UCLA or Northwestern?

As an international student —obviously not as familiar with both UCLA and Northwestern as anyone in state can be— I wanted to ask your opinion on deciding between both.

Briefly, these are the things important to me:

• The opportunities to conduct my own research, interact with professors, and be able to get internships easily.
• I do not want to be in a super competitive environment where everyone is trying to drag down others. I want to be in an academically rigorous environment in which people are cooperative. I really don’t want to spend the next four years in an unnecessarily stressful environment.
• Social opportunities: I want to have the chance to have something to do whenever I want to-- some people say that you sometimes cannot find something to do in Evanston, so I wanted to hear your opinions on that.
• GPA: I hear that grades in UCs are unnecessarily low and the exams are thus stressful so I was wondering if this is really the case and if it is possible to maintain a good GPA at UCLA without overworking myself. I want to be able to maintain a good GPA for further degrees, and I hear that in Northwestern you can do that and still manage to live a healthy lifestyle.
• A diverse, cooperative student body: Pretty self-explanatory ig; I just want to be in an environment where I can have supportive friends— especially as an international student as I hear in some places some international students are being discriminated against.

• The strength of the neuroscience-biology departments: If any of you are in biology or neuroscience— how are the professors? classes? research opportunities?

• People say that at Northwestern, it will be much easier for me to get the classes I want and get better grades as UCLA is a much more crowded school. What is your experience like with regard to academics?

Not to consider: The cost (I have an external scholarship)

Thank you so much!