Choosing the Right College

Choosing a college is one of the biggest decisions a person will make in his or her life. It will mold the future for the individual and open numerous windows of opportunity for careers. Being such a huge decision it requires a lot of thought and research. Many questions need to be asked in order to make a decision, as well as visitation to many schools in order to know which one will work best for the student. The student should ask his or herself if they would like to attend a larger school or smaller school, private or public, and take into consideration the money he or she would like to spend in order to get a quality education. These main questions can narrow down the choices and make the process less stressful on the student. In this paper I will be comparing and contrasting the benefits and downfalls of two completely different schools; a private Christian school in Tennessee, Freed- Hardeman University, and a public state school in California, UCLA. Would a student be looking for a bigger college? Would he or she feel more accustomed to a “city-life” type of atmosphere? If so, UCLA would be the college of preference. UCLA is located in Westwood, Los Angeles, California. In simpler terms, this college is right in the heart of one of the biggest cities in all of America (“UCLA” – College Crunch). Current enrollment at UCLA is around twenty-six thousand undergraduates, eleven thousand, five hundred graduate students, and approximately four thousand faculty members. This all adds up to about thirty-seven thousand, nine hundred people on the campus each day of the active semester. As many have been informed, UCLA is one of the top colleges in the United States. Ranked in the top 20 undergraduate colleges in the nation, one can expect that he or she has a tall order to fill if dreaming of attending the UCLA undergraduate school. Preparations for college begin with the high school career of a peer. The college requires a system of courses taken in high