UMich Honors vs. Berkeley vs. UCLA for pure math major

College Search & Lists
1

Hello everyone,

I’m an international student who was accepted by UMich LSA Honors (EA) and have also applied for UC Berkeley and UCLA this year. I feel that my chances of being admitted to at least one of the UC universities are quite high, and if it happens to be so, I would have a difficult time choosing between these universities.

I am very determined to major in pure math and pursue a Ph.D. degree in pure math. However, I am also very interested in various fields of the arts and humanities (art history, literature, philosophy, history, etc.) and would like to enroll in many courses in these fields in college, preferably those that are small, interdisciplinary, and accessible for those who do not wish to major in any of these fields.

Therefore, the two main factors that will influence my decision are (1) the quality of pure math courses, and (2) the availability of arts & humanities courses that meet my interests.

From the researches I’ve done, the main advantage of choosing UMich is its Residential College courses (especially the RC Humanities courses). From the course descriptions, they seem very exciting and greatly interesting. Also, I found that the Honors Math Sequence (MATH 295-296-395-396) at UMich is a nice pathway that leads prospective pure math students into the raw and fresh materials of modern mathematics efficiently, and the range and depth of higher level math courses also seems quite ideal.
However, I have always felt that UC Berkeley and LA are generally considered a little more prestigious than UMich (especially in my home country). It is somehow assumed among people around me that undergraduate education at Berkeley or UCLA has some quite subtle advantages that make them better than UMich. I’ve looked through the Arts & Humanities Department of Berkeley and UCLA and did not find many courses that attract me like UMich’s RC courses, but I’m still not sure what the Arts & Humanities education at UC is really like. Are most of these classes pretty dull, large, and AP Art History-styled (without much interdisciplinary and creative insight)? Also, as a place for graduate study in mathematics, it seems that Berkeley and UCLA are indisputably at an advantage than UMich; but is undergraduate math also so? If I choose UMich, would it hurt my chances of getting into a nice university for graduate math study?

I prefer to live off-campus, so the availability and quality of off-campus housing should also be considered. About weather and location, it is true that I prefer urban life better and the west coast also has better weather, but I don’t feel that Ann Arbor’s weather is unbearably severe, nor is its environment “rural” by any means. Tuition is not really a problem since both UMich and UC offers almost no financial aid for international students, and I also don’t really need financial aid.

I will try my best to get a chance to visit these universities, but I’m not very sure if I can. So I really hope to get more information about what the real experience (in particular, as a pure math student) at these universities are like from you all. Any advice is also welcome. Sorry to be a little wordy. Thank you so much.

2

@ucbalumnus and @Gumbymom are go to UC parents here on CC.

3

Have you looked at the course catalogs and schedules and faculty rosters to see what areas of math are particularly well covered at each school, and how they relate to your interests?

You can do the same for whichever humanities subjects you are interested in.

What kind of off campus housing? It is common to live in the dorm first year or two, and then live off campus afterward.

4

All three have top math programs. Cal #2, UCLA #7 and UMich #12.

If you were accepted to UMich LSA Honors, then you would live in a South Quad, which is considered one of the best dorms, completely remodeled, and with the best food. Off campus housing is readily available, if leased early enough, and reasonably expensive, but probably not by UCLA or Berkeley standards.

5

Among the cheapest off-campus housing at UCB are the BSC co-ops, but the waiting list is long (if interested, apply as soon as you can since there is a first-come-first-served element, but you may not necessarily get a place this fall).

https://www.bsc.coop/

6

Hardly. Arts and humanities courses at all three universities are extremely similar. There is a sufficiently wide variety of courses available that I think it’s unlikely you wouldn’t find enough interesting classes. If anything, it’s likely that you’ll struggle trying to decide between all of the interesting classes available!

The academic calendar is the primary academic difference between these universities. Berkeley and Michigan are on the semester system, whereas UCLA is on the quarter system. Students at UCLA take more courses each year, but each course generally goes a bit faster and covers fewer topics than the courses at semester schools.

You can’t go wrong with any of these schools. It’s fine to choose based on non-academic factors like weather, athletics, school spirit, etc.

7

I have Cal degree, D at UCLA, live in midwest smack in Big10 territory. I agree that choosing on nonacademic factors is fine, happiness is critical to academic sucess. The schools are very different, B10 schools are very white, Cal is 45% asian, UCLA 40+% asian. Off campus the Bay Area is one of the great cultural centers of the country, but they will all have great on campus offerings. Off campus housing very expensive in CA, I think more variety and more interesting at Cal. Some think SoCal bland and superficial, others think NorCal grungey and radically liberal.

8

Michigan undergraduates are about 60% white. At UCB and UCLA, Asian is the largest group of domestic undergraduates at 35% and 28% respectively. The percentage Asian students may appear larger because some of the international students come from Asia, and some majors may have higher concentrations of Asian students.

