better. My wife, who is a biologist, went to William & Mary and liked it. I don’t know how Cornell is now, but 35 years ago five people from my high school went to a summer program there, and none wound up even applying. I’ve been to UT Austin, and it seems pretty nice, but I don’t know any students there, only professors.

Good luck, but talk to some older Berkeley undergrads before making up your mind.

19

I’m a Cal alumna, and my sister is currently a senior there. I loved Berkeley my undergrad experience for all of the challenges I encountered, for the diversity, and for all the different opportunities and programs. I took a couple of “for non-majors” neurobio classes and loved them. Yes, you get kicked out of the dorms after your freshman year (unless you come back as an RA) but why would you want to live in the dorms more than one year? They’re expensive, you have no privacy, and generally only freshmen live there!

Berkeley has the advantage of having one of the best student-run cooperative systems in the country, with (IIRC) 19 houses and 3 apartment complexes. After the dorms, I moved into the co-ops and loved it there. They’re much less expensive than either private housing or dorms, and food is included if you live in one of the houses. Co-op link

There will be plenty of opportunity to interact with professors, if you initiate it yourself. Because of class size and other constraints, professors are generally very busy people. However, in my experience, not one professor was against the idea of student interaction. They all have office hours. Right now, my sister is involved in a research project with a psychology professor that is basically her dream project. She got the position by getting to know the professor in office hours.

Berkeley will be a challenge. Your friends may not have huge workloads, but I guarantee you that they are not the smartest or hardest-working people in their classes, and their grades may not be what they expect! I found it to be an incredibly intelligent and interesting environment, and if you feel you are up to the challenge of Chem 1A first semester freshman year with 1500 other students, one professor, and a history of half the class failing, then by all means take that challenge on. I did it, thinking I was going to be a bio major, and I got a C in that class. The only C I’ve ever gotten in my whole life. If I hadn’t had several other challenging classes at the same time, I might have done better in the class. That one, along with several others you will take as a neurobio major, will be a weeder class - so many people at Cal start out pre-med, they have to weed people out early. It definitely wasn’t the best class I’ve ever taken (in fact, it kicked my ass), but for the first time in my life I had to WORK HARD to understand something. It was a great feeling.

I didn’t end up being a bio major. I designed my own major (another program Berkeley has), got to take all the classes I was interested in without having to take classes I didn’t want to take, wrote an honors undergraduate thesis, and thoroughly enjoyed my experience there. It was a great way to get an education that I wanted, and not be just another number. I highly recommend Berkeley as an undergraduate school if you can get in.

How about Harvey Mudd or any of the other Claremont colleges? Or did you want to go far away from home?

20

Nately’s Whore:

Ive been taking 8 classes every day for about a year. Next semester I will have 9 classes + a job. Doing that will help me decide how many classes im going to take in college.

Hello Again:

The College of Williams and Mary is actually the best public school (according to US News). It has become nearly impossible to be accepted from out of state unless one has elite stats.

Interrobang!?:

I dont think I would REALLY like to go to school in Wisconsin. Im just applying to Madison because ive heard many great things about it, and if everything goes horribly wrong at all other schools, I would still have a good shot at Madison because im a hispanic with above average stats applying to school in wisconsin (cant be many of us can right?).

Shagnasty:

A meet-up with the head of the department would be great! Im being attracted to tulane more and more every day. How was the financial aid? I will be working while im in college, and my parents can help out a bit. I dont mind graduating with a bit of debt, but less than 10k debt seems ideal. I talked to someone currently at tulane, and she said that the campus construction should be nearly completed by the time the class of 08’ enters.

Voyager:

I took a tour a few weeks ago and talked to a few undergrads before leaving. The only complaints were with the housing situation.

mlerose:

The co-op program looks interesting. My friend is actually double majoring with a “full schedule” and one more class. I shouldnt judge the difficulty of the school based on him because he was one of those kids that had a perfect score on the SAT, amazing artist, and a recruited athlete… pretty much a prodigy. Claremont colleges are a little too selective, but im still looking around…
Thanks for all your replies,

culov