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So as many of you know, I'm on a tour of Southern California Colleges. I'm currently 50% complete with my tours, in fact am 3/6. So far I've seen UCLA, Irvine, and San Diego. Coming up soon are Harvey Mudd, USC, and UCSB (Dedicated to fraggles ^^)our
So far here are my impressions:
UCLA: Awesome campus, academic etc. Probably (definitely) my favorite so far. All the old architecture (Such as Royce) is awesome and I really liked the entire atmosphere. Plus it's not quite as crazy as Berkeley. I really like the environment: although I'm certainly not a surfer type, but it was quite diverse and I really liked its academics. The majors I'm interested in they are strong in. I really do enjoy it. As an added bonus my mom went there, so it would make her happy >.> (Although I"m leaving that out of my decision) UCLA seemed like a nice campus with a lot to do and great academics.
UCI: Really sort of strange. Upon arriving on campus it's no LA or Berkeley in grandeur, and the architecture was really new (reflective of how relatively new it is.) Our tour guide was not obnoxious (the one at UCLA was, and kept on saying that all these famous physicists won the Nobel PEACE Prize. Something doesn't click with somebody like the UCLA Student (who got admitted to Stanford) who is a PolySci Major, but yet so unaware as a junior...) Anyways.... I digress. UCI was pretty nice but suburban, and didn't seem as serious. Also due to the surrounding area there seemed to be less to do. On a side note, when I took dorm tours in Middle Earth (that's pretty awesome/cheesy lol) I saw a guy playing LoL. Pretty funny. Also super supersuper super asina. Even for me, and all my friends are asian >.> Mom didn't care for it, because the dorm tour person (a sort of awkward overweight, but incredibly friendly hispanic girl) said that at times it was loud at 3am. Mom was freaking out about studying etc etc etc, but I"M sure it's 90x better than most other campuses.
UCSD: Well, I've heard it's great academically (with regards to the sciences especially), and our tour guide ended up being a blonde. Just an anecdote. So we went around, the library was awesome. Super awesome lol. But in any case she went around, constantly saying all that there was to do. Considering what i"ve heard I"m somewhat skeptical, and I'm sure she was told to say it all the alleviate concerns. I think it's really ard to judge on that front. Also, in the introductory video the Chancellor in a monotone voice said "There are many Educational Opportunities at UCSD" Really passionate... UCSD sort of came off with a bitter taste, and the school sort of house sytem was weird. Can anybody from UCSD either defend or attack my points, and describe the school system better than the tourguide did >.>
If anybody goes to any of these schools, and has anything at all to say, that would be excellent 
 
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yo i go to UCSD
any questions you want, direct them towards me ill be happy to answer!
do you have any specific questions?
If i were you, and I got in to UCLA though, I'd go with that.
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apparently UCLA has epically awesome food. If you come to UCI you're gonna get mediocre food. But our Starcraft team is better. And we have asians. Which means asian girls.
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I also go to UCSD, come to us for our awesome CSL team!
But to address some of your concerns, the school system is basically set up as follows:
-The university is divided into six different colleges with different GE requirements, different housing, different dining halls, facilities, etc.
-They all end up being pretty much the same, you end up choosing your college based on their GE requirements and how nice their housing options are.
As for things to do, I don't know what you're interested in, but yeah, there isn't THAT many things to do off campus in the immediate surrounding area, but you get by with things to do on campus, and you can always just go to SD.
Our csl team is WAYYYYYYYY better than UCI btw.
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Go to UCLA if you get in! UCSD is boring and UCI has way too many Asians :<
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
Might want to describe what you're looking for in your University, major you're planning to take, hobbies, etc. That way we can give you details that are to your interests.
San Diego has the best weather though. 
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come to USC!
we have day9
and our esports club, while perhaps not the strongest in CSL, is without a doubt the most awesome esports club in all of america :3 if you drop by on friday, we meet at 6pm
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I just want to comment on UCI, holy crap! The uni is about 50% Asian, thats insane...
edit: Well, CCNY here in NYC is about 35% Asian. At 50%, one would imagine that an entire class would be almost entirely Asian. That would be hilarious...
