Is UC Davis or Tulane stronger for studying agriculture as an undergraduate?

The biggest practical difference is that UC Davis has a dedicated College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, working farms, field-based courses, and multiple agriculture majors, while Tulane does not offer a comparable undergraduate agriculture program. At Davis, sustainable farming and agricultural science can be studied directly through areas such as Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems, Plant Sciences, Animal Science, Agricultural and Resource Economics, and Environmental Science and Management. Its campus setting in California’s agricultural region also creates unusually strong access to research, internships, extension work, and commercial farming.

UC Davis’s Student Farm and agricultural research facilities make it easier to gain hands-on experience alongside coursework. Students can connect sustainable production with soil health, crop systems, food policy, water use, plant breeding, and agricultural technology rather than treating agriculture as a small part of a broader environmental studies degree.

Tulane has worthwhile options for a student interested in environmental issues, including environmental studies and biology-related coursework, and New Orleans offers meaningful opportunities to study food systems, coastal resilience, urban agriculture, and environmental justice. But those strengths are not the same as a full agricultural science education. A Tulane student interested in farming would likely need to build that focus through electives, community organizations, internships, or study away opportunities rather than through a structured agriculture curriculum.

For your stated interests, UC Davis is the clear choice. It offers the stronger undergraduate preparation for sustainable farming and agricultural science, as well as more direct pathways into agricultural research, farm management, food systems, and related graduate programs or careers.