I had a 3.8 GPA in freshmen year but in sophomore and junior year, I went into this state of dilemma and got a 3.2. Now I know I had to pull myself together to get into a good college. If I managed to get a 3.7-3.9 in senior year with SAT scores above 2000, will I still get into a good UC? Because I heard that UCs mostly just look at your sophomore and junior year GPA.
UC’s ONLY look at Sophomore and Junior grades, to form your UC GPA. Senior year matters for 1° course selection (rigor) and 2° not getting any grade below C.
So if you have a 3.2, your odds are that you’ll either get UCR/UCM, or won’t. UCSC would be a reach. Look at the UC threads this year to see the stats of students who were waitlisted/denied…
If you’re talking about weighted GPA, then I concur with the previous poster; although SAT scores above 2000 would help, unless you got something in the range of 2200-2400, most UCs would be a reach (other than Riverside and Merced; the former a target, and the latter a low target).
If you’re talking about unweighted GPA, calculate your UC GPA! You still should be able to make it into a good UC. I knew someone with a ~3.3 UW GPA (somewhere around a 4.0 or a 4.1 weighted) who made it into UCSD engineering.
This also depends on your extracurriculars–although UCs don’t put that much weight on them, they still put more weight on ECs than your standard state school. If you’ve spent a lot of time on them, it would help greatly.
Here is the UC GPA calculator: http://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/
As stated above, only 10-11th grades for the a-g courses are included in the GPA calculation. Senior grades are not considered for admissions, but are required to keep your provisional admission at the UC’s.
The average UC GPA for all the UC’s except UCR/UCM/UCSC is 4.0+. If your UC GPA is below this threshold, then having a high SAT/ACT will help but there are not guarantees. EC’s and essays are an important part of your application and can also help your chances, but depending upon your GPA, it will not overcome a lower than average GPA. The 3 things that are considered the most important in your UC application are GPA, Course Rigor and Test scores.
There are some outstanding Cal States (if in-state) and private schools that may be options, so do not use focus on the UC’s. Also UCR/UCM and UCSC are very good schools so do not dismiss them. All you can do is study hard for the SAT, continue to do well in school, apply in the Fall and hope for the best.
What about Calpoly San Luis Obispo and Pomona? Do they have the same expectations as UCs?
Is Calpoly a good engineering school?
Also, yes I’m talking about unweighted GPA. The highest GPA possible in my school is 4.0
Calculate your UC GPA.
Yes Cal Poly is an excellent engineering and business school, as hard to get into as the UCs (or, depending on specialties, even harder than some). CPP is strong and easier to get into - take the “graduate in 4 year” pledge though because otherwise you may not graduate in 4 years (90% don’t).
SDSU, CSU Long Beach, are also considered strong. Cal State Chico and Sonoma both have a more residential feel and have good honors programs. SJSU has an excellent CS program (that’s very hard to get into) and to scrunch the gen eds by 1/4th you can be part of the Honors Program (it’s a gen ed/humanities program that’s very successful.)
Just an FYI. All the UC’s and Cal States use 10-11th grades in their GPA calculation. The exception is Cal Poly SLO. 9th grades are also factored into their GPA calculation.
The Cal States (except SLO) only really use UC/CSU GPA and SAT (Math and Critical Reading) score or ACT composite score to calculate their Eligibility index. EC’s are very minor in admissions consideration for the Cal States. Once you have your CSU/UC GPA you can calculate your EI.
(CSU GPA X800) + (SAT M+CR) OR (CSU GPA X200) + (ACT composite x10).
The Cal states rank each applicant by major based on EI. They then accept from the highest down until the spots are filled.
Although SJSU is the only Cal state that consistently publishes their EI cutoff, several will state a minimum required especially for impacted and competitive majors.
http://info.sjsu.edu/web-dbgen/narr/admission/rec-10079.12651.html
Some EI thresholds to consider:
SDSU: 4100+ SAT/1000+ ACT
CSULB: 3900+ SAT/900+ ACT
CSUF: 3800+ SAT/850+ ACT
Chico state: 3700+ SAT/800+ ACT
Much will depend upon intended major. The more competitive the major, the higher the EI threshold.
This will give you some kind of guideline for determing major, needed test scores and GPA to make yourself competitive and to come up with a balanced college list.
Op,
One other factor to consider for admissions is basically the rigor or your HS and your ranking in your HS.
UCs try to accept the top 9% of the graduating class so if your grades are low, but so it the test of your HS, then it will help with admissions.
Calculate your UC gpa which will give you a better sense of the gpa that the UCs will evaluate you by.
You have your best chances at UCM or UCR. UCSC will be a reach.
As for cal state schools, cal poly slo and cal poly Pomona have great engineering schools, but it’s unlikely for you to get accepted with your gpa. But other CSUs have good engineering programs as well.
As for comparison for you, my S had 3.22 UW gpa, and 3.70 UC gpa, BUT had 35 (out of 36) ACT, ranked in bottom 50% of class.
Accepted to UCSC (CS game design), UCSD (ICAM, the portfolio was how he got accepted), rejected from UCI and UCLA (DMA, the portfolio was not strong enough to override his gpa)
Also accepted to all CSUs to which he applied: SJSU, CSULB, CSUF, csun, CSULA, csuci.
Engineering is hard and would seem even harder for a person with a 3.2. Why do you want to major in engineering? Forgot to mention that if you choose engineering as a major, you will probably get rejected from all of the UCs. My S was choosing visual arts majors which have less competition and lower grade hurdles.