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
Only 50%? Thought it was more like 70% to be honest. UCSD is like 48%.
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UCSD here. Agree with everything xmShake said, including the CSL team.
The different housing I guess depends on your personal opinion. Since UCSD separates the 6 colleges' housing, it's difficult to make good friends with anyone outside your college, but at the same time it's easier to make friends with people within your college. Personally, I don't like it because visiting friends across campus becomes a hassle and a chore. In the end though, everyone lives off campus so it shouldn't be a major deciding factor of your choice (CSL team should be that, and we've already established that answer). While the system is definitely weird, it's not at all bad or something that significantly affects your college experience, except for GEs.
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On April 06 2011 14:59 rauk wrote:
come to USC!
we have day9
and our esports club, while perhaps not the strongest in CSL, is without a doubt the most awesome esports club in all of america :3 if you drop by on friday, we meet at 6pm
He graduates in May right T_T... are there any other TL Celebs there other than LosingID8?
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nah he said he was still gonna be here next semester
losingid8 already graduated, but there's still a gaggle of other awesome SC people at the University of StarCraft
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Meh. It's hard to say exactly what I'll major in but CS Econ are my interests ATM. I enjoy mun and really haven't been that physical lately but would like to. I also would like a school where I can be social. Oh and pretty far away from home lolol.
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On April 06 2011 14:45 blabber wrote:
apparently UCLA has epically awesome food. If you come to UCI you're gonna get mediocre food. But our Starcraft team is better. And we have asians. Which means asian girls.
Ha. UclA is my first choice ATM but you do have a point with the Asian girls lolol
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
Then here is my take on the matter:
CS/Econ - UCLA is better than UCSD in these fields I believe.
Physical - UCSD has a great campus for running and an awesome gym. I'm sure UCLA has the same.
Social - UCSD is known as being the UC for the Socially Deprived for a reason. There are frats and stuff you could join, but those are everywhere.
And by the way, I'm a UCSD student, so I'm not being biased! Love my school.
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On April 06 2011 15:35 rauk wrote:
nah he said he was still gonna be here next semester
losingid8 already graduated, but there's still a gaggle of other awesome SC people at the University of StarCraft
Hmm, I may wait a bit before sending in my SIR then... I thought he was done with this thesis and stuff though.
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My definition of social may be much different from your definition considering right now om somewhat socially deprived lol
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
Well if you mean just meeting friends, then UCSD would be a good place for that, as our Starcraft team is an official student organization now. ^^
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Mesh I'm not entirely sure on the social front. But we will see...0
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T.O.P.
Hong Kong4685 Posts
On April 06 2011 15:08 Souma wrote:
Only 50%? Thought it was more like 70% to be honest. UCSD is like 48%.
I noticed that the majority of the visitors and tour guides are white, but most of the students are Asian.
On April 06 2011 16:09 Froadac wrote:
My definition of social may be much different from your definition considering right now om somewhat socially deprived lol
We'll take care of you @UCSD.
Do you really want to go to a school with a tradition of losing?
http://www.cstarleague.com/league/teams/7
Or do you want to go to a school like this?
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
I'm surprised UCLA doesn't have a strong CSL team. o_O I thought being a UC automatically qualifies you as top 20.
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don't let Starcraft or teamliquid or csl factor in. in the end all of them will be fine for it no matter win or lose. pick the school which you would like to live in for four years and you feel you would enjoy yourself at. if I had your options I'd go to ucla. but I'm big when it comes to networking so LA makes more sense than irvine or SD. pick what suits you though.
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WHY DIDN'T YOU PM ME we have our UCI SC meeting tomorrow.
It's loud at 3am in Middle Earth? I guess if you pick a dorm that sucks. You can specify your dorm according to theme, in which I picked Intellectual Competence as opposed to International Relations theme or Social Relations or some bs like that. Basically the themes mean nothing but all the nerds would obviously pick the Intellect theme dormed so people at least respected quiet hours and study hours. When I went to my friends dorm next door, there was screaming from 7pm-9pm from all the loud ass fail kids.
It really depends where you live and going to one school won't define perfect living conditions. I understand that your mom freaks out (my mom did too lol) but in the end it really is just depends what initiative you take on your living conditions. There are idiots everywhere, and there are nice people everywhere.