A less obvious demographic difference at first glance is the SES distribution. Percentage of undergraduates with Pell grants (approximates bottom half of family income):

Michigan 15%
UCB 28%
UCLA 34%

Michigan also has a much higher percentage of out-of-state students:

Michigan 44% domestic out-of-state, 5% international
UCB 14% domestic out-of-state, 10% international
UCLA 13% domestic out-of-state, 12% international

Information from (financial aid and enrollment sections):

https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?s=all&id=170976 (Michigan)
https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?s=all&id=110635 (UCB)
https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?s=all&id=110662 (UCLA)

9

ALso of course, consider Net cost including traveling home for breaks.
You cannot go wrong with any of these.

10

ucbalumnus,

Thanks for the information. I have read both UCB and UMich’s pure math major requirements and course catalogs and found them startlingly different in style.

At UMich, one may take the Honors Math Sequence 295-296-395-396 from freshman through sophomore year. As long as one is familiar to and passionate for pure math’s abstract theories and proofs, in two years one can obtain a firm knowledge of the entire undergraduate real analysis, linear algebra (very theoretical and advanced) and get a taste of various other topics like differentiable manifolds. With the sufficient knowledge from 295 and 296, one can study things like differential geometry and abstract algebra concurrently with 395 and 396. After that, the 400 and 500-level courses seems to provide a very smooth transition into graduate study with their sufficient difficulty and breadth of materials.

In contrast, at UCB, with my AP credit, I still need to spend my entire freshman year on Math 53, 54 and 55, which seem to focus a lot on computational aspects and lacks the rigor and abstractness of modern math that I love. Only after getting through them could one enter the upper-division courses, but it seems to me that most of these 100-level courses are not as satisfactory as courses in UMich on the same topics. For example, in UCB one has Math 113 (Intro to Abstract Algebra) for undergraduate abstract algebra, but from the course description it seems that it only covers the most rudimentary aspects, without topics like Sylow’s Theorems, module theory and Galois theory at all (which are all must-know subjects for graduate math study). And after that, the next course on abstract algebra would be the graduate course Math 250A, which is a very abstract and hard treatment on the topic; the leap of difficulty between these two courses just seems a little large.

I think one particular reason why the UMich system seems more appealing to me is my previous experience in mathematics. Although I haven’t formally taken any math courses in university, I self-studied from real analysis and linear algebra to advanced probability theory and random processes in high school (I finished a paper on stochastic processes). I think I’m already very used to theoretical and rigorous math, as well as reading long and abstract proofs and constructing proofs. In contrast, I really don’t quite like computational things (e.g. indefinite integrals). However, my knowledge and problem-solving skills are still not strong enough to directly delve into things like differentiable geometry and complex analysis, so I still need to consolidate them through some courses, but as fast as possible. For these reasons, the entire UMich course catalog seems very suitable for me while the UCB system seems a little dull and unsatisfactory.

Anyway I don’t mean to be biased towards UMich at all, only giving my thoughts honestly. Am I right about Berkeley’s math? UCLA’s math major requirements and course catalog seems quite similar to Berkeley’s. Thank you so much.

11

Go to your cheapest option if all things are similar. You are in a situation that you just can’t make a bad choice. Congrats and good luck.

12

I am a math professor. Course catalogs are there to give you some idea of the course work and requirements. A lot really depends on the professors who teach it. UCB has a reputation for being one of the most rigorous math departments in the US, so I doubt that you’ll be slumming it there in the intro math courses. I 'm sure you’ll thrive at any one of the places you listed .All are highly respected, and will have a vast array of pure math courses, Ugrad and grad, that you’d be interested in… So choose based on other factors such as affordability etc.

BTW, this “thumbing your nose at computational math” attitude should be something you should reconsider as you mature. First of all, it’s elitist, and no one likes an elitist snob, no matter what they’re elitist about, and second of all, pure math grads with this attitude are pretty much unemployable outside academia. Even in academia, a pure mathematician may have to occasionally condescend to teach math that’s more computational in nature.

13

Seems like if you attend UCB, you want to consider the honors math courses:
https://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/honors-courses

Same with UCLA:
https://www.math.ucla.edu/ugrad/courses

14

There are Honors courses for Math 53, 54 and 113 as well as 104 and 185 at Berkeley, if you can get in. These are for the elite math students and go way more in-depth than the regular classes.

Also by and large, many math majors will have already taken Multivariate Calculus (Math 53) and Linear Algebra/Differential Equations (Math 54) while in HS, often as dual credit. These students would start at Math 55 or beyond.

15

Michigan is a great school. Because you have been accepted to Michigan, and have been invited to the honors program / college, I think that you will find all the academic offerings & challenges that you are seeking.

I agree that all three universities are outstanding & well respected worldwide. If fortunate enough to be accepted by all three schools and still undecided, then consider the difference in cost, housing & weather. Good luck to you !

16

Indeed, a math PhD student may find that his/her first TA assignment is in a class like calculus for business majors or a remedial/developmental course like college algebra. Those who do manage to become academic faculty may find that most teaching will be of service courses to students in other majors, or courses for math majors looking more at applied and computational destinations like finance or actuarial.