Well, this is it. I’m leaving. Wow. But before I go, I guess I’ll take a minute to reflect on my favorite things about UC Berkeley. These lists are from the perspective of a CS major and Bay Area native.
The food.
There is an absolute smorgasbord of food to the north, west, and south of campus. (We don’t really talk about the east side.) In my experience, nothing else compares to the area’s range of good, affordable, diverse(, pescaterian-friendly) restaurants. Beauty’s, Baron, Kyoto, Tako, Thai Basil, Top Dog, Oriental, Toss, Tamon, Urbann Turbann, Cheese Board (+Bakery), Sliver, Rojbas, Long Life Vegi, the Med, Casa Latina, Pyeong Chang, John’s, House of Curries, Tivoli, La Mission, Brewed, Koja, Momo, … God it feels like I could go on forever. To top it off, Berkeley has the end-all dynamic duo of grocery stores, Monterey Market and Berkeley Bowl, which will provide you with a staggering selection (BB, MM) and/or incredible consistent quality (MM) when it comes to your fruits and vegetables. And a whole lot else besides: naan pizzas, BB burritos, bread products for days… anything your little heart desires, I promise you.
The Bay Area.
For me, location is one of the most important aspects of a college. Berkeley’s got California weather, woodsy/marine/city vibes, and such beautiful neighborhoods in West and North Berkeley especially, and South if you go far enough away from campus. (Immediate South has its own charms, but it’s a little too dirty and urban and full of dorms to receive my aesthetic endorsement.) There’s a creek running through the school. There’s big rocks and scenic vantage points up north. There’s Tilden Park and volcanic preserves and so much nature to the north and east. What the hell else do you want? (Berkeley probably has it.)
The people.
The people make the school, after all. Berkeley is packed to the brim with interesting, likable students who are enthusiastic about learning and doing their best to live a good life in general (not that the two are exclusive in any way). And the faculty are brilliant, compelling people as well. In particular, Berkeley’s lower-div CS teaching staff cannot possibly be beat. But it’s not just them. Every Berkeley professor is an inspiration in some way. Just go and talk (or listen) to them for a while and you’ll see.
The college experience.
For most people, Berkeley will be a “traditional” college experience where you can struggle under massive course loads in the midst of bright and amazing peers, while having the freedom to do almost anything you want on the side. With so many talented students, Berkeley has something for everyone (see e.g. clubs and DeCals). You want to learn a whole damn lot about not only academics, but life too? Go to The University of California, Berkeley.
Berkeley didn’t perish, so I can say bad things about it too.
Everyone is a CS major.
Whatever the reason – whether it’s Bay Area culture, or the fact that Berkeley’s CS program is top-notch, or the lucrative job offerings, or just plain mob mentality – you can take one thing as a given: everyone is a CS major. Also everyone wants to do machine learning. This is both good and bad. If you’re a CS major, you’ll have lots of peers to relate to and befriend, and the parade of high-achieving students can only bolster the Berkeley CS name. On the other hand, it can be annoying for class registration, sobering to be “just another CS major,” tiring to hear everybody around you talking about the exact same things sometimes. I guess that overall I would say it’s more good than bad. But I need some cons, so I’m putting this here.
Not enough graphics/vision courses.
When it comes to CS faculty, there’s no denying that Berkeley is a powerhouse. But a lot of the graphics faculty have left or retired (e.g. Sequin, Barsky, and Ramamoorthi). I think they’re trying to rectify things with some recent hires (Ng and Ragan-Kelley come to mind), but at the moment there’s only like one graphics class (+a grad class which consists of reading papers), one comp. photo class, and one somewhat out-of-date vision class. Maybe I’m spoiling myself by looking at other schools’ course offerings, or maybe you’re supposed to get more out of auxiliary/tangential classes and research and whatnot. But as a prospective graphics/vision specialist, I just wish there was more of a focus on teaching this stuff (like there used to be, with all of those 28x classes that disappeared with Sequin and Ramamoorthi).
EE 16A.
Maybe it’s getting better, maybe it’s not. But I have some things to say about how this class was run when I took it. Talk to me offline – I’m not going to put it here because I do have a lot of respect for Babak and Elad, just not for their old (?) EE 16A policies.
Housing prices.
It’s hard to find good housing at a reasonable price. That is all.
Not much.
If you couldn’t tell, I’m kind of reaching here. I didn’t pay that much for housing myself. EE 16A is my own personal meme. The graphics education is definitely not that bad, given that Berkeley does churn out great graphics students (I can name at least ten off the top of my head). And as I’ve already said, it’s actually kind of a good thing that there’s a big CS program at Berkeley. Basically, if you’re looking for a tl;dr – go to The University of California, Berkeley.