I'm like you where I didn't care about BEING SUPER SOCIAL my first year and I liked to stick with my nerds. UCI was pretty good for that because my dorm wasn't into huge parties, and if they wanted to party, they went elsewhere. You can usually call RA's to keep things quiet if things get too crazy.
Also in terms of your tour experience - don't let tour guides make up your college impressions. They follow a script and the experience depends on their personality (mostly annoying). Take the time to explore yourself and ask people on TL about their experience because we're all at least SC nerds so we can relate on some level.
Listen to blabber, there is never such a thing as "too many Asians." Anyway in the end there is no wrong choice in picking any of these schools. You'll get a great education anyway, and success is dependent on you, not the school.
UCI and UCSD have the strongest CSL teams, though I'd argue UCI is stronger this year  USC has a nice eSports club though, friendly people and kbbq.
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CA10828 Posts
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me!
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On April 06 2011 16:42 LosingID8 wrote:
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me!
u dumb man. I'm picking my grad school based on CSL. gg!
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On April 06 2011 16:09 Froadac wrote:
My definition of social may be much different from your definition considering right now om somewhat socially deprived lol
In that case, "being social" shouldn't be a factor at all. Even though we all joke about UCSD being "socially dead," it's only dead relative to other colleges. If you want to be social (even if this is a minimal amount), it's very easy to join clubs of interests and just go to events they hold, Starcraft included. Sure, some colleges are easier to get involved in than others, but in the end, being socially active is dependent on you, not the college.
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T.O.P.
Hong Kong4685 Posts
On April 06 2011 16:42 LosingID8 wrote:
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me!
How many kids choose USC because of football?????
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hey, I'm over at Pitzer College, part of the Claremont Colleges (which includes HMC). Drop by & say hello!
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On April 06 2011 14:53 paper wrote:
Go to UCLA if you get in! UCSD is boring and UCI has way too many Asians :<
they all have too many asians. the only difference is that UCLA's nonAsians are on the basketball and football team.
ucsd alum here.
everyone keeps telling me that ucsd is a party school. did it become one after i graduated in 2006?
to be honest i think all of them are the same, except that ucla has better sports. opportunities in each university are the same. all i can think of is trivial crap, like how parking at ucla sucks and how at uci and ucsd the campus is dead on the weekends because everyone goes home.
i'd probably go to ucla just because it's easier to get more excited about getting in the march madness tournament as opposed to watching the great rivalry game between ucsd and chico st.
if you're into partying, ucsd has sun god festival.
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Meh. Will be at USC in 4 hours. All this CSL hooliganship is funny, but not terribly helpful >.>
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On April 07 2011 00:29 randomKo_Orean wrote:
DO NOT COME TO UCSD IT FUCKIN BLOWS
-courtesy of your local ucsd student.
lol. Mind elaborating?
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Alright, I'm white ><
But in any case in terms of girls the white girls at UCLA were the best, the asians at irvine were the best, and UCSD had a severe lack of attractive people (tour guide was an exception >.>)
Irvine and LA are fairly strong in my (prospective)O majors SD less so, but if i was to change my mind programs at SD are in general stronger than those at irvine.
@Shindigs: the folks would not be receptive >.>
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Does anybody have anything to say re USC?
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CA10828 Posts
umm, i would say... don't be surprised by the area that's in lol.
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On April 07 2011 02:13 LosingID8 wrote:
umm, i would say... don't be surprised by the area that's in lol.
yea i live about a block from campus on 29th.... there was a drive by on someone half a block downt he street from me a few weeks ago. lol
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CA10828 Posts
whoa i just realized what i typed made no sense. "don't be surprised by the area that it's in"
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T.O.P.
Hong Kong4685 Posts
On April 06 2011 22:27 kainzero wrote:Show nested quote +On April 06 2011 14:53 paper wrote:
Go to UCLA if you get in! UCSD is boring and UCI has way too many Asians :< they all have too many asians. the only difference is that UCLA's nonAsians are on the basketball and football team. ucsd alum here. everyone keeps telling me that ucsd is a party school. did it become one after i graduated in 2006? to be honest i think all of them are the same, except that ucla has better sports. opportunities in each university are the same. all i can think of is trivial crap, like how parking at ucla sucks and how at uci and ucsd the campus is dead on the weekends because everyone goes home. i'd probably go to ucla just because it's easier to get more excited about getting in the march madness tournament as opposed to watching the great rivalry game between ucsd and chico st. if you're into partying, ucsd has sun god festival.
