Best Oakland/Berkeley community college?

June 7, 2009 11:03 PM

At which Oakland/Berkeley community college should I enroll? I'm deciding between three: Laney College, Berkeley City College, and College of Alameda. Laney College is the closest, easily within walking distance, while BCC is a convenient BART ride away and CoA is a bus ride away. Despite its convenience, Laney seems to be the most run-down of the three; BCC has very new facilities but I don't know much about the merits of its teachers or commitment level of the student body; CoA seems like the best balance but is the hardest to get to. Do you have recommendations or opinions on any of these schools? Personal experiences? Specific teachers or classes I should take/avoid?
posted by foulowl to education (7 comments total)

I don't know what your future plans are, but I've heard that BCC has some kind of partnership with UC Berkeley that makes it easier to transfer. I don't know the validity of this rumor, but I heard it from someone who was researching local community colleges so I assume she knew what she was talking about.

Also, downtown Berkeley is a better environment than the area of Alameda where CoA is located. There are more shops and restaurants for you to visit during breaks and the atmosphere is exciting and invigorating. Definitely younger and more academically oriented.
posted by Nickel at 11:39 PM on June 7

Since they are all part of the Peralta College system I've taken classes at every one of them, depending on timing and availability of the classes I wanted. BCC is easy to find your way around because it is one building, I had a very good California History class there but otherwise find it sort of a small and boring place. I've had many classes at Laney, I prefer it to all the others, save Merritt (which you didn't ask about). The people I've dealt with in the administration building are friendly, counseling was OK. I had a very good astronomy class, Amy Bohorquez (sp?) was good for biology, my architecture classes were OK. Alameda campus is entirely uninspiring, a pain to get to, and I only went there out of necessity. Still, the professors were good, esp. prof. Campbell for communications/speech. It's possible to log into the Alameda online library system to get to databases such as Lexis-Nexis; Alameda also has wifi everywhere on campus. Not sure if this is true of the other campuses- Merritt did not have campus-wide wifi a year ago, and as far as remote logging in, all I can say is that Alameda was the only college that bothered to bring it to my attention. ;) That doesn't mean the other campuses don't though, it is just that it never came up.

There's no need to choose just one campus. One semester I had classes at Laney, BCC and Merritt. I would just go to nearby Laney to deal with any administrative stuff, including getting into an Alameda class that had a prereq that the computer didn't believe I had, so I had to go in person. The paperwork and bureaucracies work together pretty seamlessly on a basic level.

As far as students goes, the campus demographics are pretty similar, though Berkeley is whiter, and possibly skews a little older. Merritt's horticulture and environmental programs are generally much older and whiter, but still very diverse in a relative way- I have been the only white girl in one of my Laney classes, and one of three white girls in two of my Alameda classes (which is fine by me). Commitment level is usually higher in evening classes because they are mostly employed people who have decided to make a genuine effort to go to school. The same is somewhat true of summer classes. I have known professors who have said they prefer to teach evening, weekend, or summer classes because the students are more committed. However, uncommitted students rarely impacted my schooling, and even when everyone seemed very young and teenaged I would end up finding the older, more interesting students when it was important, like when I needed lab partners in biology.

All things being equal, I would take classes at Laney over the other two, just because walking to school makes life so much easier (Merrit is my favorite, but difficult to get to). I don't feel like teachers at any campus are more dedicated than another, they all seemed pretty dedicated to me. The nice thing about Laney is that you can go lounge on the lawn next door at the Museum of California, or walk down to the river near the south end of campus. It is also very easy to get from Laney to BCC via BART.
posted by oneirodynia at 11:52 PM on June 7

They are all pretty equivalent as far as transfer agreements and eligibility go, BTW. I'm transferring to UC Davis this fall, and though the application wants you to name a primary campus, there was no differentiation between credits from one Peralta campus to another. You can poke around on Assist to explore transfer agreements. It's probably worth doing if your major is more supported at one campus than another; Merritt, for example, has all the horticulture and environment programs.
posted by oneirodynia at 11:59 PM on June 7 [1 favorite]

What do you know about the specific programs you want to study at each college? I'd research the programs you want to take, and if one college is a clear leader in your area of study (i.e., better teachers, more courses offered, a really good work placement program), that should probably be a bigger factor in your decision than convenience of location. If they're all equal, than you get into considering things like your commute and the vibe on campus.
posted by orange swan at 5:07 AM on June 8

Like oneirodynia said, you don't have to explicitly choose. You enroll with Peralta and that gives you access to Laney, BCC, Alameda and Merritt colleges. All credits from any of the four colleges appear on the same transcript. You can pick whichever classes or campuses you want to attend from there.

Whenever I'm signing up for classes, I always take a peek at Rate My Professors to see if they have ratings to see what I'm getting in to.
posted by Nerro at 7:09 AM on June 8

For clarification, my goal is to double major in Fine Art (illustration) and Art History. That being said, my interest is much broader than that. I'd like to take classes in:

Literature
Anthropology
Psychology
Philosophy
Sociology

...etc. Basically, aside from math, I'm interested in everything, but if I had to set a single priority it would be studio art.
posted by foulowl at 11:56 AM on June 8

You just need to go pick up a (paper) fall catalogue and flip through it. Laney and Merritt have a lot of UC transferable art courses, Berkeley less, and Alameda hardly any. Laney has a brand new art department on the nicest end of campus; it had five art history classes last year to BCC's two. The summer catalogue is deceiving; classes are massively scaled back so it's hard to tell which campus focuses on what.

Lit classes are mostly at Berkeley, as it is writing focused. Alameda has a large psych department. But all the basics are at all the campuses.

Ultimately it really doesn't matter, as you can flit about from campus to campus for any class you want. If you don't connect with a particular school you can choose another next semester. Sign up early for anything you think you are interested in, because Peralta starts canceling classes without 35 people early, before the semester even starts. Then just be sure to drop the ones you don't want before the deadline to be refunded. If you can take classes this summer I highly recommend it, as prices are bound to go up since Schwarzenegger has no interest in funding community college.
posted by oneirodynia at 2:05 PM on June 8