University of California - Los Angeles Reviews

"UCLA was the best choice I ever made. The classes, facilities, experiences here were exceptional and the location of UCLA is perfection."

"UCLA's Graduate Program for Architecture is competitive with the Ivy League's. It's stimulating and challenging, and the conversations that take place within it are increasingly questioning architecture as a discipline. Its faculty is young, smart, and growing. Its cons lie in the lack of funding. I don't think they reward their best students enough nor do they reconsider initial financial packages they give out to incoming graduate students. I think the program can be as rewarding as the student makes it to be. The more time and effort put into it, the more he/she can get from it."

"The full-time MBA program at UCLA Anderson is great! The career center is second to none and my experience has allowed me to switch careers."

"Pros: Great Campus, Lots of resources, great professors Cons: Expensive city, not enough time to network and use campus resources, not enough number of professors. Summary: Great camp with world class reputation but has a capacity to be much more than it is right now."

"There are many pros to my graduate program. The main one is the quality of education that I will be receiving. UCLA School of Nursing is a program that embraces outreach, education, and hard-work. I feel very grateful to be part of this graduate program and I look forward in contributing to the nursing field. The con is that the program is expensive and very demanding since it is an accelerated program. But I know that after successfully completing this rigorous program I will be able to do what I have always dreamt of: proving care to patients."

"UCLA was a great place for someone who wanted a diverse array of experiences. I didn't know what I wanted to get out of college going in, but with so many majors, programs, people, groups and classes I felt like I found my place - which was vastly different than my friends, but that just made it all the better."

"The college was great. I had wonderful professors and challenging classes. Plus, the campus was diverse and social"

"College should be more heavily focused on inquiry-based learning as opposed to rigid classes."

"It was a beautiful campus with great professors and extracurricular programs."

"Great school and enjoyed the experience of attending UCLA. It was a great location, close to the beach and had a lot of activities to do in Los Angeles."

"I received my BA and MBA from UCLA. For the MBA program: very top notch facilities and faculty. If you want to stay in the LA area and network with its top employers, then I would shoot for here or USC. My MBA was expensive since I received little scholarship, but the contacts easily make up for the price/time. Majority of my professors (marketing MBA) had long office hours and were very friendly. I felt like I was treated far less than a little fish in a big pond and was valued more for my input (undergrad business program had many students, alot of work to stick out). Networking, academy quality, campus life, and overall experience was a solid A"

"I am very grateful for being part of a graduate program that has so many great faculty members that do great research. The pros of being part my graduate program is that I get to work alongside a faculty advisor is that really known in the kind of research that I am most interested in. I get to be part of many great research studies that are known by faculty members from other universities and organizations. Schools districts and other sources are seeking out to our department in how to deal with English language learner students. The cons of being part of this program is that because our faculty members are really good in their work they are constantly working or traveling, and sometimes availability with them is limited. Another con of being part of my graduate program is that funding may sometimes be limited, but this issue is probably experienced at other graduate program from other institutions."

"Competitive and rigorous studies. Offers real world application. The selection committee strives for diversity in the classroom to ignite active and dynamic class discussions."

"UCLA provided a diverse, rich and opportunistic experience for me. They helped foster autonomy and encouraged us to explore any career avenue we were interested in and helped us explore our options before we decided to pick a career choice. The school's spirit, resources and mentors helped me get to where I am now!"

"Graduate school is better than undergraduate. The people around you are smarter and you're all held to a higher standard. That being said, it is not necessarily harder. I have quite enjoyed my time here and have made many good friends. The teachers are good at what they do and most of them care about students."

"I originally intended to get a Master's degree at UCLA. At that time, the Chemistry Dept. staff offered almost no feasible projects for a Master's Degree. The professors wanted PhD students only. I believe that this was due to the emphasis being placed on research. I changed to a PhD programme when my Master's project became very challenging, albeit very interesting. During my first three years I was a teaching assistant in 1st and 2nd year Chemistry courses and I received an Outstanding Teaching Award. I later worked as a Research Assistant until I received my degree. The money I earned from these assistantships plus the cancellation of tuition fees enabled me to support myself while in graduate school. I discovered that I had a talent for teaching chemistry and spent the next 50 years mainly in teaching positions. I maintained an interest in crystallographic research and assisted my husband (also a UCLA PhD crystallographer) in his research in the Chemistry Dept. of the University of Natal here in Durban, South Africa. The UCLA Chemistry Dept. was an exciting place in those days -- most of the top scientists in the USA visited or lectured. The crystallographers from Cal Tech cooperated with their UCLA counterparts and I was privileged to meet Professor Linus Pauling at those meetings. With regard to the quality of teaching, good researchers were hired but these men were not always good teachers. On the other hand, some excellent lecturers were not given tenure as their research (or personality?) was considered not up to standard. The graduate students were given no instruction about how to teach, so it was due to luck if a first year student had good instruction during the ten hours per week he/she had contact with the teaching assistant. Most of these new 1st year students were under a lot of pressure and did not seem to be having a good time. I hope that the UCLA Chemistry Dept. of today (a) hires women lecturers, (b) hires good teachers as well as good researchers, (c) provides instruction on how to teach chemistry for the new teaching assistants and (d) helps all students to discover the joy of Chemistry."

"Excellent learning environment and outstanding support from professors and staff. My advisor and committee were really helpful in making the doctoral experience a unique one, where immense learning became the focus of my experience throughout. Now I am better equipped to make a contribution in the field of public health."

"The pros are that the professors are excellent and engaging. The affordability of the campus offers many challenges but is manageable because of the academic and financial support that UCLA provides."

"I absolutely loved my experience at UCLA. The teachers were engaging, challenging, and passionate about their work. My experience taught me how to navigate a new setting and truly flourish as a mature adult. I would also encourage joining the Greek community, as its network and support system completely shaped my university and occupational experience to follow."

"Top notch education. The school is large, so making friends can be a challenge, but the dorm experience helps with that. The neighborhood is expensive, the in-state tuition is a bargain, but prepare to pay for parking at the grocery store, out to dinner, and everywhere else. Beautiful sculpture gardens and tons of top-notch research opportunities. The Alumni network is very active in California, and some other metro areas. This is not the school for individualized attention."