[2006alum]

My two sons toured UCB and UCLA as high school juniors in 2009 and 2013.  During the 2009 tour (prior to the 2009 admissions date), the Berzerkley tour guide told the kids to plan on five years, but that four years was certainly doable.  Five months later, at the start of his senior year, I was talking to one of the counselors at his high school who told me that the counselors had to tell 80 families (out of a graduating class of 330, almost all of whom went to four year schools) that they weren't going to get into the UC that had been considered likely for them.  Their annual average up to that point was disappointing between three and six families, and twelve was the prior record.

Eighty students were told that they weren't getting into their target UCs, and forget about reach UCs.  The bar raised that much in a year.  UC Santa Cruz's acceptance rate went from the mid 80s to the low 60s in a year.  Part of that may have been because of the dismal economy and shrinking college funds.

I was at UCB during that time period working on my Ph.D. After the brobdingnagian budget cuts in 2009-10 they cut brobdingnagian swaths of funding from the UC system and had to temporarily reduce the undergraduate class size (because tuition is not nearly enough to cover costs) and also shift to admitting a lot more full-tuition-paying out-of-state students. I imagine the one-two punch meant a vastly reduced acceptance rate for in-state students during those years.

Unfortunately the State doesn't want to fund UCB at the rate it needs to and unlike Stanford, UCB can't really rely on alumni giving to make up the difference. All of which makes my blood boil even more when reading articles like this - the state pays for boomers to retire at 55 with $115k annual pensions and lets the next generation fumble along on student loans and 5-6 year graduation rates. It drove me crazy that the lowest paid tenured faculty at Berkeley made well north of $200k per year and might teach two classes a year, while the grad students did all the actual teaching in sections (and ALL of the grading) and made $16k per year.

The system is really stacked against the young. </rant>

[2006alum]

My two sons toured UCB and UCLA as high school juniors in 2009 and 2013.  During the 2009 tour (prior to the 2009 admissions date), the Berzerkley tour guide told the kids to plan on five years, but that four years was certainly doable.  Five months later, at the start of his senior year, I was talking to one of the counselors at his high school who told me that the counselors had to tell 80 families (out of a graduating class of 330, almost all of whom went to four year schools) that they weren't going to get into the UC that had been considered likely for them.  Their annual average up to that point was disappointing between three and six families, and twelve was the prior record.

Eighty students were told that they weren't getting into their target UCs, and forget about reach UCs.  The bar raised that much in a year.  UC Santa Cruz's acceptance rate went from the mid 80s to the low 60s in a year.  Part of that may have been because of the dismal economy and shrinking college funds.

I was at UCB during that time period working on my Ph.D. After the brobdingnagian budget cuts in 2009-10 they cut brobdingnagian swaths of funding from the UC system and had to temporarily reduce the undergraduate class size (because tuition is not nearly enough to cover costs) and also shift to admitting a lot more full-tuition-paying out-of-state students. I imagine the one-two punch meant a vastly reduced acceptance rate for in-state students during those years.

Unfortunately the State doesn't want to fund UCB at the rate it needs to and unlike Stanford, UCB can't really rely on alumni giving to make up the difference. All of which makes my blood boil even more when reading articles like this - the state pays for boomers to retire at 55 with $115k annual pensions and lets the next generation fumble along on student loans and 5-6 year graduation rates. It drove me crazy that the lowest paid tenured faculty at Berkeley made well north of $200k per year and might teach two classes a year, while the grad students did all the actual teaching in sections (and ALL of the grading) and made $16k per year.

The system is really stacked against the young. </rant>

[French Rage]

We're #1 in the Pairwise! http://www.collegefootballpairwise.com/2...kings.html

[French Rage]

We're #1 in the Pairwise! http://www.collegefootballpairwise.com/2...kings.html

[CTcard]

A few comments round the horn on this latest bit about U$C and public/private universities.

1. U$C is not a small private school. It is a large (very large perhaps) private school.
U$C has 19,000 undergrads and 43,000 students overall. That's bigger than most state flagship schools (but not all).

2. A good university education is not just more high school. As such, there is a value to undergraduates in having professors who are notable scholars in their field.
To be sure, most intro classes are probably more like extended high school, but advanced classes in your major shouldn't be. Learning from somebody who is an expert in what you are learning makes a difference. Even more importantly, students at research universities typically have opportunity to do actual work in their chosen fields under the direct supervision of experts - that's really how you learn something.

3. To the whining U$C quotation, I am at a loss as to how business school rankings are imprevious to gaming as opposed to US News rankings. I am also at a loss to understand why busniess school rankings can function as a substitute for whole university rankings.

And yes, U$C is among several schools with a reputation of setting policies specifically to game the US News rankings.

4. Very roughly, the best American private schools tend to be the best universities in the world. However, the good American state universities are also excellent. The worst universities in America tend to be the among the many poor private universities. U$C doesn't quite fall in either camp, but is much closer to the former.

[CTcard]

A few comments round the horn on this latest bit about U$C and public/private universities.

1. U$C is not a small private school. It is a large (very large perhaps) private school.
U$C has 19,000 undergrads and 43,000 students overall. That's bigger than most state flagship schools (but not all).

2. A good university education is not just more high school. As such, there is a value to undergraduates in having professors who are notable scholars in their field.
To be sure, most intro classes are probably more like extended high school, but advanced classes in your major shouldn't be. Learning from somebody who is an expert in what you are learning makes a difference. Even more importantly, students at research universities typically have opportunity to do actual work in their chosen fields under the direct supervision of experts - that's really how you learn something.

3. To the whining U$C quotation, I am at a loss as to how business school rankings are imprevious to gaming as opposed to US News rankings. I am also at a loss to understand why busniess school rankings can function as a substitute for whole university rankings.

And yes, U$C is among several schools with a reputation of setting policies specifically to game the US News rankings.

4. Very roughly, the best American private schools tend to be the best universities in the world. However, the good American state universities are also excellent. The worst universities in America tend to be the among the many poor private universities. U$C doesn't quite fall in either camp, but is much closer to the former.

[oldalum]

Years to graduation varies based on which UC, how popular the major, and whether the student followed a straight and unwavering path from the start or has changed course or even just taken some time to figure out what he/she wants to do. A friend's daughter just graduated from UCSB in 3 years in philosophy, but another's daughter at UCLA has found it impossible to get into many of the pre-med classes she needs. My impression is that for popular majors at the better UCs it is often difficult to finish in 4 years unless you are extremely focused and aggressive from the start.

[oldalum]

Years to graduation varies based on which UC, how popular the major, and whether the student followed a straight and unwavering path from the start or has changed course or even just taken some time to figure out what he/she wants to do. A friend's daughter just graduated from UCSB in 3 years in philosophy, but another's daughter at UCLA has found it impossible to get into many of the pre-med classes she needs. My impression is that for popular majors at the better UCs it is often difficult to finish in 4 years unless you are extremely focused and aggressive from the start.