<p>Admitted stats for UC davis fall 2009 students:
3.85-4.21
ACT: 25-31
SAT CR: 550-680
SAT M: 600-720
SAT W: 560-690
Average SAT of admit: 1902.
Davis beats out UCSB in every category I think.
<a href=“http://www.ucop.edu/news/factsheets/2010/freshman_admit_profile_2010.pdf[/url]”>http://www.ucop.edu/news/factsheets/2010/freshman_admit_profile_2010.pdf</a>
Reputation wise UC davis beats UCSB because UCSB is a known party school. UC davis also has an absurd amount of research + med schools + vet school etc.
622 million spent on research for 2009 at Davis, up from 573 million before.
[Washington</a> Monthly](<a href=“http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/rankings/national_university_research.php]Washington”>http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/rankings/national_university_research.php)
With this year davis spent 573 million while santa barbara spent 174 million. With the UC systems facing cuts UCSB is likely in trouble (along with every UC but UCSD/UCD/UCLA/UCB which have a lot of research). Currently the wealth is spread around a bit, but this is not likely to continue.
Note:
UCSB endowment? 153.8 Million.
UC Davis endowment? 538.7 million.
This data coupled with the known party school reputation of UCSB makes davis a pretty clear winner in terms of academics. They’re pretty close statistically but UCSB has a bad reputation for excessive drinking/sex all the time while UC davis has a reputation for biology and research. I’m not sure how people can rank UCSB above Davis unless they rank based on the overall campus (which is fairly silly to do since it is so subjective).
Pretty clear break down:
UCB
UCLA
UCSD
UCD
UCSB/UCI
UCSC/UCR
merced
cal poly is really damn good for engineering but outside of that I’d say it is between mid-tier UC and low tier UC. If you’re going into engineering it is probably comparable to UCI/davis and maybe a bit better depending on the field. I don’t know anything about lower CSU.</p>
<p>EDIT: especially for UC, UCI and up will be pretty damn similar in terms of academics. You aren’t going to be limited at all at irvine vs cal, you’ll just be able to get a higher GPA lol. Only at schools like UCSC are you potentially limited by limited pre-med programs etc. It’s definitely going to mostly be about a different feel at the different campuses. That said you’re mostly going to be in huge lecture classes/have a similar academic experience at any of these places. It is what it is.</p>