That's the way I see it. I doubt there's much of a difference between west coast UC schools besides academic reputation. I chose UCSD because it's the highest ranked of all the schools that accepted me in US News and Report University Rankings. The first time I been to San Diego was orientation for UCSD.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobs_School_of_Engineering#Rankings
I don't think we're behind Irvine in Computer Science. Economics? I don't know. Who cares.
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On April 07 2011 04:09 T.O.P. wrote:That's the way I see it. I doubt there's much of a difference between west coast UC schools besides academic reputation. I chose UCSD because it's the highest ranked of all the schools that accepted me in US News and Report University Rankings. The first time I been to San Diego was orientation for UCSD. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobs_School_of_Engineering#RankingsI don't think we're behind Irvine in Computer Science. Economics? I don't know. Who cares.
to some extent, academic rating is also overrated.
there are some respects where it's important. for example, ucsd's bioengineering is one of the best in the nation. and it helps because if you go down the freeway for one more exit, there are a ton of biotech companies that enjoy good relationships with ucsd so if you play your cards right you can get good internships and jobs straight out of college.
but that's an extreme case.
most recruiters only care if you go to a cream of the crop school, like top 3 in whatever field you're in. everyone else is really equal.
one of my friends graduated in compsci at Cal Poly Pomona and currently makes more $80k+, more than any of my friends... so really it's more about how you apply yourself in college.
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CS @ UCLA here.
And every UC you listed besides UCSB has "too many asians" (which has some correlation with CSL ranking  ).
I also know a little bit about Harvey Mudd. Small school atmosphere is what sets it apart from all the others (the campus is tiny and ugly), but I think admissions are the most difficult among those schools and it's probably going to be the most expensive (if you get in) for all those you've listed, hopefully you will get a good tour.
UCSB is probably the biggest party school out of all those, but I'm not one to ask about partying anyway.
On April 06 2011 14:45 blabber wrote:
apparently UCLA has epically awesome food. If you come to UCI you're gonna get mediocre food. But our Starcraft team is better. And we have asians. Which means asian girls.
yes ucla has good food (compared to other schools dorms), but it can get old after a year or so. luckily its right next to westwood.
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CA10828 Posts
On April 06 2011 17:00 T.O.P. wrote:Show nested quote +On April 06 2011 16:42 LosingID8 wrote:
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me! How many kids choose USC because of football?????
this is a fair point but i think it's very different from CSL.
having a bigtime football program impacts the entire vibe of the school. huge school spirit, saturday gameday atmosphere, etc. that's why i don't think taking div 1 athletics into consideration is a bad thing.
but giving CSL that same weight is the equivalent of choosing a school based on its ping pong intramural club or something lol.
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I'm at UCLA. I think it would be nice to be in the dorms but paying the epic rent around here and the epic commute times would drive you absolutely nuts if you lived off campus. IMO.
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On April 07 2011 04:55 LosingID8 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 06 2011 17:00 T.O.P. wrote:On April 06 2011 16:42 LosingID8 wrote:
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me! How many kids choose USC because of football????? this is a fair point but i think it's very different from CSL. having a bigtime football program impacts the entire vibe of the school. huge school spirit, saturday gameday atmosphere, etc. that's why i don't think taking div 1 athletics into consideration is a bad thing. but giving CSL that same weight is the equivalent of choosing a school based on its ping pong intramural club or something lol.
esports is serious. business.
