<p>Student activities: College is more than just about getting a degree. During your time in college, you should be exploring outside activities which interest you. Both schools offer a variety of clubs that people can participate in such as cultural, dance, singing, literary/publication, political, intramural sports, etc. The difference, however, is the visibility of these clubs. At Berkeley, you can walk through campus and it’ll always be lively in the main plaza during the day because of how many people have tables set up for their clubs, live performances, fundraisers, and distributing flyers. This occurs pretty much all year, rain or shine, except for during finals. You will not find that at all at Cornell. I’ve walked through campus (on nice days early in the fall semester) and did not see any student activity groups and the only thing I saw was a sorority selling donuts outside the student store. I know student groups exist at Cornell but they have terrible presence on campus.
ADVANTAGE: Berkeley</p>
<p>Political environment: Berkeley is a very liberal campus because of the majority of California residents, and many students are very vocal about what goes on in state and national politics. Cornell is more in the middle. At Berkeley, there are many students who consider themselves conservative or Republican, but they are still greatly outnumbered. If you are conservative, you may find a lot of people at Berkeley who oppose your views, but in general your platform can still be heard as long as you don’t intentionally try to offend anyone. Cornell students are not nearly as politically active as Berkeley students, although I’m sure there are plenty of people who follow what goes on in politics.
ADVANTAGE: Berkeley if you want to get into politics, or if you want to be in a super liberal environment. If you’re conservative, you may find it more comfortable at Cornell where people are less likely to judge you for your conservative views. If you don’t care about politics, then this criterion doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>Study abroad - If this is something that interests you, Berkeley and the UC system have a very heavily established network of partner universities around the world which make studying abroad very accessible and saves you a lot of trouble. Cornell students can still study abroad but they do so at probably 1/10th the rate of Berkeley students, probably because the process may not be as streamlined. I base this estimate on my own study abroad experience, where there were 12 Berkeley students at my university, around 60 more from other UCs, but only one from Cornell (or any other Ivy, for that matter). Just FYI, at this university, Berkeley sends between 10-30 students every semester, so it’s not an unordinarily disproportionate event.
ADVANTAGE: Berkeley</p>
<p>I know there will be people who will greatly disagree with what I said, especially Cornell alumni since I rag on this school a lot, but these are just my opinions as someone who attended both. In the end, I suggest prospective students go with whichever one they think is a better fit for them. Personally, Berkeley was the perfect fit for me for undergrad, and my experience as a grad student elsewhere strongly confirmed that. I will always highly recommend Berkeley over Cornell to anyone who asks, but I know this won’t be the case for everyone so go with whichever you think is better for your own needs. I listed a bunch of non-academic factors because the decision on where you spend the next four years shouldn’t just be based solely on what school sounds more impressive on your resume. The decision should be based on what you think is best for you, your goals in life, the kind of people you want to be surrounded by (they really will be your friends for life), and the quality of life you wish to have for the next four years.</p>