College

UC Santa Barbara
UC San Diego

 

UC Santa Cruz as well ... UC Irvine isn't in a bad spot either, although it's not right on the beach like the others.

 

any coastal UC school or cal state. Cal state isn't as competitive however

 

Santa Barbara community college, wont regret it.

 

yea uc irvine is 10-30 mins from anywhere in north orange county, and just over 30 mins to anywhere in south county, including trestles

 

I made that choice just this past year. Don't go to USCB. There is no surf there until you start getting NW swells in the winter. All summer, most of fall and spring it is dead flat there.

California State University Northridge
California State University Channel Islands
California State University Monterey Bay
Point Loma Nazarene (private school san diego)
San Diego State University
University of California San Diego
University of California Santa Cruz

all of these are right near the beaches all up the coastline from San Diego to Santa Cruz. seriously, skip santa barbara the surf is the least consistent of all of California's coastline because of the islands offshore (the channel islands) that block all south swell from getting to there. Best advice, go to San Diego or Santa Cruz. Both receive a decent amount of south swell but its all about the NW winter swells. both get big, double overhead and beyond big. (and san diego is really damn close to trestles which has 5 different waves including lower trestles)

 

im also lookin at schools that have decent surf in the area but all the majority of the lists for schools near surf are all west coast what are some east coast schools? 3.8 weighted gpa and 1700 sat score. looking at school for some sort of good finance programs or business administration type program

 

UC San Diego. Walk to Blacks...enough said

 

Dont be an idiot and spend over 50k+ for all four years of college. Move to SD County, enroll in one of the community colleges, get residency after 1 year. Apply to SDSU at a state resident cost.

If you graduate college with over 100K in student loans, you lost at the game of life..

 

With an 82 average good luck....

 

There's also Hawaii (UH at Monoa) and Australia (Griffith, Bond, Southern Cross). You'd probably be able to get into Hawaii fairly easily, but I'm not sure about the Australian universities. Does anyone know about those?

 

Bill Gates on dropping out of college: "If you have it, you have it. I didn't need anyone giving me a piece of paper to hang in m office. My office has Monet's."[video=youtube;ymsHLkB8u3s]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymsHLkB8u3s[/video]

 

First things first. What do you want to major in? Also, out of state tuition is steep.
California has lots of universities near or even on the ocean. In addition to those already mentioned, let me add Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. It's in central coastal California, north of Santa Barbara and south of Monterey. Beautiful area. It's about a half hour to Pismo Beach and Avila Beach to the south. And it's about the same distance to Morro Bay beach to the north. It's small town and rural, certainly not city. Lots on vineyards. I graduated from there in 79. Engineering, architecture agriculture, business, and environmental sciences are big there. Depending on the popularity of the major, it can be fairly selective. Pick a less popular major (sheep husbandry?) to get in then change it after you're there.

 

what about schools in California for business? the majority of the UC schools seem to all be science based? any ideas?

 

You want constant waves. SF State U or go up to Humbolt. You had better like surfing if you go up there. It's cold, wild and uneven. easily 2-3 times bigger than SD and SC every day in the fall, winter and spring. You'll never pray for waves again.

 

I have to disagree with most of the people who have replied so far. You do not need to pick a specific major before you show up, but you should at least have a general idea of what you want to study: physical sciences, computer sciences, engineering...? Pick a broad field of study and make a list of schools that fit that bill. THEN worry about surfing and quality of life. The same goes for jobs. I can tell you from firsthand experience that choosing a job SOLELY because of the waves in the area is a terrible awlful no-good very bad idea. You should not disregard it entirely, but I caution you against making it your number one priority. If that were the case, I would say maybe you shouldn't go to college right now. I do not mean that to be derogatory. I am, once again, speaking from personal experience. I went to graduate school in Monterey, CA and surfed my damned brains out...so much, in fact, that I did not have a good educational experience and now consider that year of my life to be a wash. If you want to go study, it has to be priority number one! Otherwise, it's too hard to do it correctly.

My personal recommendation, if it were me in your shoes: study physics at UC Santa Cruz. They have a great department. It's a challenging field of study, and you will work VERY hard, but it's (in my biased) opinion the most interesting stuff anyone can learn, and there are plenty of good waves and nice people.

 

Don't waste your money. go get a trade. My nephew got a masters in computers. 27 and just got a job after being out 2 years.

 

East Coast: FIT, UNCW, Flagler
West Coast: UCSD, UCSC, UCSB

in that order as well.