The University of California - Los Angeles

UCLA was a dream school for me. Big, beautiful, exciting, motivating, I could go on and on. My degree is respected outside of the U.S., too. Know that when you go to UCLA you will have opportunities that most students will not have. UCLA has it all. Enjoy the fabulous professors, and classes. Take a class just for fun! Enjoy the beauty of the campus and the perfect weather. Be happy that you are one of the very select students who got in to UCLA. Study hard, join groups, talk to people, take the time to talk to your professors, eat, drink and be merry, because this is a great life!

Alumnus Male -- Class 2000

I never knew I could ever fall in love with a school until I got to UCLA. I wasn't madly in love with it, until the start of my second year. I was one of those antisocial nerds in high school, I won't lie.. haha, so transitioning was kind of scary. I finally broke free and now am completely happy. I feel like this school has everything located in a nice little bubble. It was scary moving to LA, but UCLA made the transition a lot easier. Not only does UCLA excel in academics, it also excels in sport too, which has made my college experience totally amazing ( I used to hate sports.) Academics-wise, it is challenging, be prepared to work hard, but I'm sure that this is the same for any other college. Classes are sometimes hard to get, but if you came in with a ton of AP units, it will be fine ( I didn't but still am on track to graduate in 4 years.) Many people ( not all...) are very smart, and the competition can be seen.. espeically in science classes, but that will just motivate you to work a little harder. The professors are good, not wonderful, many are very robotic, and just read the lecture notes off the screen. I've had many new professors, and many foreign professors, so that was a little bit challenging. There's a lot of self-study for the science classes, it's not because the teacher can't teach, it's because the students often fall behind and not read ahead ( or not attend lecture.. it's easy when there's 300 people in it.) There's decent free tutoring service on "the hill." There's always a place to turn to when you need help.

When you look around campus, you really can't help but fall in love with the beautiful brick buildings and green grass, the weather is perfect almost everyday. The food is AMAZING. I love dorm food. I know I got sick of it after my first year, but I was just being spoiled. After I moved out onto off campus housing, I start dreaming of dorm food and all of the desserts they had. Even without the buffet the self serv. restaurants are great for food on the go too! Socially, it is alright, nothing crazy but nothing snooze-worthy. A lot of club and frat parties on Thursday nights, and the usual house parties. Many people live around the frat row area, so it's usually "happening" on any given day. The area around UCLA is wonderful, I mean, who can say that they live next to the celebrities (and a lot of celebrities are seen around campus)? It's very safe, although there are some random sexual harassments things that happen. There's always something to do in Westwood like little cheap restaurants, or a movie premiere (westwood is the location of choice for big movie premieres). UCLA is a wonderful school, there's no where I'd rather be.

2nd Year Female -- Class 2009

Campus Aesthetics: A+, Faculty Accessibility: B-