Welcome prospective Gauchos. It’s that time of year again as the UC application has now opened and submission starts October 1 through November 30. I am @Gumbymom one of the two UC Forum Champions/Moderators. My Co-Forum Champion is @lkg4answers and we are knowledgeable on the increasingly complicated UC admissions process and hopefully we can help any prospective UC applicants with their questions.
UCSB does NOT directly use the uncapped GPA; however they heavily take into account course rigor/number of APs etc, and use the uncapped GPA on their website/UC website for statistical purposes.
UC Santa Barbara like all the UC’s are test blind and will use 13 areas of criteria to review Freshman applicants. Each campus will weight the various areas of criteria differently so one size does not fit all. The UC application website has plenty of information that can help determine if UC Santa Barbara is a good option when applying. Below is some admit information specific to the school.
Very important : Academic GPA, Personal Insight questions, Rigor of secondary school record
Considered : Character/personal qualities, Extracurricular activities, First generation college student, State residency, Talent/ability, Volunteer work, Work experience
Special consideration for disadvantaged students.
College of Letters and Sciences: Choice of major is not considered in selection to the College of Letters and Science but applicants are admitted into the major or pre-major. If admitted into a Pre-Major, the student must meet course and GPA requirements before declaring the major. The exceptions to this rule are dance and music performance majors. Both majors require applicants to complete an audition in late January or early February.
College of Engineering: Students are selected by major for all engineering and computer science majors. Only applicants with a solid background in advanced high school mathematics will be considered for admission to engineering. This includes high grades in all math courses through grade 11 and enrollment in pre-calculus or higher in grade 12. A student not selected for their first choice major will be reviewed for admission to an alternate major outside of the College of Engineering if one was selected.
College of Creative Studies:
Applicants to the College of Creative Studies submit a supplementary application in addition to the general UC Application, which is reviewed by Creative Studies faculty. Students are selected within Creative Studies majors only. Applicants not selected for Creative Studies will automatically be considered for admission to the College of Letters and Science if an alternate major is listed.
If applying to CCS you should indicate as your first choice major.
CCS admits come after the original admission decisions.
When your parents applied the acceptance rate was about 80%, now it’s down to about 30%. So be sure to spend time looking into alternatives - other UCs and CSUs, privates if they are affordable.
And one alternative worth looking into, for those that really want to be at UCSB, would be to attend Santa Barbara City College while living in Isla Vista and then transferring as a junior. If this is something of interest to you then start looking into it and discussing it with your parents well in advance of admit decisions coming out in the spring.
UCSB admit rates and Average Fully weighted GPA by College for Fall 2022:
Letters and Sciences: 27% GPA: 4.40 (App-87,816 Admit-23,540)
Engineering: 22% GPA: 4.52 (App-21,350 Admit-4775)
CCS: 21% GPA: 4.37 (App-1840 Admit-383)
Note - this appears to be fully weighted UC GPA, not capped UC GPA.
Did they mention specific applicant numbers? I find it incredible that half of the applications for the College of Engineering is for CS (10% of 110k is 11k).
Also seems to confirm that CS is around a 4-5% acceptance rate.
Hi, what is the chance to be admitted to ucsb computer engineering, unweighted gpa 3.95, weighted capped 4.4, there are B+ in Calculus BC in grade 11, others are all A/A-, competitive public school in Santa Clara county, national merit semi finalist and ap scholars, I am quite worried that the Bs in Calculus, pls share your experience and advice, Thanks.
When admitting freshmen, the UCSB College of Engineering considers grade point average in college preparatory courses, completion of coursework beyond the university’s A-G requirements, and completion of advanced placement and honors courses, particularly those in science and math.
All anyone can say about UC chances is that based on what you have posted, the applicant is competitive.
Acceptance or rejection almost certainly will not come down to a single grade in a single class. Admissions is more complex than that, especially at the UCs.
Unfortunately, not all the Engineering majors list their admission data and ME is one of them. Based on the # of enrolled students and campus yield you are looking at an admit rate below 20%.
Economics is in the College of Letters and Sciences which does not admit by major. 2023 admit rate for the College of L&S was 32% with a Middle 50th percentile UC capped weighted GPA of 4.23-4.29.
Engineering had a 13% admit rate with the Middle 50th percentile UC capped weighted GPA of 4.26-4.30.
Overall campus average UC capped weighted GPA for admitted students was 4.20 with 4.14 for enrolled students.
Most applied majors: CS/ME/Biology/Psychology/Economics/Political Science
Hi there - my daughter applied to three UC campuses, including UCSB, and has only received a portal link to one of the campuses (UCSD). Is this typical? Should we contact the campuses that haven’t sent her a portal link? It’s been a couple weeks. Thanks for any context you can give - it’s our first time going through this -
