UCB<UCSC? So says PhD.

MOS25V10
Mon, 19 May 2008 16:55:49 +0000

So I just got back from my trip to California to check out UCD and UCSC. I tell ya, that’s one heck of a flight from Germany.

Anyways, I checked out both schools for a couple of days. UCSC was beautiful. How often can you see the ocean while standing in a forest? The students kind of killed it for me though. I knew there were hippies abound but I didn’t think much of it because I’m not a hardcore right-winger myself. The problem was, these didn’t seem like the “let’s fix the world” kind of hippies…they were more like the 18 year old “all government is bad, let’s tear down the man” variety. All the students weren’t like that though. I actually met some really cool students that were willing to show me around a bit.

Good school, just wasn’t my scene.

UC Davis was cool…very chill. Every student I talked to, which had to be more than 30, loved the place.

During “Davis Days” (or something like that) transfer students from all over checked out the campus. The ones I met with were usually trying to decide between UCD or UCSD. All had UCD ahead.

After picking UCD I started looking for apartments. One of the places that I checked out already had two people living there. One was a grad student that taught at Davis and the other just got his PhD in some advanced chem…thing, haha. Anyways both spoke very highly of UCSC. The PhD guy got his “4 year” at UCSC, his Masters at UCB and his PhD at UCD. He said that he felt that UCSC was the best of the bunch. And this guy wasn’t just some average joe-schmo. He was a genius. He was telling me about how he rewrote the nitrogen cycle. The greatest minds had been wrong for over 150 years and this guy figured it out. Robert Northup is his name.

I included this last part for all the people that for into a “lesser” (what a joke) school. There are people out there that would take your school over Berkeley or UCLA anyday.

The NAME of your school won’t get you a job, it’s what you DO that matters most.