Among the three A&M, PACE, or CAP which is better?
Which one gives the highest chance, given that I get a 4.0 in all, of getting into the major I desire at UT?
Pros and Cons of each?
Should I risk not obtaining a bachelor’s in my first choice major because I chose PACE and subsequently get rejected from my first choice major at UT and risk getting rejected when I desperately apply to A&M again for my first choice major?
@punctiliouseye, my son has the exact same dilemna with Mays Business School at A&M v. UT Waitlist/PACE/CAP, so I would also appreciate any thoughts.
I’m in the exact same situation that you are; waitlisted, offered pace/cap and admitted to TAMU.
I presume that if you made an equivalent grade at A&M it would look better than the same grade at ACC or a CAP, but I’m just assuming that.
The benefit of PACE is that you are considered a UT student(attend football games, join clubs/organizations, however some fraternities/sororities do not take PACE students), but you only take one class at UT and the remainder of your courses during your freshman year are taken at ACC. You also split tuition between UT and ACC. After your completion of PACE you’re transferred into the university as a full time student, BUT you still have to compete for your major, unless you major in a liberal arts degree.
CAP with regards to admission is the same thing, except you don’t actually get to live on campus.
With regards to PACE/CAP - I’ve heard that the chance you will actually get your major are really iffy depending on what major you choose. My friend who participated in CAP got into his major but knows numerous other people who were denied entry into their major even though they satisfied the CAP fulfillments.
Unfortunately, I don’t have the answers you guys are seeking but it seems to me like there need to be an honest discussion with administration respecting what percentage of students who successfully complete either PACE or CAP are accepted in the specific majors that you guys are interested in. I have no idea if administration tracks this info; however, if my desired major was more important to me than attending UT without the major, I’d feel very uncomfortable doing either program if I were interested a STEM or business major and did not have that info. If any of you do talk to administration, be sure to request data about the success rate of PACE/CAP applicants to the specific major you are interested in and not the more generalized info such as “X% of students are placed in their requested major.” That kind of generalized response is not going to give you the full context when its likely that the Fine Arts and Liberal Arts students in the X% have a much higher success rate than business and STEM majors.
@Decision2015
Accepted to PACE/CAP and TAMU as well
Gleaning from a unverified source on this site, I think for external transfers there’s about 10 to 25 max accepted for engineering majors,more competitive meaning less transfers. This information scares me because it makes it seem as though getting a high gpa at Texas A&M is still not advantageous over PACE at ACC— though I don’t know if PACE is external or internal.
@texasjayhawk did your son make a decision - my son is in the same dilemma - but leaning towards A&M as a direct admit to Mays.
@punctiliouseye are you interested in engineering and if so what major? I am a software engineer and the majority of my co-workers over the years have been Aggies and the companies I have worked for have recruited equally from both UT and A&M - so I think as far as job placement TAMU would be just as good as UT. If you have a lot of AP credits and you are admitted already to Dwight I would go with the for sure thing.
@marfalights, my son has not decided about UGS at UT v. Mays at A&M. He still has the very slim chance of an appeal pending for admission to McCombs, and hopefully that will be ruled upon within the next two weeks. Also, before he got in UGS off the waitlist, he had already made plans to go with friends to A&M for a weekend later this month. After that weekend, and hopefully he will have heard from his appeal by then, he will decide. Sure will be nice to have it all decided so we can move on and plan!
@punctiliouseye Have you cleared the waitlist? They’ve sent out two rounds of acceptances so far I think. PACE is already full if you check on your mystatus. I’ve talked to a few people most of them say A&M is the safest option because we basically have “a bird in the hand” while as with UT nothing is guaranteed.
Let me know what you’re planning on doing!
@punctiliouseye did you get into Engineering at A&M?
@MyLonghorn
I got into ChemEat A&M.
@Decision2015
I most likely will do PACE at UT
@marfalights
I want to do ChemE but MechE is fine as well.