Just wondering the rankings of the UC’s best for research. Thanks!
That would depend on the department. Grad school rankings are by subject–they are not ranked as a whole unit. Al the UCs are research institutions. Even within a department, like Computer Science there will be specialties like CS Theory, Databased, Security & Privacy, Graphics, Programming Languages etc and different universities may have some specialty areas, like UCSD and UCLA have research groups in Cryptography, so if you were interested in that sort of research they would be good, where if you were interested in another area you might go elsewhere.
What subject? What UCs are you competitive for? All are research universities and almost all full time professors at the schools are hired based on their prior publications.
Which ones are best for research in the behavioral health sciences like psychology.
Generally speaking, CAL and UCLA, but as many have previously mentioned above, the remaining portion of that question depends on the specific areas of interest.
All of the UCs, save for perhaps Merced (not sure about that though) offer plenty of undergraduate research in such fields. UCI, UCSC, UCD, and UCR all have extensive UG research for things like psychology. Additionally, many of the Cal States offer decent research opportunities in the social science fields. Sonoma State is particularly notable although there are plenty of others.
Do you think one of those UC’s trumps the rest?
Are you applying to undergrad or graduate programs?
undergrad
I have already applied. I got in to UCSC and was wondering if it was worth it to appeal to another UC I applied to that may have a better research program like UCI. Thanks!
UCSC is still a research university, and as such its psychology department receives over $3.2 million in funding a year. Given that there are only [url=<a href=“http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?q=santa+cruz&s=all&id=110714#programs%5D14%5B/url”>http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?q=santa+cruz&s=all&id=110714#programs]14[/url] people a year who get a masters or phD in psych from the school, it’s very likely that the professors require a number of undergraduate assistants.
UCSC’s page describes how an undergrad can get involved in social science research.
https://ugr.ue.ucsc.edu/Social_Science
The odds of successfully appealing at UCI are incredibly low.
I know of people who have gotten in to UCD at least by appealing. If you can write a letter emphasizing your desire for a research program, it’s worth a shot.
I went there and was liberal arts, so there weren’t too many research opportunities. I lived with science majors though, and they always had lab opportunities and were hired by the university post-grad to continue.