<p>Choosing between Electrical Engineering at Cal and the same at Cornell University? No financial aid it either, but instate acceptance for Cal. Cornell gave the Rawlings research scholarship while Cal gave Regents.</p>
<p>Have trawled these forums a lot to note the “said” negatives concerning Cal for the following:</p>
<ol>
<li>Difficulty in getting courses: Wouldn’t Regents priority help here? Also, the fact that about 6-8 courses will be taken care of thru AP courses in High School?</li>
<li>Difficulty in getting housing after the 1st year: Again Regents should take care of that. Right?</li>
<li>Large school with very little contact/guidance from Professors: Shouldn’t the faculty mentorship available under Regents take care of this as well?</li>
<li>Large class sizes: Once the initial general education courses are taken care of thru AP courses, there should be only a few courses upto lower division courses where this could still be a problem. But, later when you are doing upper division courses, will such class size problems still exist?</li>
<li>Undergraduate research: Cornell is offering research as a freshman (so it UCSD Regents), but is that possible in Cal?</li>
<li>Grade deflation at Cal: Does that really impact ones ability to get a job or even continuing for a Graduate program in any other college? </li>
<li>Grades: If one doesn’t participate in aggressive grade chasing, will that be a big disadvantage? Assumption is that the competition in the class of Elec Engg is higher in Cal compared to Cornell, but that could be a myth as well.</li>
</ol>
<p>Is the additional cost of 30K per year in Cornell justified?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Yes, Regents gives you priority registration. Though, depending on the classes you take, you may find it extremely easy to register for all the classes you want (or extremely hard).</p></li>
<li><p>Yes.</p></li>
<li><p>Yes, though it’s more like most students don’t try to take advantage of the fact that world-class professors are right before their eyes. You probably wouldn’t have a problem getting individual attention from MOST professors even if you were not Regents.</p></li>
<li><p>Upper division courses tend to be small, with a couple of exceptions. </p></li>
<li><p>Yes, very easy to do so in the experimental majors but harder for the pure stuff. Still, it isn’t THAT hard to get say a pure math research position if you deserve it. Cal isn’t a research university for nothing =p</p></li>
<li><p>Grade deflation is a myth. On the contrary, my GPA here (4.0) is higher than my GPA (3.8) in high school and I’ve been taking on unusually hard courseloads. Many of my friends have similar experiences…though there are a lot of people who experience the opposite case.</p></li>
<li><p>Depends on how good of a student you are. If you like the subject and are good at it, you will keep a 4.0. If you’re okay at it and you don’t pursue the A, then your GPA will drop. If you had to struggle your way through high school to get that A or if your high school handed out As freely, you probably will struggle a lot to get an A/B/C.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>i have the exact same question! how much of a boost does the regents scholarship give you at cal? or would paying nearly double be worth it for a prestigious private school?</p>
<p>It honestly depends on your field of study and what you’re looking for. If you’re say, a pure math major looking to take the Honors series of every math class, you’ll probably get your classes no matter what - even if you sign up for them weeks into the semester. </p>
<p>If you’re in a more popular major (biology, etc) the priority registration helps a bit more. If you’re looking to get into a unit one double (or something in high demand), Regents helps a lot. If you don’t care about where you end up, Regents does nothing for you.</p>
<p>Couple more small details here and there, but that’s the main idea. </p>
<p>It’s your call…though most people who have the option of going to the prestigious private school go if they have no financial issues.</p>
<p>Since it’s EECS, I would say choose Cal. Heavy recruitment, Silicon Valley network, etc… almost all the EECS freshman I know have gotten research/internships already. </p>
<p>About Regents, though…
I’ve never had trouble signing up for classes b/c of Regents
Tons of people get research positions just by asking the person that interviewed you for the scholarship (this is what happened to me)
Lots of Regents activities where you meet professors at dinners or even casual settings
I’ve had tons of face-time with professors, and this is true for non-Regents students as long as you are proactive about contacting them. </p>
<p>Even if I wasn’t Regents, I’d choose Cal over Cornell for EECS. Regents sweetens the deal, though.</p>
<p>I’m also in the same position as the OP, except for me it’s between Carnegie Mellon’s School of Computer Science and Berkeley EECS with Regent’s. I don’t think my Regent’s interviewer is a full professor at Berkeley (so getting research with him seems ruled out). Can I still get research as a freshman? How would I go about it? Is it just as simple as going up to a professor during office hours and asking whether they have any research positions open? Also, does it help if I already have research experience?</p>
<p>Regarding research with non-full professors, they certainly do research. Associate professors are newly tenured professors, while assistant professors are tenure track but not tenured. But they all do research.</p>