UCLA vs UC Berkeley Psychology

[rotund dove]

Posting for a friend!

Schools: UCLA vs UC Berkeley
Intended major: Psychology
Similarities: Both large public schools, similar prestige level (slight edge to berkeley?)
Costs: UCLA COA is 84k/year, Berkeley COA is 89k/year

UCLA

UCLA Pros:

• better weather (friend suffers from seasonal depression)
• less grade deflation (???), friend is MAYBE considering law school so GPA is important
• food
• liked atmosphere during ASD
  UCLA Cons:
• public transportation is worse
• my friend wants to work at a figure skating rink as a coach and the rink closest to UCLA if farther away
• not a big fan of the quarter system
• worse housing (???)

UC Berkeley

UC Berkeley Pros:

• better public transportation
• better dorms (?)
• ice rink is closer
• she thinks she’d prefer the semester system
• her parents prefer berkeley
  School 2 Cons:
• more academic pressure/grade deflation (?)
• she doesn’t like the location as much
• weather is slightly worse compared to LA
• fears of social life being worse

Tiebreaking considerations

• differences in strength for psychology
• rigor (is berkeley as difficult as some people make it out to be?)
• culture fit (split on where she would fit in more, she’s more introverted)

Sorry if this isn’t really detailed, she never expected to get off the waitlist so she never considered berkeley as an option before now!

[upbeat marlin]

does your friend have any cheaper options? im not sure if any UCs out of state are worth the price before law school, and i might recommend staying in state

i dont think you can go wrong with either since theyre both very strong in psychology, she might have to look at which location offers more opportunities

maybe this will help https://www.goodgoblin.ai/blog/UCLAVsUCBerkeley2025

and if shes looking for law school, she can look into what school has better law school placement which is berkeley

[rotund dove]

she could’ve gone to UT Austin in-state instead but she’s already committed to UCLA and her parents are going to figure out how to make it work. she really vehemently didn’t want to stay in Texas for personal reasons. law school is just one possibility and she’s not set on it at all!

[rotund dove]

thank you!

[lapis valve]

ngl this is a completely personal decision and u hit basically everything on the head with the list of pros and cons

there’s not gonna be any single piece of info anyone can give that would make the answer clear

i will say berkeley isn’t really significant more rigorous than ucla

it is rigorous but so is ucla it’s ucla

[visual stump]

^

UCLA also guarantees housing all 4 yrs

Both ucla and berk have amazing psych departments

Also I’m a huge fan of the quarter system (I was also very scared) but it’s honestly great