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On April 07 2011 04:55 LosingID8 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 06 2011 17:00 T.O.P. wrote:On April 06 2011 16:42 LosingID8 wrote:
i know people here are (mostly) kidding but there may be a couple impressionable high schoolers reading this blog.
please for the love of god never pick your school based on something as dumb as CSL. CSL is an awesome and fun extracurricular activity that allows you to meet some cool people, but that's about it.
you're a smart guy so i know you'll pick your university based on the important things: strength of major, placement into graduate schools, facilities, location, "fit", etc.
also i'm assuming you'll be at USC very soon. have fun, and say hi to tommy trojan for me! How many kids choose USC because of football????? this is a fair point but i think it's very different from CSL. having a bigtime football program impacts the entire vibe of the school. huge school spirit, saturday gameday atmosphere, etc. that's why i don't think taking div 1 athletics into consideration is a bad thing. but giving CSL that same weight is the equivalent of choosing a school based on its ping pong intramural club or something lol.
I honestly don't think it's fair to downplay the presence of a CSL team when it comes to picking a school. It may come off as a bit silly to some but when I arrived in Irvine the first thing I did was go down the halls and asked if anyone played SC in my dorm. The people hang out with the most right now I met through SC related talk and through CSL. Knowing StarCraft nerds has made my college experience pretty amazing - I went to BlizzCon, GSL Parties, and amazing LANs here at UCI and with my homeboy nerds at USC.
Your college experience won't be 100% revolving around StarCraft, but having a community you can turn to and meet new people through SC is a great experience to have. The best part is that you can all relate to each other on some nerdy fundamental level and having people you can easily talk to makes adjusting to a new social scene a lot easier, especially when you don't have to fake interests just to make small talk with new people. The quality of the team doesn't matter too much as long as everyone's friendly and tight knit like the UCSD/Irvine/USC teams.
I don't care about football, but that's just me. I'd say picking a school based off a vibrant StarCraft community is much more beneficial in getting yourself comfortable with your new school, but since the majority of your schools have an awesome SC following anyway, you should be fine wherever you go.
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I graduated from UCSD last year. It's an extremely boring school to be honest. Not much in the way of parties or any of that typical college stuff. There are some, but most people are extremely introverted at UCSD and try to interact socially as little as possible.
Of course if joining the CSL is your thing, you may have fun, but yeah. In general, 90% asians and 0% interesting things to do.
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![[image loading]](http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/nn124/sav858/ucsb.jpg)
easiest decision i have ever made in my life
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To qualify what I'm about to say, I did not go to any of the aforementioned schools. However, I had many good friends at UCSD and often visited, so I'd just like to chip in against the "boring" and "introverted" comments - maybe I did run into that small segment of people who interact very little socially, but I had more parties and did crazier things down at UCSD than I ever did visiting friends at UCLA (not as many as at my college, which isn't in the options right now).
The international community (International House aka I-House) is really awesome at any school, but particularly so at UCSD. They party hard. It's wicked. The majority of them are also really friendly and a ton of fun in general.
Off-campus, things largely depend on your group of friends and having a car, since honestly public transit around UCSD sucks hard compared to other campuses. If you have a car, there are a lot of cool places to go nearby (within 15-20 minutes), comparable to what you would find at many other campuses. Given, LA probably has a larger selection of cool things to do and places to eat, but I'd rather deal with beautiful weather and beaches within walking distance than LA traffic anytime remotely close to rush hour.
As always, Sun God = tons of fun. If you have any friends down there right now, try to get them to get you tickets this year (Wiz Khalifa, Jimmy Eat World, Mike Posner headlining) so you can see for yourself. To be honest, it gets kind of crazy, but in a good way.
Make a good group of friends, and I believe UCSD holds its own very well against any of your other choices. Lord knows I heard often enough from my best friend about how a group of them were going out to some party or other every weekend my 2nd year (I'm not exaggerating. We went back and discussed it and realized that there were exactly 6 weekends that year that they didn't go to at least one party).
Good luck!
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I'm not really considering HMC seriously: I want to do some more liberal arts type stuff, along with a more scientific (prob compsci major) My mom just wants me to visit.
I went to USC today, which enraged my brother, who is getting dragged along . (We did the long tour aka Meet USC)
USC was pretty awesome, we got a tour, admissions presentation, talked to people at Vitterbi, our tour guide actually has the CS/BA major I"ve been looking at, and i got his contact which is cool, along with talking to the head admissions officer for Vitterbi. Pretty cool overall, and I'll blog on it more later.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/2Z1rd.png)
