CP SLO vs UCLA DECISION!!

OsakaDad
Wed, 16 Mar 2011 01:37:05 +0000

Excellent comments Mallen640 and ucbalumnus. Mallen640, I’ve never seen such a comprehensive pro vs. con description on this site. Good stuff.

alving0107 – go with your gut. You chose Cal Poly and applied for ED. It is a great school and you’ll get out in 4-5 years with a job. My kid was also recently accepted to UCLA and he is going to Cal Poly SLO. He has made his decision.

Since we are a mixed Asian family and deeply hooked into the Asian community, I can explain why Cal Poly has more White students than Asians where it seems the opposite is true at some UC campuses. It seems as if some folks on the forum were stumped by this. A lot of Asian families, especially first generation immigrants, are heavily influenced by prestige. UCLA and Berkeley have big international recognition and the UC’s are considered superior to schools in the CSU system. Due to academic prestige, theory and research are often prized over practicality and “hands on” learning which is often misconstrued as more akin to the way they teach at trade schools in Asia. Professors and PhD’s enjoy far higher status in Asia than here in the US where entrepreneurs and street savvy investors sometimes get more respect. Basically it is cultural attitudes that hold over from the old country that influence many Asian students to opt for a UC engineering education.

Now this was a very stereotypical explanation with absolutely no empirical evidence. It is 100% anecdotal pulled from my own experience and comments from some of our friends and neighbors when we told them that my son was turning down UCLA for SLO. You should have seen the jaws drop. Anyway, we get it. Here in the US, we’ll choose a polytechnic education over a UC any day and quite frankly, I’ll follow what employers prefer in a heartbeat.