University of California-Santa Barbara Top Questions

I wish I had known this public school would end up costing more money than I can afford.

Before entering college, I wish I had known just how different the quarter system was going to prove to be. It is much more fast paced than the semester system of high school and this contrast is very much felt, particularly in the beginning of the freshman year of college.

How many different social activities there are. It's hard to know of all the campus clubs, but there is almost one for every interest.

I wish I had known how amazing my life would turn out to be at UCSB.

I wish that I would have known how to manage my expenses better. I have learned my lesson and will be a lot more careful about spending my money wisely.

It is ok to be the bookworm who also wants to have fun and just hang out with friends. They dont judge you for wanting to be successful because they all want to be successful too! They want to support you, and there are more than enough people here to help you be successful in any endeaors, whether they be personal or professional. And the faculty and staff are here to support you as well:)

To be honest, I wish no one told me anything about the school before I attended. I wanted to experience it for myself, and see what I can make of my life there. Anyways, if I took anyone else's word for what the school was like, I'd probably live in the world they described to me as UCSB, rather than what I really thought of it while going there. Most of all however, I wish I knew where everything was, because not knowing where everything was, I eventually landed in a dorm a mile off campus.

Faculty and administrators say "It's not a party school, but we do know how to party." Not entirely true. It is a party school.

I wish had known more of what I truly wanted to study. I feel that I spent a lot of time in my first two years here on classes that I did not enjoy and that served little purpose to me or my future. I also wish I had come to school with more of an idea of how to prepare for the college workload. High school came way too easy for me and so the transition to college served as somewhat of a wake up call. My grades suffered my first year here because of this.

Before I came to this university, I wish I had been taught how to better balance my time. While, I have learned good balance techniques and grown to understand that a certain amount of prioritizing is necessary at a university, especially in the quarter system, it was a definite challenge in the beginning. Lerning how to balance my social life with my academic one would have been an extremely valuable skill to have mastered before I stepped foot in Santa Barbara.

I wish i had better understood the financial aid process entering freshman year, though it became easy and understandble in time. Also, I wish I had been more aware of the scholarships available.

I wish that I had been able to prepare myself for the different environment in Santa Barbara compared to growing up in a city like San Francisco. I was use to lots of traffic and commotion, coming here the atmosphere is so laid back which is not a bad thing. The environment definately affects how people behave, there seems to be a sense of a stronger community because it is much smaller than a larger city. I just was not use to being around people who were more focused.

How far it really is from any big cities. Also the type of community it is located in.

I wish I would have known how much more demanding college courses are than highschool courses. It takes a significant amount of extra time and energy for classes than it did in highschool. You need to learn time management to do well and have fun at this school.

Rent is so expensive.

That the transition into college isn't really as scary as it seems.

I wish I knew more about financial aid, because this place is VERY expensive. I wish I knew more about the campus itself, where everything was located, and how it all worked, but that was my fault for not exploring more when I arrived. I didn't go to the orientation, which I'm sure would have been extremely beneficial.

nothing.

The school is much stronger academically than I knew.

People are nicer than you'd think theyd be.